Dr Campbell Price (Curator of Egyptology and The Sudan) and Dr Dmitri Logunov (Curator of Arthropods) discuss the Scarab beetle and it’s meaning to the people of Ancient Egypt.

You can read more about the Scarab Beetle on one of our older posts.

An interesting project has been undertaken by the MMU’s photography student Renata Lazdauskiene. Renata was first influenced by the art-work of the photographer Nigel Shafran and started exploring the indoor environment of her own home. Incidentally she encountered several dead flies and took a few close-up shots of them. Renata was so excited by what she discovered that she came up to the Manchester Museum’s Entomology department in order to look at and photograph more insects.  The idea was to look into insects’ shapes and colour patterns and to create their images which would then be transformed in a kind of jewellery pattern. The most challenging thing for Renata was to describe her works in words. But here they are: the examples of butterfly ornamental wings transformed into unusual, black & white grainy and shadowy texture!

A beautiful butterfly, one of the thousands retained in the Manchester Museum

 And two transfromed wings!

A butterfly wing transfromed into a blakc-and-white shadowy pattern

Yes, it is still a butterfly wing with the creature's antenna seen through it; but what do you see in this image?

___________________________________________________________________

Beyond the Surface

 I have just finished studying on the design and visual arts degree at Stockport College. I specialise in Moving Image, so the type of work that I create is generally animation based.  As the final part of our degree, we undertake a major project which lasts the whole of our final semester. Early on in the project I decided that I wanted to create a project which looked at the idea of taking one ‘object’ and using it to represent something else. After initial deliberation, I decided that I wanted to look at the idea of camouflage and a soon interest in insects and their use of camouflage became apparent.

 Over a number of trips to the museum I studied various types of insects. Drawing from observation, documenting insects with photographs and speaking to the entomologists in order to get an insight into particular insects. As my project developed the research that I gained from the museum was extremely helpful.

Shots from my exhibition:

 This is a shot taken from my exhibition. I used this unit in order to display artifacts in a similar way to that of a museum. In the picture below you can see how I displayed the insects that Manchester Museum leant me and they went down extremely well. 

Here is an overview of my exhibit:

As part of my exhibition I decided that I wanted to create an interactive exhibit. As my animation was based underneath a kitchen sink, I decided that I wanted to use the actual unit that I modified and used for filming within my piece. I decided to take the main characters from my animation and created simple loops which were back projected under the sink, where the characters moved around. For example, the butterfly to the rear of the cupboard flapped a little on top of the dishwasher tablet box, subtly revealing it’s camouflage and the projection at the front of the cupboard shows one of my insects camouflaged as a dishwasher tablet.

 Here is a link to my final piece, entitled ‘Beyond the Surface’

Manchester museum has been a fantastic resource for me for my project. Without being able to visit the museum and being able to work with the entomologists I would certainly not have got as much out the project as I did. 

 In terms of creating a narrative for my piece I wanted to use an organic process. So I decided to create a series of question and interviewed Dr Dmitri Logunov, the Curator of Entomology. By using the responses I was able to build an effective narrative. Having a specialist talk about their area of expertise was invaluable. Drawing inspiration from film makers such as Paul Bush, who uses found content in order to build narrative, see here.

Before working behind the scenes in the entomology department I didn’t realise that these sort of resources existed to allow students to reap the benefits of such great collections, but even more get help from experts in the field. A fantastic resource that I don’t think many people necessarily know is available and I would highly recommend taking advantage of the possible opportunities.

Matt Geeling (matt-gee.co.uk; www.linkedin.com/in/mattgeeling)

______________

Insect remains, including the Coleoptera (beetles), may be preserved in ancient deposits by charring, desiccation, mineral replacement, or in contexts that have remained consistently waterlogged. Since the 1960’s the insects found in archaeological deposits have been used as a tool in the investigation of past environmental and climatic conditions and to tell us about the activities and living conditions in the past on archaeological sites. 

 Many insect species require specific habitats and climatic ranges. The morphology and ecology of beetle species and communities appear to have remained constant since the early Quaternary so we can be confident that the habitat requirements of beetle species deposited in the past are directly comparable with those of the same species observed today. Using this information past local conditions can be investigated through the assessment of species and communities found in sub-fossil beetle assemblages.

