Off to Florida

Image by Flickr user traviswilcoxen

Tomorrow morning I leave for a week at the Archbold Biological Station in the scrublands of central Florida.  Archbold is a magical place filled with charmingly unique plants and animals. I spent a summer there in 1995; this will be my first visit since then.  With any luck I’ll return with a pile of new photographs.  On the list to shoot: the Florida harvester ant, Platythyrea punctata, and a couple scrub endemics like the graceful Dorymyrmex elegans.

I’ve pre-scheduled a few posts while I’m away so the blog won’t go quiet, but I may be slow answering comments and emails.

In the meantime, there seems to be a bit of thoughtful discussion in the comments about the extent to which Myrmecos Blog ought to be publishing scientific commentary, considering that the blog is not peer-reviewed.  I have my own thoughts, of course, but posting them will have to wait.  Until then, I hope you all have a great week.

Read Full Post »

Paisajes de Argentina, 2009

Hikers at Purmamarca

Bits and pieces of landscapes, northern Argentina, March 2009.

Read Full Post »

Hitting the Road: Argentina

Near Cruz de Eje, Argentina

Tomorrow I leave for three ant-filled weeks in northern Argentina. Don’t despair, though, the Myrmecos Blog will not go into remission.  Scott Powell will be taking the reins for the rest of the month, and Eli Sarnat will drop in once or twice to regale us with shocking-but-true ant adventures from the South Pacific.  I’ve also pre-scheduled a few Friday Beetles and Sunday Movies.

We’ve got several goals for the expedition.  First, Jo-anne and I are trying to get a better sense of the biology of the closest relatives of the Argentine ant Linepithema humile. While the Argentine ant itself is quite well studied, the ecology and behavior of its sibling species are almost entirely unknown.  We’ll be collecting and making observations about the territoriality, genetics, and nesting biology of several related species in the northwestern mountains.  Second, Andy Suarez and I have a small project to track down the source population of the tramp species Pheidole obscurithorax, so I’m gathering additional samples for genetic comparisons between the native and introduced ranges.  Finally, we’ll be visiting an ant lab at the Ciudad Universitaria in Buenos Aires, getting some pointers from local myrmecologists on conducting field work in their country as well as helping them out with a few specimen identifications.

Time and internet access permitting, I might make a few posts from the road.  In any case, I hope you all have a great month.

Read Full Post »

Back from South Africa

Sunset over the St. Lucia Estuary

I am happy to report that both parts of my trip- ant photography in the coastal forests of St. Lucia and the ICE conference in Durban- were a success. I’ll try to put up a few posts in the coming week about both.

A brief note about this photo: I used a 2-stop hard graduated filter to darken the upper 2/3 of the image, and because the sky lacked clouds I stood under a tree to add interest. Skies present interesting photographic challenges when the weather is clear, as it was for most of my brief Africa trip.

Read Full Post »