Star objects of our collection – the longhorn beetle, Macrodontia dejeani Gory, 1839

Male (left) and female (right) of the longhorn beetle Macrodontia dejeani Gory, 1839 from Colombia; the Manchester Museum’s Entomology collection.

This species of longhorn beetles (family Cerambycidae) is rare in collections. It has a claimed range from Costa Rica to Ecuador and Peru but its heartland is Colombia. If 70 years of civil war and drug wars in Colombia is beginning to settle down, then perhaps more collectors will run collecting night lights there and more dejeani will appear.  This beetle is named after General Pierre Dejean, a prominent figure in Napoleon army and a notable entomologist at the same time. The story of this eccentric man is told by Martin Laithwaite (Huddersfield, West Yorkshire).

Pierre Francois Marie Auguste Dejean (1780-1845)

Pierre “Auguste” Dejean was a soldier of fortune during the Napoleonic Wars; he became Colonel of the 11th Dragoons in 1807, General of Brigade in 1811, General of Division in 1814, served eight years as head of the Administration of War under Napoleon and was one of the Emperor’s aide-de-camps at the Battle of Waterloo. A prominent figure during the Empire, he is mentioned in Marshall MacDonald’s and Baron de Marbot’s memoirs.

He is also well-known for his five volume work on beetles and was one of the most important entomologists of his time. The Annals of the Entomological Society of France, vol. 2, p.502, 1845 relates that General Dejean, commanding the French army at the battle of Alcanizas was awaiting the attack of the enemy and noticed a rare specimen on a nearby flower. Jumping from his horse, he captured the click beetle, a Cebrio ustulatus, fastened it to a piece of cork, which he always carried under his chapeau for this reason, remounted his horse and won the battle.

The account was written by his private curator M. Boisduval “Before the battle of Alcanizas, which Dejean won after a long-contested fight, taking a great number of prisoners, when the enemy had just appeared and he was prepared to give the signal of attack. Dejean, at the border of a brook caught sight of a Cebrio ustulatus on a flower.  He immediately dismounted, pinned the insect, applied it to the inside of his helmet which, for this purpose, was always supplied with pieces of cork, and started the battle.  After this, Dejean’s helmet was terribly maltreated from cartouche fire; but, fortunately, he refound his precious Cebrio intact on its piece of cork.”

Most of the soldiers in his regiment learned to collect insects. Each carried a small vial of alcohol in which to place the insects he collected. It was claimed that even the enemy knew of Dejean’s eccentricity – those who found dead soldiers on the field having with them a little bottle containing insects in alcohol always sent the bottle to Dejean, regardless of who won the battle.

He amassed vast collections of beetles and listed 22,399 species in his cabinets in 1837—at the time, the greatest collection of coleoptera in the world. In 1802, he began publishing a catalogue of his collection, including 22,000 species names. Dejean was an opponent of the Principle of Priority in nomenclature. “I have made it a rule always to preserve the name most generally used, and not the oldest one; because it seems to me that general usage should always be followed and that it is harmful to change what has already been established”. Dejean acted accordingly and often introduced received popular usage names, given by himself to replace those already published by other authors; his names became invalid. However he is the authority for the family names of attractive popular well-studied beetle genera such as Batocera (family Cerambycidae) and Chrysochroa (family Buprestidae).

Dejean was president of the Société Entomologique de France in 1840. In 1834, he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. In later life, Dejean financed a number of collecting expeditions (particularly to what is now Panama and Colombia) and much of what he received was new to science.

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Nature’s Recycling Squad – the role of dung beetles

Nesting by the Horned Dung Beetle (Copris lunaris): 1 – Initial stage, male (left) and female (right) working the ‘dung cake’; 2 – Female alone, making brood-balls of the ‘cake’ for laying eggs. Illustration by V.A. Timokhanov (Almaty, Kazakhstan).

Waste disposal is a growing problem for any industrialized nation. The UK alone generates about 100 million tonnes of waste each year, the majority of which is still being disposed of through landfill. The present story is about dung beetles or scarabs (family Scarabaeidae) that are involved in processing and decomposing dung.