 For example, if we find the saw toothed grain beetle (Oryzaephilus surinamensis) in archaeological deposits we can be confident that this is evidence that grain was present on the site. Furthermore, because this species has a strict temperature range in which it can breed, in parts of the world with cool climates, such as in Iceland, if this beetle is found it is usually interpreted as being evidence of imported grain rather than a locally cultivated crop.

Kim Vickers examining beetles from the Manchester Museum entomology collection.

 Identifying disarticulated sub-fossil beetle sclerites can be quite difficult, so it is important to use a reference collection of complete modern specimens, together with published keys when identifying insects from archaeological sites. The Manchester Museum has kindly allowed me to use their extensive Coleoptera collection in order to identify specimens from my sites. The work I have conducted there includes identifying beetles from around a British Bronze Age settlement (c. 2000BC), and from Norse sites inIceland(c. AD 1200). These have allowed me to draw conclusions about the function of sites and the activities taking place there as well as information about the surrounding ancient environments.

 Further reading:

Atkinson, T. C., Briffa, K. R. and Coope, G. R. 1987. Seasonal temperatures in Britainduring the past 22,000 years reconstructed using beetle remains. Nature, 325, 587-592.

 Buckland, P. C. 1990. Granaries stores and insects. The archaeology of insect synanthropy. In: Fournier, D. and Sigaut, F. (eds.) La Préparation Alimentaire des Céréales, Rapports Présentés à la Table Ronde, Ravello au Centre Universitaire pour les Biens Culturels, Avril 1988. PACT, Rixensart, Belgium, 69-81.

 Coope, G. R. 1986. Coleoptera analysis. In: Berglund, B. E. (ed.) Handbook of Holocene Palaeoecology and Palaeohydrology. J.Wiley and Sons,Chichester, 703-713.

 Kenward, H. K. 1978. The Analysis of Archaeological Insect Assemblages: a New Approach. Archaeology of York, 19/1. Council for British Archaeology for York Archaeological Trust.

______________________

In the age of digital photography, many people question whether the need for scientific illustration is still relevant. They argue that the average camera is so powerful these days that hiring an illustrator seems pointless. Even the Royal College of Art seemed to agree with this, as they recently shut down their long running MA course in Natural History Illustration.

However, the tide is turning. People are beginning to realize that science illustration is useful and an important part of science. The Natural History Museum in London recently opened its new Images of Nature gallery to great acclaim.

So why is science illustration important? One of the most important reasons is that it is a visual record of a specimen or species. In some cases, the particular species illustrated may no longer exist, and an illustration will be the only record we have to reconstruct that species.

Similarly, museums and scientists sometimes rely on what are called iconotypes. An iconotype is type specimen that is represented by a painting or drawing instead of a physical specimen. This sometimes happens because a physical type has not been collected when it was described, or because it has been lost. An iconotype is also useful for keeping a record of specimen colours. Animals like fish and cephalopods have colours that fade very quickly after death. Further deterioration of colour happens if the specimen is placed in alcohol. The iconotype tells us what the specimen looked like in life. You can view a video about iconotypes here.

Fig. 1. A herbarium sheet (left) and an illustration of the sugarcane.

 Botanists also benefit from the use of illustration. Leopold Grindon collected newspaper cut outs and book plates to supplement his collection of cultivated specimens. When botanical specimens are pressed on a herbarium sheet, the colour often fades (Fig. 1).

Fig. 3. Drawing of a Holotrichapion weevil along with what it would look like to the human eye to scale.

Fig. 4. Page from a children’s book on pandas and their anatomy. Showing a skinless “living” panda via illustration makes the image “safe”.

Phillip Rispin, curatorial assistan in the Entomology, holding a drawer with Morpho-butterflies.

“This photographic project is about the Manchester Museum; the images I have produced reflect the time I spent behind the scenes of this institution, meeting and photographing the people that work there.  Initially I photographed members of staff at the museum, after reviewing the portraits, I established that this direct method of portraiture was not illustrating how I wanted to represent them and the museum.  I then photographed a variety of working environments in the museum photographed as if there is a person present.  My objective is for the images to function as portraits, although the human form is not included. 

Dmitri Logunov, curator of entomology, in his office, the Manchester Museum.

The museum displays, preserves and stores many treasured objects, this permanent archive highlights the transience of the staff that oversee the collection, who are mere custodians of this material environment.  These ‘portraits’, which have been made in both personal and communal areas, illustrate the future absence of those currently occupying the chairs, which will one day be filled by new personnel”.

