Nice article about @ceiseman! I’ve made this a gift article, anyone should be able to access it. Thanks for all of your hard work, Charley!
I like the last paragrah:
Mr. Eiseman understands: This is not the stuff of headlines like the monarch on its milkweed or the pollinators’ plight. But he wants to make the case for these unsung, unseen heroes. And he wants us to make room for them — undisturbed and a bit better understood — in our gardens.
Awesome article, nicely done @ceiseman !! How great it is to see the increase in articles which support letting things be as they naturally are to help skew the perception that a pristine yard and beautiful yard are not mutually exclusive, and I think the article, with @ceiseman 's comments and guidance highlights how interesting and important this ‘niche’ group can be. Great headliner pic with the aspen serpentine leafminer moth too! Let’s just not tell the public some of the designs in the photos are made from insect larvae poo…
I need to give credit where credit is due for getting me to notice galls and miners; iNaturalist facilitated for sure but I’m positive I wouldn’t have gotten as interested if it weren’t for the prolific identifiers of these groups that we have on the site. They do a truly magnificent job and, with a little scheming with a few of them, I’ve actually managed to help document some things that hadn’t previously been photographed. It’s been great fun and I’ve truly appreciated the information and guidance they have provided.
Thank you for providing that wonderful article. Looks like I’ll have another title on my book wish list,too.
To answer your question,yes, I am one that started to really notice leafminers. More accurately, notice the mines, I’ve yet to see the miners.
His comment on the less you move, the more you see is so correct! I’ve seen many new and (to me) incredible things by being still and looking.
Hooray for Charley! I must confess I knew about leafminers before iNat, but that’s only because Charley is local to me. If you ever have have a chance to hear him give a talk, make sure you go to it!
“I would love to put out a major message: If you see evidence of things eating and living on your plants, that is a good thing.”
That sums up the paradigm shift we need when thinking about gardening. The more native species, the more holes and mines you’ll see in the leaves, and that’s a good thing. Gardens full of non-native plants with hardly any insect damage just seem dead.
For those interested, others (including me), inspired and encouraged by Charley, have set up leafminer projects for other parts of the world too. Just don’t hold your breath for an identification to species - adding the plant ID will increase the chances of identification at some point:
Charley has been so helpful with identifying leafmines(I post a lot of them)! Great to see a naturalist get major recognition outside of the Inat community and other naturalist publications!
Could I see the article link?
It’s in the first line of my original post (“Nice article”). Because it’s a gift link and not a direct public link to the article, it’s a really long URL so I didn’t want to paste the whole thing.
Great article and so important to show all the firms of life around us. In the US there seems to be an obsession with making everything neat and manicured which ends up being lifeless. If you google leaf miners the first things that come up are pest control sites.
New York Times has a great article on leafminers and galls featuring our own @ceiseman and talking about iNaturalist. It’s a great article - I think I’m going to have to go order the book now.
This link should allow you to read it even if you don’t have a subscription.