On average, about 40% of the food intake of mammals is either excreted as urine or passed out of the body as faeces. This waste is decomposed and returned to the soil by insects that use dung as food for themselves and for their larvae, thereby preventing it from building up. How this is accomplished is best known for cattle dung.

A cow’s fresh dung pat is colonized by a succession of dung-breeding insects, numbering several dozen species and often exceeding 1000 individual insects. A total of 275 species has been reported to occur in cattle dung in Britain. The majority of them are dung beetles that feed directly on dung. There are three main ecological groups of dung beetles. First, small-sized beetles (Aphodius species) usually feed in the main dung mass. Others, like the horned dung beetle, dig burrows beneath the pat and pack pieces of dung into them for feeding their larvae (see figure above). The third group includes beetles that make spherical dung balls, roll them away and bury them intact in shallow burrows. The Sacred Scarab is the most famous of the rollers. As well as dung beetles, the pat is colonized by dung-feeding fly maggots, predatory beetles which feed on eggs and larvae of other insects, small parasitic wasps, fungus-eating insects and mites, etc. At the advanced stage of degradation, soil invertebrates, including earthworms, begin to move into the dung pat. The natural rate of dung degradation depends on temperature, humidity, habitat and season of deposition. In Britain, the complete natural disappearance of a dung pat is achieved in two to three months.

Sculpture of the Sacred Scarab in the Natural History Museum in Stokholm, Sweden. © Dmitri Logunov, Manchester Museum.

It is known that each cow produces an average of 12 dung pats per day, or over 9000 kg of solid waste per year. It is estimated that each year approximately 200 million tonnes of waste are produced by livestock in England and Wales, and about 900 million tonnes in the USA. About third of this is recycled by dung beetles. In the USA alone, the annual economic value of this service is at least $380 million.

Unfortunately, the activity of dung beetles is severely disrupted by current agricultural practices, such as the treatment of livestock with persistent anti-helminth drugs given to kill parasitic worms or helminths. Residues of these drugs can persist in the dung and are lethal to the beetles. As a result, the dung pats of animals treated with anti-helminthes remain biologically undegraded for months, fouling available grazing area. If left unprocessed, livestock wastes may present a health risk to humans, because they can contain some pathogenic microorganisms.

By recycling the nutrients locked up in dead organic materials such as dung, insects make these nutrients available to new life. As recyclers, they do an indispensable job for our planet. Without organisms breaking down dead organic materials and recycling nutrients in the wild, as well as in gardens and on farms, the planet would soon be piled deep with the waste products of its inhabitants, and potential spread of diseases would be unavoidable. Whether we like it or not, our own existence directly depends on insects and their ecological services. As M. Telfer (2004) put it: “Not everyone welcomes having ‘creepy-crawlies’ around but we should be grateful for what they do.”

In the following video, our special guest, Ms Roisin Stanbrook from the Manchester Metropolitan University, is taking about the ecological role of dung beetles in Kenya.

The presented story is based on: Logunov D.V. 2010. Nature’s recycling squad. Biological Sciences Review, 22(3): 22-25.

Further reading:

Berenbaum, M.R. (1995). Bugs in the system. Insects and their impact on human affairs. Helix Books.

Waldbauer, G. (2003). What good are bugs? Cambridge-London: Harvard University Press.

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A decade of invasion – a story of Harlequin Ladybird in the UK

The Manchester Museum’s collection of Harlequin Ladybirds recently acquired under the ongoing museum project ‘Thematic collecting’.

Recently, the Manchester Museum’s Entomology Department acquired some specimens of the Harlequin Ladybird, an invasive beetle species that appeared in Britain (Essex) in 2004 only, but is now a widespread and even dominant species of ladybirds in the UK.

 

Harlequin Ladybird – Harmonia axyridis (Pallas, 1773) (Coleoptera: Coccinellidae) – is a beetle species in the same family with the Seven-spot and Two-spot Ladybirds, both being considered gardener’s best friends as natural enemies of aphids and other garden pests. Harlequin Ladybird was deliberately introduced from east parts of Eurasia, where it is a native species, to many places of continental Europe as a biological agent to control aphids (=greenflies) and scale insects. As Harlequin Ladybird has excellent dispersal abilities (by means of flight), it was just the matter of time until it could have reached the British Isles.

