Rob Cannings: E-Fauna BC Dragonfly and Robber Fly Editor

Rob Cannings has been supporting E-Fauna BC since we began the project in 2007. He and Geoff Scudder embraced E-Fauna when they made the decision to post the draft chapters of their insect book-in-progress, The Insect Families of British Columbia, on E-Fauna.  It was a marvelous contribution, and made expert information on the insect fauna of the province widely available, from bristletails to termites. In our insect section on E-Fauna, accessed through the menu on the home page, you can read the chapters of the book which include introductions to each insect order in BC. We have presented these in sections, alphabetically by order.  You can also view family descriptions and keys to the families that Rob and Geoff have prepared.  Just follow the menu links to explore their book.  The book is a work-in-progess, though, so Rob and Geoff continue to work on write ups on orders and families found throughout the province.  

From the beginning, Rob has also helped us process insect photos for our photo galleries, identifying submissions and helping us to find experts who might be willing to help.  His new role as editor of dragonflies and robber flies really just continues this work, except Rob will now be publishing and processing photos for these two insect groups. 

Rob grew up in the Okanagan Valley beside a Penticton grassland in a family known across Canada for its contributions to natural history and conservation. Rob was Curator of Entomology at the Royal British Coumbia Museum (RBCM) in Victoria, BC, from 1980 until his retirement in 2013.  He is now Curator Emeritus there and continues his entomological research and writing.  From 1987 to 1996 he also led the museum's Natural History Section. He has been active on the Scientific Committee of the Biological Survey of Canada (Terrestrial Arthropods), the British Columbia Invertebrate Recovery Team and the Entomological Societies of Britsh Columbia and Canada. He started the ESBC newsletter Boreus in 1981 and was editor until 1991. He is a member of the Arthropod Subcommittee of COSEWIC (Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada).  In former lives, Rob was a biologist and nature interpreter for BC Parks and the Canadian Wildlife Service and served as a lecturer in the Zoology Department and curator of the Spencer Entomological Museum at the University of BC. His B. Sc. and M. Sc. are from the University of BC; his Ph. D. comes from the University of Guelph.

Rob studies insect systematics, especially the taxonomy, evolution and biogeography of dragonflies (Odonata) and robber flies (Diptera: Asilidae).  However, he has published on groups in all of the major orders of insects.  He has authored several books, including The Dragonflies of British Columbia (1977), Introducing the Dragonflies of British Columbia and the Yukon (2002), and The Systematics of Lasiopogon (Diptera: Asilidae) (2002).  With his brothers, Syd and Dick, he co-authored the books The Birds of the Okanagan Valley, British Columbia (1987) and The World of Fresh Water (1998). 

Read more about Rob here and here.

New Checklist and Key to the Anostraca (Fairy Shrimp) of British Columbia Now Posted

An updated checklist of the Fairy Shrimp of British Columbia (Order Anostraca), prepared by Thalia Grant and Ian Gardiner, is now available on E-Faun BC.  View it here.   Eight species, in four families, are reported for the province.

A key to the Order Anostraca, prepared by Thalia Grant, is also available, and is linked to from the checklist. View it directly here.

Now Posted on E-Fauna BC: An Introduction to the Fishes of British Columbia

 

 Ratfish (Hydrolagus colliei)

This month, E-Fauna Fish Editor Eric (Rick) Taylor has posted his new Introduction to the Fishes of British Columbia.  He says:  "The fishes of British Columbia are an extremely diverse and interesting wildlife group. With 67 native and 15 or so introduced species of freshwater fishes and 409 native species of marine fishes, British Columbia boasts a fish fauna much richer than most provinces in Canada. A simple count of named species as a measure of diversity, however, does not tell the true story of BC’s diversity of fishes. First, many species are endemic to BC; that is, they occur nowhere else in Canada. Second, BC, owing to its mountainous terrain and a mix of freshwater and marine habitats, possesses myriad genetically distinct populations within species (including several thousand distinct populations of Pacific salmon and trout). In addition, some “species complexes” comprise genetically distinct populations living together that act as distinct biological species, but have not yet been named as such (e.g., BC’s world famous “species pairs” of threespine sticklebacks)." 

Read the rest of Rick's article here. 

