Seven New Leaf Insects with Royce Cumming
09/05/23 • 29 min
You’ve got to hand it to leaf insects; their camouflage is so well-refined that studying them is difficult and collecting them is near-impossible. A sub-group of stick insects, members of the family Phylliidae have evolved to leaf like the best of them, even going so far as to uptake leaf pigments to match their colors. In order to study these creatures, Royce Cumming had to visit and take loans from collections all over the world, looking at historic specimens often found only because a passing storm had knocked them out of the canopy.
But Royce is not deterred. He and his coauthors are organizing and describing Phylliids in order to make studying them more approachable, and to help people better appreciate their uniqueness. Listen in as he describes identifying and reclassifying leaf insects, pulling us into their strange and beautiful world.
Royce Cumming’s paper “On seven undescribed leaf insect species revealed within the recent “Tree of Leaves” (Phasmatodea, Phylliidae)” is in issue 1173 of Zookeys.
It can be found here: https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1173.104413
New Species: Phyllium iyadaon, Phyllium samarense, Phyllium ortizi, Pulchriphyllium heracles, Pulchriphyllium delislei, Pulchriphyllium bhaskarai, Pulchriphyllium anangu
Episode image was taken by Ashwin Viswanathan via iNaturalist and is used with permission by Royce Cumming
Follow Royce on Instagram: @RoyceCumming
Or check out his ResearchGate profile, where all of his work is shared open access: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Royce-Cumming
Check out this video on the phytochemical camouflage Royce talks about: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JygVv3coRaU&t=1s
A transcript of this episode can be found here: Royce Cumming - Transcript
Further coverage of Royce and this paper:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/01/science/leaf-stick-insects-phyllium-asekiense.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUymjLIPWUk
Be sure to follow New Species on Twitter (@PodcastSpecies) and Instagram (@NewSpeciesPodcast) and like the podcast page on Facebook (www.facebook.com/NewSpeciesPodcast)
Music in this podcast is "No More (Instrumental)," by HaTom (https://fanlink.to/HaTom)
If you have questions or feedback about this podcast, please e-mail us at [email protected]
If you would like to support this podcast, please consider doing so at https://www.patreon.com/NewSpeciesPod
You’ve got to hand it to leaf insects; their camouflage is so well-refined that studying them is difficult and collecting them is near-impossible. A sub-group of stick insects, members of the family Phylliidae have evolved to leaf like the best of them, even going so far as to uptake leaf pigments to match their colors. In order to study these creatures, Royce Cumming had to visit and take loans from collections all over the world, looking at historic specimens often found only because a passing storm had knocked them out of the canopy.
But Royce is not deterred. He and his coauthors are organizing and describing Phylliids in order to make studying them more approachable, and to help people better appreciate their uniqueness. Listen in as he describes identifying and reclassifying leaf insects, pulling us into their strange and beautiful world.
Royce Cumming’s paper “On seven undescribed leaf insect species revealed within the recent “Tree of Leaves” (Phasmatodea, Phylliidae)” is in issue 1173 of Zookeys.
It can be found here: https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1173.104413
New Species: Phyllium iyadaon, Phyllium samarense, Phyllium ortizi, Pulchriphyllium heracles, Pulchriphyllium delislei, Pulchriphyllium bhaskarai, Pulchriphyllium anangu
Episode image was taken by Ashwin Viswanathan via iNaturalist and is used with permission by Royce Cumming
Follow Royce on Instagram: @RoyceCumming
Or check out his ResearchGate profile, where all of his work is shared open access: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Royce-Cumming
Check out this video on the phytochemical camouflage Royce talks about: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JygVv3coRaU&t=1s
A transcript of this episode can be found here: Royce Cumming - Transcript
Further coverage of Royce and this paper:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/01/science/leaf-stick-insects-phyllium-asekiense.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUymjLIPWUk
Be sure to follow New Species on Twitter (@PodcastSpecies) and Instagram (@NewSpeciesPodcast) and like the podcast page on Facebook (www.facebook.com/NewSpeciesPodcast)
Music in this podcast is "No More (Instrumental)," by HaTom (https://fanlink.to/HaTom)
If you have questions or feedback about this podcast, please e-mail us at [email protected]
If you would like to support this podcast, please consider doing so at https://www.patreon.com/NewSpeciesPod
Previous Episode
Five New Kleptoparasitic Spiders with Cláudia Xavier
Mysmenopsis is a tiny spider genus that has been shaped by women; women have collected, identified, and described the majority of members of the genus. In fact, Dr. Nadine Dupérré alone described 25 species, almost half of the genus’ known diversity. So it’s fitting, Cláudia Xavier explains, that her five new species are named after women, including Dupérré herself and Dr. Emilie Snethlage, whose position as director of the Museu Goeldi made her the first woman in South America to lead a scientific institution.