A number of factors have contributed to the successful establishment and dominance of this ladybird species in the UK, particularly, its high reproductive capacity and ability to live in most available habitats. Harlequin Ladybird is also a voracious predator that can feed on other ladybird species.

The UK Ladybird Survey is a citizen science initiative that was launched in 2005, right after the first records of Harlequin Ladybird in Britain had been done. This programme is aimed at encouraging people across Britain to track the spread of Harlequin Ladybird (and other ladybirds) across the UK and submit their records online. Based on this survey, it is clear that by 2014 the Harlequin Ladybird has extended its range by almost half of the country. A decline of seven native ladybird species, which is correlated with the arrival of Harmonia axyridis, has also been demonstrated.

How to control this species and its spread in the UK is a bit unclear. Harlequin Ladybird produces a special, aggregation pheromone to attract other individuals to overwinterwing habitats. It has been proposed to use this pheromone within a network of traps in order to physically withdraw Harlequin Ladybirds from the environment. However, the cost of managing such traps is potentially too high to be feasible. The use of natural enemies of Harmonia axyridis, such as the ectoparasitic mite (Coccipolipus hippodamiae) that is capable to induce sterility in females of Harlequin Ladybirds, has also been considered, but alas with no practical applications so far. Therefore, this species is likely to be staying in the British Isles, apparently becoming another ‘native’ ladybird species with which we are to live (as it already happened with many other insect, crustacean and mollusc species).

The occurrence of Harlequin Ladybirds in Britain from 2004 to 2014 (one dot is equal to 10-km square), after Roy & Brown (2015).

In the following interview, Don Stenhouse, the Curator of Natural Sciences at the Bolton Museum, will share with us his own experience in studying the Harlequin Ladybird.

A full story of the Harlequin Ladybird in the UK can be found in the following paper:

Roy H.E. and P.M.J. Brown (2015), ‘Ten years of invasion: Harmonia axyridis (Pallas) (Coleoptera: Coccinellidae) in Britain’ – Ecological Entomology, 40(4): 336–348; online at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4584496/

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Taking Wing: curating a collection of Venezuelan hawkmoths

The following report has been prepared by Claire Miles, Honorary Curatorial Associate at The Manchester Museum.

Manchester Museum purchased the Adams and Bernard collection of 300 Venezuelan Lepidoptera in April 1976. Since then, if a curious curator removed the lids from the cardboard boxes to peer at the ghostly silhouettes in their translucent paper packets, the lids were always replaced. Now, thanks to funding from the Natural Science Collections Association (NatSCA), part of this collection – around 175 hawkmoths – can be set out, identified, catalogued, and made useful. This blog is a brief summary of progress so far.

Tantalising shapes – the moths in their paper packets.

In the paper packets, the hawkmoths lie with their wings folded together. With wingspans of up to 17 cm, setting the hawkmoths out will take up quite a bit of expensive storage space. Thanks to the NatSCA funding, the necessary glass-topped drawers can be purchased for the Entomology department’s new metal cabinets.

Entomology cabinets at Manchester Museum.

The entomology collections at Manchester Museum contain more than three million specimens including about two and a half million insects (Logunov & Merriman 2012; Logunov 2010). They already hold around 2000 hawkmoths (Sphingidae) representing around 270 species: 700 in the British collection, 850 in the C. H. Schill Worldwide Lepidoptera collection and 370 in the P. Schill Palaearctic Lepidoptera collection.

A drawer of the Death’s-head Hawk-moth, Acherontia atropos, in the British collection.

