January 03, 2012
By Paul Weamer
http://www.adirondackdailyenterprise.com/page/content.detail/id/528429/Insect-study-uncovers-new-revelations.html?nav=5046
The link above highlights a very interesting New York State, Adirondack Park, study that was completed in 2010. The team of experts who conducted the study found 99 species of mayflies, caddisflies, and stoneflies never before identified in the Adirondacks. The study was published last summer in a journal of the American Entomological Society.
From the article:
During the study that ended in June 2010, Myers and his team examined 25,000 specimens from 465 locations. They found 509 species of mayflies, caddisflies and stoneflies, including 99 that were reported in this state for the first time.
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They also discovered several species new to science and some species of conservation concern.
How can new aquatic insects be discovered in 2012? I once asked my friend and Penn State University entomologist, Greg Hoover, that question. Greg told me that there simply isn't a lot of money in the aquatic entomology field. No one is using these bugs to cure cancer, or to develop alternative energy, so it's difficult to acquire funding. Because of the lack of monetary incentive (entomologists have to eat too), few people are studying aqautic insects throughout the United State's 3,660,000 miles of rivers.
The last extensive study of this nature in the Adirondack park was by James Needham and Cornelius Beteen in 1901.
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This link discusses the new mayflies that were found: For those brave enough (see also crazy enough) to read it:
http://200.144.120.19/pdf/NGD311-08.pdf
I found it to be very interesting. But then crazy and I travel together often : )