Mysmenopsids are tiny, kleptoparasitic spiders found across the Americas, particularly in northern South America. They are cryptic, their small size making it difficult to observe them, never mind dissect and study them. But that’s just what Cláudia and her coauthors did. In this interview she shares what it’s like studying spiders smaller than an apple seed - the good, the bad, and the painful! In her writing both in and out of the museum, Cláudia hopes to demystify spiders and bring more attention to their diversity.
Cláudia Xavier’s paper “On the symphytognathoid spider genus Mysmenopsis Simon, 1898 (Araneae: Mysmenidae) from the Brazilian Amazonian region: description of five new species and new records” is in issue 5219 off Zootaxa.
It can be found here: https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5319.1.4
A transcript of this episode can be found here: Cláudia Xavier - Transcript
New Species: Mysmenopsis rodriguesae, Mysmenopsis nadineae, Mysmenopsis snethlageae, Mysmenopsis lopardoae, Mysmenopsis regiae
Episode image courtesy of Cláudia Xavier
Follow Cláudia on Instagram or Twitter: @claudiia_xavier
Read Cláudia’s writing on Fauna News: https://faunanews.com.br/category/colunas/invertebrados/
Be sure to follow New Species on Twitter (@PodcastSpecies) and Instagram (@NewSpeciesPodcast) and like the podcast page on Facebook (www.facebook.com/NewSpeciesPodcast)
Music in this podcast is "No More (Instrumental)," by HaTom (https://fanlink.to/HaTom)
If you have questions or feedback about this podcast, please e-mail us at [email protected]
If you would like to support this podcast, please consider doing so at https://www.patreoNesticuscom/NewSpeciesPod
Next Episode
Collections Data with Makenzie Mabry
On this podcast we talk a lot about natural history collections. In fact, a spot (or more) of collections work is pretty much required to describe a new species. But what actually counts as a natural history collection? How many are there in the world? And what happens to all of that juicy data waiting in the stacks to be worked on? Dr. Makenzie Mabry has some of those answers and more. We talk about all of the different types of information that can be associated with specimens, the different resources researchers and non-researchers can use to access it, as well as some of the strengths and challenges to the way we build, use, and share museum data.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
IDigBio - Integrated Digitized Biocollections, a platform for organizing, storing, and sharing specimen data
Symbiota - Platform aimed at helping smaller collections manage and distribute their data
GBIF - The Global Biodiversity Information Facility which acts as a network for distributing biodiversity data
Bionomia - A platform that links natural history specimens to their contributors
Biodiversity Information Standards (TDWG) - a group that develops data standards for collections in order to help in the sharing of knowledge and information
Makenzie’s publications can be found in journals including Plants People Planet, Journal of College Science Teaching, Plant and Cell Physiology, and PhytoKeys.
Follow her on twitter: @KenzieMabry
Or Instagram: @kenziemabry_phd
Makenzie’s website: makenziemabry.weebly.com
A transcript of this episode can be found here: Makenzie Mabry - Transcript
Check out our website: www.newspeciespodcast.net
Be sure to follow New Species on Twitter (@PodcastSpecies) and like the podcast page on Facebook (www.facebook.com/NewSpeciesPodcast)
Music in this podcast is "No More (Instrumental)," by HaTom (https://fanlink.to/HaTom)
If you have questions or feedback about this podcast, please e-mail us at [email protected]
If you would like to support this podcast, please consider doing so at https://www.patreon.com/NewSpeciesPod
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