After retirement from the University of Manchester as a Research Associate Dr Yvonne Golding began working as a volunteer in entomology. Previously she had worked on behavioural mimicry in insects notably on hoverflies and how they mimic wasps and bees. Phasmids were initially a hobby interest; Yvonne was a keen member of the Phasmid Study Group and bred many species in culture.

The Manchester Museum already had a small collection of Phasmids most of which were collected 50 or more years ago. Many of these specimens have old names and so need to be re-examined in the light of new classification. One interesting group of specimens was collected during a C.R.A expedition to the Solomon Islands in 1965. Of these we have some strange and unusual specimens one of which a female Phasmotaenia solomense (red arrow in Figure 1) was newly described in 2009 and another Phasmotaenia species with a strange swelling on the thorax as yet undescribed (green arrow in Figure 1).  A third very unstick-like and beautiful stick insect is Nisyrus spinulosus (Figure 2).

Fig. 2. The beautiful stick insect - Nisyrus spinulosus; the Manchester Museum.

 One interesting and new species from this collection Necroscia acutipennis was described by Dr. Phil Bragg with the help of Yvonne who provided measurements. This species is attractive and has wings. Most stick insects were likely to have originally had wings but then, through processes of evolution when they developed morphological camouflage and during periods of diversification, they were lost. Later some species ‘re-evolved’ wings, e,g., Acrophylla species (Figure 3). Being able to fly is a good way to escape from a predator. Generally male phasmids are the better flyers and this helps to find females for mating. Other winged species have even take a lesson from their grasshopper cousins and learnt to jump presumably to escape from predators.

Fig. 3. An Acrophylla species; the Manchester Museum.

The Phasmid collection was further expanded when Dr Mike Hill donated a number of specimens collected during a wide-ranging biodiversity survey carried out in protected areas of northernVietnamby Flora and Fauna International in 1998/9. The aim of the surveys was to assess the value of sites in protecting biodiversity. These specimens were received in a large sweetie jar of alcohol where they had remained for 10 years! The collection contains over a hundred of specimens which Yvonne mounted and prepared for identification.North Vietnamis one of the richest biodiversity hotspots in the world. Many new species of plants, animals and insects are found there on a regular basis.

 The phasmid fauna of this area is understudied so identification of species is difficult requiring the help of phasmid experts; unfortunately these are also a rare breed! Of the many interesting specimens found in this collection is a male relative of the longest stick insect in the world – Chan’s Megastick (Phobaeticus chani) from Borneo – a new species which has been on display in the Natural History Museum in London. The Chan’s stick is a female measuring 56.7cm with body length of 35.7cm not including legs. In the phasmid world females are generally quite a bit longer than males so a male P.chani will most likely measure around 10cm less in body length. Our male Phobaeticus species (see Figure 4), which is yet to be identified to species, at around 20cm in body length may be a contender for the 2^nd longest male insect in the world!

Fig. 5. A fully grown female of unknown Paragongylopus species; the Manchester Museum.

 A faunistic list of out Vietnamese phasmids is currently being compiled by Yvonne.

Selected references:

1. Whiting, M.F., Bradler, S. & Taylor, M. (2003). Loss and recovery of wings in stick insects. Nature 421, 264-267.

2. Burrows, M & Morris,O. (2002). Jumping in a winged stick insect. The Journal of Experimental Biology 205, 2399–2412.

The display 'Mary, Mary Quite Contrary’ created by Jade Ashton.

During the research of Mary Greg and her collection, a line from one of her letters particularly caught Jade’s interest; addressed to Mr. Batho, Mary’s letter expressed her concern over the possible damage to a collection of dresses: “I want to get them sent off but not to lie in boxes in some lumber room where the moths may destroy them” (1924).

A close-up view of the old store-box which has been given a new lease of life.

Jade’s intention for this project was to create a visual story: to bring alive the imagery within that quote, and to make a connection with the children’s novel, The Secret Garden – the story of Mary Lennox, another “contrary Mary”. Jade particularly wished to reflect the storage and display methods used within the Manchester Art Gallery and the Manchester Museum. Moreover, almost all materials used have been collected by herself; unwanted and unloved items destined to be thrown away have now been given a new lease of life, and add a sense of antiquity and nostalgia to the final display.

I am very grateful to Jade for the permission to use her statement and images of the display ‘Mary, Mary Quite Contrary’ in our blog (Dmitri).