To put this in perspective, there are about 1500 known hawkmoth species worldwide, and this collection is a drop in the ocean compared to the Natural History Museum’s holdings of 289,000 Sphingidae. Curating and identifying the Adams/Bernard collection serves multiple purposes. It will extend the range of Manchester Museum’s Sphingidae, it will increase the accessible Sphingidae by about 9%, it will hopefully add some species new to the collection (and who knows, possibly completely new species), it will improve access to the collections, and it will improve their storage and security. In addition, I get to hone my practical skills setting the moths, with expert guidance from Phil Rispin, Curatorial Assistant in the Entomology Department.

Some of the hawkmoths have extremely long tongues. They pollinate flowers which provide nectar at the bottom of correspondingly long flower tubes, such as orchids and petunias.

Hawkmoths are fast-flying moths with streamlined bodies, present on almost every continent except Antarctica. They are pollinators as adults, and can be agricultural pests as larvae, which makes them ecologically and economically important, and their relatively well-understood taxonomy and fast response to environmental changes makes them useful environmental indicators (Camargo et al., 2016). This collection gives a snapshot of the species that were present in Venezuela 40 years ago when Mike Adams and George Bernard collected them in May 1975. This was one of a number of expeditions they mounted to Columbia and Venezuela in the 1970s and 80s, searching the high montane cloud-forests of the northern Andes for Pronophiline butterflies (a subtribe of the subfamily Satyrinae), on which they published a number of papers. The hawkmoths were collected in a region 24km north of Altagracia, Miranda State, at altitude 700m; from Guapo Dam, Miranda, and from Rancho Grande, Aragua, at altitude 1090m. The Museum’s Annual Report of 1976 describes the pair only as ‘University Zoology students’ at the time, although it appears they were recent graduates when they started their explorations (Adams, 1984).

Out of their packets, the hawkmoths were found to be in pretty good condition and the colours are remarkably fresh. Six weeks into the project, we have developed a routine – Phil puts the moths to relax in a damp atmosphere at the beginning of the week, and I (generally working one day a week) set them out at the end of the week.

A moth removed from its packet (Adhemarius species).

Moths relaxing in dessicator.

Each moth is set out, pinned down and left to dry for a fortnight (Adhemarius species shown here).

Once set, the collection data label and accession number are added to the pin. 80 moths have been set so far, and at a quick count those represent at least 20 species. The next step will be to identify them. Ultimately, the aim is to collate the information on all the Manchester Sphingidae collections into a single resource, and these stunning moths will be available for research and provide a fantastic resource for the museum’s teaching, displays, public events and engagement activities.

Erinnyis species before adding labels to the moth’s pin.

Eumorpha species.

Work in progress – some of the Adams/Bernard collection.

Claire Miles, Honorary Curatorial Associate at The Manchester Museum, working with the Adams/Bernard Sphingidae collection

References:

Adams MJ. 1984. Andean Butterflies – Search and Research. Alpine Journal. 89: 90­-96.

de Camargo AJA, de Camargo NF, Correa DCV, de Camargo WRF, Vieira EM, Marini-Filho O, Amorim FW. 2016. Diversity patterns and chronobiology of hawkmoths (Lepidoptera, Sphingidae) in the Brazilian Amazon rainforest. Journal of Insect Conservation. 20 (4): 629–641.

Giusti A. 2014. A whopping private collection – yet something still is missing.

http://www.nhm.ac.uk/natureplus/community/research/life_sciences_news/lepidoptera/blog/2014/03/17/a-whopping-private-collection, accessed 27 Feb 2017.

Kitching, I.J. 2017. Sphingidae Taxonomic Inventory, http://sphingidae.myspecies.info/, accessed 27 Feb 2017.

Logunov DV. 2010. The Manchester Museum’s Entomology Collections. Antenna 34 (4): 163–167.

Logunov DV & Merriman N. (eds.). 2012. The Manchester Museum: Window to the World. Third Millenium Ltd., London.

 

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Captivated by natural beauty: Robin Gregson-Brown and Lepidoptera

About 30-40% of the visitors to the Manchester Museum’s Entomology Department are art or design students and professionals, who come over to get inspired by the variety of insect shapes, colours and patterns, and to talk to the museum curatorial staff about what interests them. Museum’s curators are especially pleased when such visits result in something tangible, such as an installations, original ideas for contemporary product and/or jewellery design, and, of course, pure examples of fine art.

