diagnostic characters

 

to give a newly discovered species its identity and immortal name

we tear out its distinctive genitalia to macerate and draw them

you have to be cruel to be kind

backlogs of discovery

 

if i never go in the field again i could spend the rest of my career

describing new species that are already sitting in drawers in the museum

that, i think, is the definition of biodiversity

 

unfortunate names

 

a tiny fly called Pseudopachychaeta approximatonervis (Zetterstedt)

too long for my tiny identification label

would it have killed them to find a shorter name?