As Honorary Curator of Myriapoda in the Manchester Museum  Graham Proudlove is responsible for all of the specimens of multi-legged animal – that’s the millipedes (Diplopoda), centipedes (Chilopoda), Pauropoda and Symphyla (the last two without common names). The Museum holds three very important collections of myriapods and he is working his way slowly through re-curation and cataloguing of each of them one by one.

Dr Graham Proudlove sorting out K. W. Verhoeff's myriapods

The first collection is that of J. Gordon Blower, the British authority on millipedes from 1950 to 1995. When he retired from the University of Manchester in 1984 he donated his whole collection of millipedes, and his library, to the Department of Entomology in the Museum. Graham Proudlove has now completed the re-curation of this collection which consists of 4560 bottles in 181 boxes. Currently an Excel database is being produced for this collection which will allow us to analyse what is present in more detail. During the re-curation process we extracted specimens of nearly every British species into the J. Gordon Blower reference collection of British Diplopoda.

Shelves with the re-curated Myriapoda collection of G. Blower, the Manchester Museum.

The Museum also holds two other important collections of myriapods. One is a part of the collection of the very prolific German worker K. W. Verhoeff who was intensely active from about 1880 to 1945. Most of what remains of his massive collection (he studied myriapods from around the world) is in various German museums but in 1908 the Manchester Museum bought a collection from him for the sum of £18 (anywhere between £2000 and £7000 now depending on the conversion used). Graham Proudlove is now in the process of re-curating this collection. One difficult aspect of this task is in determining the modern names of the animals in the collection. The official Latin name of animals can change (for reasons given in the International Code on Zoological Nomenclature that governs how animals are named) and it is important to use the correct name. The re-curation process will probably take over a year to complete.

Two jars of the Verhoeff collection of Myripoda, the Manchester Museum.

The third collection, which so far has not been examined in detail, is that of two remarkable scientists who were active from about 1915 to 1939. Their collection probably arrived in the Museum by way of Gordon Blower who was given it sometime, we think, in the 1950s. Born as Hilda K. Brade and S. Graham Birks they met at the University of Manchester, were married in 1916, and took the married surname of Brade-Birks. Between 1916 and 1939 they produced 36 papers on myriapods, which they titled “Notes on Myriapoda” 1-36. They were the most important workers on this group throughout that time and described four species as new to science as well as doing a great deal of important literature work which stabilised the names of these animals. Without their ground-breaking work Gordon Blower would have had a much more difficult time when he took up work on the millipedes in 1950. Their collection is large, we estimate 50 large bottles each with dozens of tubed within them. It is likely that work will not start on the re-curation and cataloguing of this collection for some years.

Details of each of these collections, and other myriapodological resources in the Manchester Museum, will be published in the Bulletin of the British Myriapod and Isopod Group (BMIG) later in 2011.

Since working on the Alchemy Enquire project at Manchester Museum in

2008 I have developed a growing fascination with the study of insects as a means of expressing our relationships as humans with all other species within our ecosystem.

 Dr Dmitri Logunov’s passion for entomology and the importance of arthropods to biodiversity and the ecosystem has inflamed my desire to further study, draw and understand this special and important aspect of our environment.

My work created during 2010 was an exploration into the aesthetic use of insect imagery (in particular) butterflies, used to represent aspects of personal freedom, mental health and well being. Much of my work is inspired by our connectedness to the planet through our relationship with environment; following a range of work with Mexican artists the pieces ‘Mariposa’ and ‘Tu vida es mi vida’ arrived on my drawing table.

I hope to develop this work further through an ongoing relationship with Manchester Museum but also through the fabulous resource of the Lancaster Butterfly House, managed and run by Lancaster City Council.

During March I will be visiting the Entomology collection at Manchester Museum and will be working for several weeks with 30 Year 4 pupils from Quernmore Primary School exploring how the school can develop the use of their outdoor environment into the curriculum, funded by Curious Minds.

I am based at Green Close in rural North Lancashire www.greenclose.org I also manage and have developed the Bowland Arts Festival which runs from 1st May – 30th June 2011 and uses the arts to celebrate and explore the unique environment and special habitats of the Forest of Bowland Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty see www.bowlandarts.co.uk for further information.

 Ms Sue Flowers, Green Close Studios, Green Close Barn, Melling, Carnforth, Lancs, LA6 2RB. Tel 015242-21233; www.greenclose.org; sue@greenclose.org