Coverage of some hardcore insect systematics/taxonomy in the New York Times (strangely).
iNaturalist gets a shout out! A small parasitic wasp Ormyrus labotus, once thought to be a generalist gall-piercer, appears to be comprised of a number of distinct species based on genetics.
Cool to see this very specialized basic research covered in a major newspaper.
A Parasitic Wasp Unmasked: One Species Is Actually 16 Species
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/17/science/wasp-species-parasite.html
Hey that’s my lab! Here’s a couple more articles on this Ormyrus research that are not paywalled, though they don’t mention iNat explicitly: https://entomologytoday.org/2022/02/16/hidden-diversity-parasitoid-wasp-16-species-complex-ormyrus-labotus/, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/02/220216103041.htm. Oh also here is the paper they are referencing, you can thank Andrew Forbes for the cheeky title https://academic.oup.com/isd/article/6/1/8/6528936
iNaturalist is a super useful tool for figuring out which areas to target for field collections. And in my case (though I study fungi, not wasps) iNat has connected me with awesome people who collect and send me fungi samples.
This is awesome! Congrats @sarahduhon and your lab!
Thanks for sharing @sarahduhon. Great to see how researchers are using iNaturalist.
I learned about that through EntomologyToday, didn’t know this was a big enough deal to make mainstream news!
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