The Newsletter of the International Society of Hymenopterists
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Volume 5, Issue 2 — 10 September 2014 HamuliThe Newsletter of the International Society of Hymenopterists In this issue... Greeting from the new presi- dent (Whitfield) … 1 ISH and That (Heraty) … 2 Swiss Hymenoptera Course (Baur) … 2 HYM Course (Kula et al.) … 4 Some thoughts (Agosti) … 4 Announcements … 6 Hymenoptera in the Übersee- Museum (Lohrmann) … 6 Machu Picchu, near Cusco, Peru, site of the 8th International Congress of Hymenopterists. Parasitoid Symposium (Polaszek) … 8 Greetings from your both through our photographic archives of New President after hymenopterists and through our Society’s Collecting in Kosñipata Valley the Spectacular Cusco Archivist position. (Heraty) … 9 Congress What a spectacular success the Cusco meeting was, due to fantastic local orga- ISH Business Minutes By: Jim Whitfield, Department of Entomol- nizers (see message from my predecessor (Krogmann et al.) … 10 ogy, University of Illinois, Urbana-Cham- John Heraty!), and of course due to major paign, IL, USA efforts from the other ISH officers who had Postgrad Corner (Kittel) … 12 a longer effort to help organize the confer- Hi everyone! I just wanted to introduce ence than I did. Kudos to all! Noyes Research Medal myself to those of you who were not able Among the highlights for me (besides (Heraty) … 13 to make it to the Cusco Congress. I work the great talks and posters): the day-long on a wide diversity of biological top- excursion to many sites including Saqsay- Hamuli Update (Deans) … 14 ics (systematics, ecology, genomics), all waman, the banquet with its local music related to microgastrine braconid wasps and dancing, and the local interesting Author’s Instructions … 14 worldwide, so I have a strong interest foods, crafts and markets. John Heraty has in seeing the Society both continue to uploaded a lot of photos to Flickr further Membership Information … 14 internationalize (the Cusco conference documenting all this. After the meetings, I was a great example of this trend) but headed to Machu Picchu, with its spectac- also to expand beyond its current strong ular ruins (see above) and scenery. Despite taxonomic focus. As I mentioned in a the effort to get to the Congress from cen- previous Hamuli post, I also am interested tral Illinois (4 flights in each direction, and in us preserving our history more vividly, on the way back trains and vans as well), it 1 Hamuli (ISSN 2224-2791) is published by the International Society Greetings ... Continued ISH and That of Hymenopterists. By: John Heraty, University of California, Contact: Andrew R. Deans Riverside, USA Department of Entomology Pennsylvania State University 501 ASI Bldg This is the last column from me in the University Park, PA ISH and That category. Largely this is to 16802 USA. comment on the excellent meeting in Fax: +1 814 865 3048 Ph: +1 814 865 1895 Cusco, Peru. This was the first congress [email protected] of Hymenopterists in Central or South America (and hopefully not the last). We President: had over 160 participants, from 28 differ- James B. Whitfield [email protected] ent countries represented. The largest con- tingents were from Brazil (51), U.S.A. (22), Treasurer: and Peru (18). Travel awards were made to Craig Brabant six students, two of which (Crystal McE- [email protected] wen, University of Maryland, and Erica Secretary: Tucker, University of Kentucky) also won Lars Krogmann presentation and poster awards. The first- [email protected] place award winners were Antônio Freire Webmaster/Archivist: de Carvalho (Univ. Federal de São Carlos) Katja Seltmann Jim, during a 6:00 am on hike up Machu Picchu and Miles Zhang (University of Manitoba). [email protected] Mountain, above the archaeological site. Of course, just being there was a great experience for everyone. There were 77 Editor, Hamuli: Andrew R. Deans was all well worth it. presentations, 76 posters, one wild kick-off [email protected] Soon we will be considering the loca- reception (more than enough Pisco-Sours tions for the next Congress in 2018 – for everyone!), and a great banquet with Associate Editors: Cusco will be a hard act to follow, but I’m live music and even some dancing. Local Robert Longair István Mikó sure it will be very exciting to look forward arrangements were handled by Frank to as well. • Azorsa, Erick Yabar, Lidia Sulca, and a Art Director: host of wonderful volunteers. Our meet- Nick Sloff See more: ing was a financial success because of the Articles appearing herein should not be help from our meeting sponsors (Bioquip, considered published for the purposes https://flic.kr/s/aHsjZX3hji (Congress) Bugdorms, CSIRO publishing, Entosphinx, of zoological nomenclature.. Find us on https://flic.kr/s/aHsjZXZoJy (Wayqecha) Pensoft and Princeton University Press). the Web: https://flic.kr/ps/2UnMob (Society) One of the main benefits of the meeting http://hymenopterists.org 2 ISH and That ... Continued the framework of a lecture at the Institute and thus does not require the installation of Ecology and Evolution, University of of special software (if needed, Xper2, an was a big increase in our Society member- Berne (Switzerland), the course is open to earlier, java based version is available that ship. We have a strong and healthy Society, everybody interested in the subject. There- can be installed on all platforms). Xper3 is but we ultimately need more members. fore, I usually have a couple of partici- free but has about the same functionality This translates directly to what we can do pants from other institutions (e.g., natural as, e.g., the Lucid software. as a Society, including making a greater history museums and CABI Delémont in The new, electronic Xper3 key proved number of travel awards. We are two years Switzerland), in addition to 8–10 regular to be a great improvement with respect away from our next big meeting at the students. The course is normally held in to the earlier paper version of the key, International Congress of Entomology late summer; this year it took place from although it is essentially based on the same meeting in Orlando. Hopefully we can ride August 25th till 29th. character matrix. Identification success the wave and support more students going The aim is to give an overview on the di- was much higher and the students needed to another superb meeting! versity, systematics, and biology of parasit- only about half the time for identifying the ic wasps with a special focus on morphol- same sample of specimens. I thus can only Sincerely, ogy and identification. Thus, at the end of recommend the use of Xper3. The key used the course, participants should be able to in the course can be accessed using the fol- recognize the European families with the lowing link http://bit.ly/1AaMVmH help of keys. On an excursion day the students are intro- - ISH Past-President duced to collecting using the Noyes sweep net, Malaise traps and yellow pan traps. The next day the collected material is mount- ed, either directly pinned or glued on cards. The course is supplemented by talks of external lecturers, this year for instance by Tim Participants of the parasitic Hymenoptera course from August 25–29, Haye (CABI, Delé- 2014. Photo taken on the excursion day in Leuk, Valais (Switzerland). mont, Switzerland) Front row, from left to right: Jannic Odermatt, Thomas Obrist, Louis on biocontrol and Sutter, Dennis Quach, Lukas Lischer; back row: Marc Neumann by Marc Neumann (co-lecturer), Debora Unternährer, Katrin Luder, Sandro Meyer, Tina International representation at the 8th ICH. (Walterswil, Swit- Dancau, Timea Szikora. Countries represented above: Argentina, zerland) on com- Australia, Austria, Brazil. Bulgaria, Canada, munity ecology. Students are furthermore China, Colombia, Czech Republic, Denmark, introduced to digital stack imaging using Georgia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, the Keyence photo microscope. Finally, Japan, Mexico, Norway, Peru, Romania, Russian they are expected to give a small presenta- Federation, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland, tion of some individual work, such as the USA, United Kingdom, Venezuela. identification of specimens at the genus or species level, investigation of a complex of sibling species, construction of a simple identification key, etc. Parasitic Hymenoptera In the first two years, I used a simpli- course in Switzerland fied version of the key of Goulet & Huber (1993) Hymenoptera of the World: An By: Hannes Baur, Natural History Museum Identification Guide to Families, restricted Bern, Bernastrasse 15, 3005 Bern, Switzer- to European taxa. However, for this year land. a new key has been furnished using the Xper3 software (http://www.xper3.fr/). Female of Monodontomerus sp., taken on the In the past three years I have given a This software allows the construction of Keyence digital microscope by Timea Szikora one-week block course on parasitic Hy- multi-access (interactive) identification during the parasitic Hymenoptera course. menoptera. Although taking place within tools. The program runs in a web browser 3 HYM Course News tion. Katherine Nesheim (The Ohio State improve access to content and make our University) and Ben Smith (National Park knowledge much more widely accessible, By: Robert R. Kula, Matthew L. Buffington, Service) were recognized for their excellent not least for our colleagues who are not af- Michael W. Gates, John T. Lill, James P. performances on the post-course assess- filiated to a scientific institution with their Pitts, and David B. Wahl ment. extensive subscriptions to publications. Plans are underway to offer HYM Many of those colleagues are where most The fifth offering of HYM Course was Course in Argentina in March of 2015. The of the natural diversity is. held at the Eagle Hill Institute near Steu- course will be advertised broadly, includ- Journal of Hymenoptera Research: Lyubo ben, Maine.