John

Many thanks indeed. The sawflies list sounds exciting and I will look forward greatly to its incorporation within the dictionary and in Recorder (obviously).

Your response ref the galls is both encouraging and discouraging at one and the same time. Good news indeed that a gall mite list is likely to be incorporated before too long BUT very disquieting to hear that you have been recommended not to include the complete species list from the FSC publication. I know many entomologists who undertake gall recording are using this volume as the basis for identification (usually as a second string to their main interest). I would be very interested to hear why you have received such a recommendation. I know there are questions about some of the anthomyiid (Diptera) species galling pteridophytes.

Cheers and thanks again

Steve

The above postings date from quite a while back now. I was rather hoping to bring all my Hymenoptera records for Leicestershire up to date so that I could replace our Aculeate dataset on the NBN Gateway with a comprehensive Hymenoptera one.
Our Dipterists Forum Field Weeks are regularly attended by a Symphytologist (!), Andrew Halstead and we all help him out with Symphyta catches at various spots around the country, so there is lots of data out there which needs to be gathered up and published onto the Gateway.
A new Symphyta list would be really handy, is there any current news about progress on this as I'm using the old Recorder 3 list.

Here is an update on the situation:

I have received (via Gavin Broad) an up-to-date checklist of Bristish and Irish Symphyta compiled by A. D. Liston & D. A. Sheppard. This will require considerable manipulation to get it into a form suitable for importing into the Dictionary but hopefully this can be done in about a month's time.

I have also just received the Plant Gall Society list of gall-forming organisms from Janet Boyd (thank you very much Janet). This should be quicker to import but will also need some tweaking.

Regards,

Charles

NBN Species Dictionary Project Manager (Retired!)

Dear Steve,

As I mentioned previously, both lists have arrived with us at the NHM and are presently in a queue of work. Although we have automated import routines it is unfortunately never as simple as just clicking a button and a lot of work is required to get the data as received into the format that our import routines can work on.

Sawflies will come first as I still need to sort out licence agreements with the Gall people, but it may still be up to a month before the lists are delivered to the Recorder Team and they will then have to decide when it is appropriate to issue an update.

Please bear with us!

Regards,

Charles Hussey

NBN Species Dictionary Project Manager (Retired!)

Charles

Just noticed that MapMate is being updated with the Newer Sawfly nomenclature - this was a note on the UK Leafminers Newsletter (available on the UK Leafminers website (http://www.leafmines.co.uk/)). The extract from the Newsletter went as follows:

"The updated sawfly nomenclature (courtesy of Liston and Sheppard, 2008) has been passed to Mapmate so that they can update their programme. Watch out for when it is released!

Guy Knight, who runs the National Sawfly Recording Scheme says: "the scheme is active
and I would welcome all records of leafmining (and other) sawflies in just about any format,
although Excel spreadsheets including at least a four figure grid reference are the ideal."

He would also be pleased to add anyone interested to the scheme newsletter circulation.

His email address:

Guy.Knight@liverpoolmuseums.org.uk

His postal address:

Guy Knight,
Zoology (Entomology) Section,
World Museum Liverpool,
William Brown Street,
Liverpool,
L3 8EN"

How are we doing on the Sawfly list for Rec-6 ??

Cheers

Steve

Thanks for that Charles - very much appreciated.

I have passed on the information ref the list changes to Guy Knight (National Sawfly Recorder) and I think/hope he will pass them on to the MapMate people. It will be good to have an accurate and up to date list finally available.

Thanks for all your work on this.

Cheers

Steve

I am sorry that everyone had to wait so long for this list to be added to the Species Dictionary. It took a long time to process, partly due to the format that it came in but also because, during checking prior to import, we raised a number of queries with the authors, who were thus able to improve their own list, as well as the version that eventually made it into the Dictionary.

Regards,

Charles Hussey

NBN Species Dictionary Project Manager (Retired!)

Dear Steve,

It is indeed in the Liston & Sheppard Checklist of British and Irish Hymenoptera Symphyta 2008. You will have to contact the Gateway Team to find out when their copy of the Dictionary will be updated, but I suspect that it shouldn't be too long as they received an update from me towards the beginning of this month.

Regards,

Charles Hussey

NBN Species Dictionary Project Manager (Retired!)

Dear Graham,

Back in June 2008 (See over at: http://forums.nbn.org.uk/viewtopic.php?pid=3031#p3031) you indicated that the lack of availability of species information on webservices for species with no records on the Gateway was being reviewed as the ability to obtain names and keys for such species had been requested from a few areas.

You also pointed to Andy Brewer's original explanation as to why such species were not available (due to the policy of not presenting information for species with no records) - (http://forums.nbn.org.uk/viewtopic.php?id=614).

Could I ask whether this 'review' of procedure has yet taken place and if so, what the outcome was ?? I think this will be very important for a number of LRCs.

To me, the problem seems somewhat circular. If names and keys are not presented on a webservices dictionary search then this makes it impossible for our online input routines to accept that species - consequently no records for that species get into the system and onto the Gateway - which in turn means that as there are no records for that species then the info will not be presented. I feel this circle needs to be broken.

Cheers

Steve