New E-Fauna Species Account Now Posted: Eubranchipus hesperius n. sp. (Western Ethologist Fairy Shrimp)

 

 Eubranchipus hesperius n. sp. (Western Ethologist Fairy Shrimp), photo by Ian Gardiner

A new species account for Eubranchipus hesperius n. sp. (Western Ethologist Fairy Shrimp--unofficial name), Order Anostraca, prepared by Thalia Grant, has now been posted on E-Fauna BC.  In her write up, Thalia says: 

"Eubranchipus hesperius was recently declared a new species, separate from Eubranchipus serratus Forbes 1876 (Rogers, 2014). It differs from E. serratus in the morphology of its antenna, brood pouch and abdomen, and in its geographical range; E. hesperius is found in North American transmontane and cold desert bioregions west of the Great Plains. E. serratus is now considered restricted to the Appalachian/Ozark bioregions and eastern Great Plains of the United States."

"Eubranchipus hesperius has been recorded in British Columbia, eastern Washington and Oregon, Idaho, western Montana, northwestern California, northeastern Nevada and central Arizona. In British Columbia, E. hesperius has been found at altitudes of 600 to 1700 meters around Merritt, south of Merritt on Iron Mt., Selish Mt., Gillis Mt. and Shovelnose Mt., southwest and southeast of Kamloops, and in Curzon in the southeastern part of the province (Smithsonian collections, RBCM collections, Ian Gardiner, Thalia Grant)."

Read about the Western Ethologist Fairy Shrimp (unofficial name) here.
View Ian Gardiner's fabulous photos for this species here.  
Read Thalia's species account for the Oregon Fairy Shrimp here.
View Thalia's key to the Anostraca.

Note to Registered E-Fauna Photographers

This week E-Fauna was hacked into, and there was some damage.  While we now have the site back up and running, some data was lost. The database that holds the photo details that accompany your photos was corrupted.  Our back up files were also corrupted.  The result of this is that if you submitted photos to E-Fauna between August 2014 and now, your photo details will have been wiped out. This includes the location information, date, habitat, and comments. Lats and longs will still be there, as these were unaffected.  We are asking you, if you have the time, to re-enter the details, particularly the location of your shot.  To do this, go to the 'edit my photos' link at the top of the photo upload page. That will take you to your photo file where you can re-enter the data.

Steps have already been taken to ensure that if we are hacked again, we will have back ups to replace lost data that can't be corrupted.

Oregon Fairy Shrimp (Eubranchipus oregonus): Species Account Now Posted

 Oregon Fairy Shrimp, photo by Thalia Grant

A new species account for the Oregon Fairy Shrimp (Eubranchipus oregonus), written by reseacher Thalia Grant, is now posted on E-Fauna BC. This tiny crustacean species is primarily a species of western North America (disjunct in Oklahoma), where it is reported from California, Oregon, Washington and British Columbia. In British Columbia, it is described by Thalia as "recorded from Vancouver Island, Salt Spring Island, Texada Island, Galiano Island and on the lower mainland between the US border and Whistler, with one historical outlying record from Kamloops (RBCM collection). It is now rare on the mainland of British Columbia. The species was first described in Oregon, in 1930. It was first collected in Hope, BC, in 1918 but at the time was misidentified as Eubranchipus vernalis (Johansen, 1921; Ferguson, 1935)."  

Thalia describes the habitat of the Oregon Fairy Shrimp as follows:  "[It] occupies small, freshwater ephemeral ponds from sea level to 1500 meters elevation. It is restricted to small water bodies that are neutral to mildly acidic, low in dissolved solids and turbidity, have little or no flow, and are inundated for several months (Eng et. al, 1990). Habitat ranges from deciduous or mixed forest, to wet meadow and Typha-dominated pools, with some shade and proximity to coniferous forest being frequent habitat descriptors (Hill et. al, 1997)."

Thalia Grant is a recognized expert on the Galapagos, and has been working on Eubranchipus oregonus with John Richardson at UBC.  She has recently published a book titled Darwin in Galapagos: Footsteps to a New World (2009).  Her most recent Galapagos research has focused on the distribution and breeding behavior of the world’s rarest gull, the Lava Gull (Leucophaeus fuliginosus).

Read more about the Oregon Fairy Shrimp on our atlas page, found here.
Read more about Thalia's book, co-authored by her husband Greg Estes, here. 
View Thalia's photos of the Oregon Fairy Shrimp on E-Fauna BC here.

Additional Rare Bird Articles Now Posted: Red-faced Cormorant, Red-legged Kittiwake, Little Bunting

Additional rare bird articles authored by Rick Toochin, Jamie Fenneman, Louis Haviland, Peter Hamel, Margo Hearne, and Martin Williams have now been posted on E-Fauna BC. These include the following rare species:  Red-faced Cormorant, Red-legged Kittiwake, and Little Bunting.  The rare bird articles are found in our Notes and Articles section. They are comprehensive summaries of the species occurrences in BC and include detailed species descriptions.