This year we are taking our Winter Wildlife event online. Join us for the live launch on our YouTube channel at 4.30pm on Tuesday 1 December or catch up here: Get your questions ready for a LIVE Q&A with Rob Jaques from the British Trust for Ornithology, who’ll be talking about birds and other winter wildlife, and ways you can get involved collecting important data … Continue reading Coming Soon: 12 Days of Winter Wildlife
At this time of year, people across the world will be celebrating Diwali or Deepawali, also known as the Indian festival of lights. Create a lantern bug light holder to celebrate the festival together. What is a lantern bug? Lantern bugs, Fulgora and Pyrops, (also known as lanternflies) are found across south and south east Asia, and the Americas; mostly in tropical regions. They are part of … Continue reading Lantern bugs for a Festival of Lights
Ever wondered how bees communicate with each other to work as a team? Learn about the important job these pollinating insects carry out. Play our ‘Talk like a Bee’ game and discover how bees can ‘smell’ each other when visiting flowers, and find out how we can give these insects a helping hand by building your very own bee-friendly winter refuge. Insect communication Insects can … Continue reading Busy Bee Communication
Valentine Reiss-Woolever, a PhD student in the Insect Ecology Group, writes: Bamboo straws, Nordic flight shame, and reusable tote bags – environmentally minded consumption is increasingly common. A buzzword in recent years, “conscientious consumption” describes our attempts to spend money with an awareness of how our choices affect the world outside of ourselves. At the start of 2020, 64% of Germans said “living more sustainably” … Continue reading Palm oil boycotts may block the path to sustainability
The Museum of Zoology is open to the public again, pre-book only and with additional measures in place to keep visitors, staff and volunteers safe. Visit our website for more information and to book your free timed entry slot (tickets are released every Thursday for the following week). The Museum is home to a wonderful collection of animals, with thousands of specimens on display. Download … Continue reading Highlights of the Museum of Zoology
Martina Harianja, PhD student, writes: Imagine that you were eight times as big as a grain of sugar, and you live in a fast-flowing stream. To get food, you need to swim against the current. What properties would need to accomplish this? Semi-aquatic bugs in the genus of Rhagovelia offer a brilliant approach. Their body length ranges from two to four millimetres as an adult, and … Continue reading Can how we manage agriculture’s impact on insects and biodiversity?
We are excited to announce that this year’s BioBlitz will be taking place in the Cambridge University Botanic Garden from 5pm on Saturday 19 September to 5pm on Sunday 20 September. During this 24 hours we will be counting as many species as we can in the garden. You can take part by visiting the garden and adding your data to the Cambridge BioBlitz 2020 … Continue reading BioBlitz 2020 at the Botanic Garden
Swastika Issar, PhD student, writes: “I’ve always been fascinated by how new species can emerge from the way populations adapt to their local environments. For my PhD, I worked on the burying beetles. These incredible insects turn the carcass of a small vertebrate, such as a bird or a mammal, into an edible nest for their larvae. I was interested in studying how local adaptations … Continue reading Studying evolution through the specialisations of burying beetles
Have you noticed some of the amazing insect life living around us this summer? Prof Bill Amos of the Department of Zoology has been keeping a photo diary of insects this year. Here it continues with some lovely metallic insects, a stone-like bush cricket, and some fabulous action shots: You can see more of Bill’s photographs on the blog: An Insect A Day for bee … Continue reading An Insect A Day Part 11
Stanley Quek, an MPhil student focusing on assessing the effectiveness of the Nature Ways network in Singapore, writes: Singapore is an island country in the biodiverse region of Southeast Asia. Singapore is also a large city, with urban landscapes dominating the island. In the past, Singapore was completely covered with dense primary forests and mangroves, however, much of that has been lost with the development … Continue reading Singapore’s Nature Ways
Join us every Tuesday as we make an alphabet from the animals in the Museum of Zoology. Today is the letter R: R is for rhinoceros, robin, reindeer, red admiral, raccoon, razorbill and red panda. Can you think of any others? Join us next week as we explore the animals in the Museum beginning with the letter S – including something that moves very slowly… Continue reading Animal Alphabet: R is for Rhinoceros
Beetles are insects, which means that their body is made up of three parts; a head, a thorax and an abdomen. Antennae are found on the head, and six legs attach to the thorax in the middle. If a beetle has wings for flying, they are usually found protected underneath a hard carapace on the abdomen. Beetles come in many different shapes and sizes. Discover … Continue reading Build a Beetle
Sara Steele, Museum learning assistant says: With 400,000 named species of beetle found across the world and over 4,000 species in the British Isles, beetles are a diverse bunch even among invertebrates. They come in all shapes and sizes, from long and thin soldier beetles to rounded ladybirds. This diversity points in part to their distribution; being found in every habitat except the sea and … Continue reading Basking Beetles
Have you been following the insect photo diary of Prof Bill Amos of the Department of Zoology? Here it continues with beautiful butterflies, unusual moths, and surprising flies. You can see more of Bill’s photographs on the blog: An Insect A Day for bee fly, orange tip buttefly and parasitic wasp. An Insect A Day continues for scorpion fly, shield bug and click beetle. An … Continue reading An Insect A Day Part 10
Prof Bill Amos of the Department of Zoology continues his insect photo diary with soe wonderful portraits of damselflies, a bush cricket, and images of predation in action as a spider and a robber fly feast on hoverflies. You can see more of Bill’s photographs on the blog: An Insect A Day for bee fly, orange tip buttefly and parasitic wasp. An Insect A Day … Continue reading An Insect A Day part 9
Museum of Zoology Blog 