Here we are pleased to present an interview with Robin Gregson-Brown, a Lepidoptera artist as he calls himself, from Derbyshire (recorded 20th October 2016). At the age of 80 and in retirement, Robin has embarked a new career of poetic artist of nature. And what could be more beautiful nature’s beautiful creatures than moths and butterflies? Hardly anything! Robin is fascinated by Lepidoptera all his life and now started to satisfy his passion by painting them in mixed media.

In collaboration with the Derby Museum and the Manchester University Museum, he has produced a series of spellbinding images of endangered and extinct butterflies, which were displayed once in his personal exhibition at the Derby Museum (22nd May – 5th June 2016).

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Butterfly migrations, an interview with Prof Laurence Cook of the University of Manchester

Do butterflies migrate and if they do how long distances are they able to cover? How many British Lepidoptera species do migrate to the country? Why do butterflies and moths migrate? These and other questions related to migratory species of Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths) were discussed with an expert, Prof Laurence Cook of the University of Manchester (Manchester, UK).

The interview is presented here in two parts.

Watch interview, part one:

Watch interview, part two:

You can find useful information about two British migrant species (Painted lady and Humming-bird Hawk-moth) and the initiative ‘Migrant Watch’ online on the Butterfly Conservation site, here.

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Butterflies conservation at the Prees Heath Common Reserve, Shropshire

In recent years, an increasing concern has been caused by the decline of butterflies in Britain. Almost half of the 59 resident species have reduced their ranges over the last 150 years, and five species have become extinct: Black-veined White (Aporia crataegi; c. 1925); Large Copper (Lycaena dispar, c. 1851); Mazarine Blue (Cyaniris semiargus, c. 1903); Large Blue (Maculinea arion, c. 1979); and Large Tortoiseshell (Nymphalis polychloros, 1980s?). Many of the remaining butterfly species continue to decline nationally or even have become extinct locally on many sites. One of such species is the Silver-studded Blue (Plebejus argus), which is scarce elsewhere in the UK with a high extinction rate (evaluated as 25%): i.e., the species no longer occurs in about a quarter of the localities from where it was recorded in the 1970s. In the UK, this species declined most severely from 1950 to 1980, but with relatively few extinctions occurring between 1980 and 1985 (data by Warren, 1993, for Central Southern Britain).

The main reason for extinction/declining of this and other butterfly species in the UK is a combination of habitat loss and fragmentation/isolation, and changes in habitat management (especially, in Forestry Commission and Public Authority sites). Butterflies are known to be highly sensitive to environmental changes and therefore they often decline whilst their larval food-plants are still widespread and abundant. However, any changes in butterfly populations are to be seen as early indicators of habitat changes that in the future will affect many other wildlife groups.

The Silver-studded Blue is more usually associated with heathland habitats, and a number of regional nature reserves have been specifically established to protect it. One of such sites is the Prees Heath Common Reserve (Shropshire), the last sanctuary for the Silver-studded Blue (Plebejus argus) in the Midlands.

Stephen Lewis, Officer at the Prees Heath Reserve, visited the Manchester Museum on 19/12/2014 in order to study historical records of the Silver-studded Blue from the Midlands on the basis of museum specimens.  He also gave us a short interview about the conservation of the Silver-studded Blue in Shropshire (see below).

A more complete story of the Silver-studded Blue butterfly at the Prees Heath Common Reserve presented by Stephen Lewis can be seen in the following short video.

If you are interested in British Butterfly Conservation (the British Butterfly Conservation Society) and their currently formulated strategy for British butterflies please visit the society’s site.

Further reading:

Warren, M.S. 1993. A review of butterfly conservation in Central Southern Britain: I. Protection, evaluation and extinction on prime sites. – Biological Conservation, 64, 25-35; pdf-file online.

Warren M.S., Barnett L.K., Gibbons D.W. & Avery M.I. 1997. Assessing national conservation priorities: an improved red list of British butterflies. – Biological Conservation, 82: 317-328; pdf-file online.

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