For Hedgehog Awareness Week, Zoology Collections Manager Mark Carnall and Museum Librarian and Archivist Danielle Czerkaszyndiscuss these prickly and charming creatures.
The 2-8 May is Hedgehog Awareness Week, which give us an excuse, not that one were needed, to talk about these charismatic mammals. Although the West European hedgehog (or common hedgehog if you’re in Europe, these vernacular names get very confusing when geography and language is taken into account), Erinaceus europaeus, is probably the hedgehog that springs to mind to many of our readers, there are nearly twenty living species of hedgehog and many fossil species are known.
Hedgehog specimen at OUMNH
In terms of evolutionary relationships they share a family with the moonrat and the rather wonderful gynmures, distinctly un-hedgehog-like relatives.
Their characteristic spikes that run across the back of hedgehogs are modified hairs which are periodically replaced and each individual hedgehog has around 7000 spines at any one time, varying slightly with age and size. Behaviourally, they are competent climbers (and have a built in shock-absorbing coat should they fall) and surprisingly perhaps, all species are thought to be competent swimmers.
Although much loved across their native range, Erinaceus europaeus, is considered a pest species in New Zealand where it was deliberately introduced as a form of biological control, by acclimatisation societies and possible as pet animals. They have now spread to all but the highest parts of New Zealand threatening native species of birds, amphibians, reptiles and directly competing with native mammal species.
In 2020, Erinaceus europaeus was added to the Red List for British Mammals as vulnerable across the lists for Great Britain, England, Scotland and Wales informed by analysis of citizen science data although there remains some uncertainty about true population levels.
Unsurprisingly perhaps they are comparatively well represented in the collections at the Museum including specimens donated and prepared for the Museum from the 19th Century through to much more recent specimens acquired from road death animals for display. The specimen pictured above being one such relatively recent acquisition for display in the Museum’s display case on the animals featured in Alice in Wonderland.
We’ll leave you with one more hedgehog from the Museum’s library and archives. Hedgehogs unusual appearance initially led to some odd beliefs about why their quills existed. For example, in his book ‘The History of Four-Footed Beasts and Serpents’ (1658) Edward Topsell wrote:
“The hedgehog’s meat is apple, worms and grapes: when he findeth them upon the earth, he rolleth on them until he hath fylled up all his prickles, and then carrieth them home to his den.”
– Edward Topsell
One of the most common questions about hedgehogs is how do they mate? The answer is of course, very carefully.
A few weeks ago we asked for your insect jokes in our post ‘Why did the insect cross the road?’ and you didn’t disappoint us! Here is our top ten selection of the best of your jokes, including those you sent to us online, or that we heard on our visits to schools.
I have a joke about fireflies that most people say is brilliant! alyiakerenina
What do you call a fly with no wings? A walk! Year 3 Great Horwood School
Why are entomologists like spies?They’re always looking for bugs! Anonymous
Why did the boy throw butter into the air?He wanted to see butterfly! Year 4 Bearbrook Primary School
Where do you take a sick hornet? Waspital! anonymous
How do fire flies start a race? Ready, steady, glow! Year 4 Cadmore End Primary School
What is red and black and lives underwater? A ladybird in a submarine! Anonymous
What happened to the Queen bee when she kissed a frog? She broke out in hives! Kerri
Which insect is best with numbers? An account-ant! Anonymous
What do you say to a naughty bumble bee? Bee-hive yourself! Year 5 Thameside Primary School
Think you can do better? We’d love to hear more jokes. Just enter them in the comments below, or send them using the form on the Contact Us page.
To mark Plant Appreciation Day today, Lauren Baker and Chris Thorogood of the University of Oxford Botanic Garden and Arboretum take us on a quick tour of the evolution of plants: from primitive water-dwelling algae to the colonisation of land, and the eventual success of angiosperms – the flowering plants.
The Earth formed around 4.6 billion years ago, and around 2.7 billion years ago the very first plants evolved. These were the algae, a diverse group that live mainly in water. The ancestor of all modern algae – and the first organisms to photosynthesise – were cyanobacteria. Green algae evolved from these cyanobacteria and are the ancestors to all modern plants.
We owe the air we breathe to plants. With the production of oxygen through photosynthesis came a drastic climatic shift around 2.4-2.0 billion years ago. Known as the Great Oxygenation Event, it dramatically increased oxygen and decreased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Fossil of Margaretia dorus, a 500 million year old algae from Utah, USA
Algae growing in the Outdoor Water Lily Pond at Oxford Botanic Garden
Non-flowering plants
Jump ahead 1.5 billion years and the evolution of plants really takes off. To leave the water, plants needed to develop protection from drying out. The group that colonised the land is called the bryophytes, and includes the liverworts, hornworts and mosses.
Bryophytes are simple plants that lack true roots or ‘plumbing’ vascular tissue such as xylem or phloem. Bryophytes may have evolved from green algae in shallow, fresh water and developed the ability to survive on land when these pools dried out: 470 million years on, you can still see many bryophytes growing in damp habitats today.
A living bryophyte: Marchantia species growing in the Carnivorous House at Oxford Botanic Garden
The first vascular plants appear around 430 million years ago. One of the earliest examples was Cooksonia, consisting of a simple branching stalk without leaves.
Fossilised Cooksonia, one of the earliest vascular plants. This 420-million-year-old fossil is from Lower Wallop in Shropshire. OUMNH C.31324.
Fossilised Cooksonia, one of the earliest vascular plants. This 420-million-year-old fossil is from Lower Wallop in Shropshire. OUMNH C.31324.
Lycophytes, which evolved around 350 million years ago, also have vascular systems that enable water and nutrients to be moved around the plant. This drove the evolution of more complex, multicellular plants.
The ability to pump water allowed lycophytes to grow to heights of 45 m and they formed vast forests. Their remains also make up the coal, oil, and natural gas we use for energy today. More than 1,200 species of lycophytes exist now, grouped into three orders: the club mosses, quillworts and spike mosses.
Fossilised remains of Lepidodendron, an extinct genus of primitive lycophytes
Living lycophytes: Selaginella, growing in the Cloud Forest House at Oxford Botanic Garden
A ‘living fossil’ that can be seen growing at the Botanic Garden is Equisetum, commonly called the horsetail. Horsetails evolved around 350 million and although the species alive today are herbaceous, extinct horsetails such as Calamites once formed large trees. The fossilised remains of Calamites in the collections of the Museum show the vascular tissues that would have carried water and nutrients up the vast trunk of the tree.
Extinct horsetails such as this Calamites once formed large trees. This 300 million year old fossil is from Rhondda Valley, Wales
Horsetail today at Oxford Botanic Garden
Cycads also evolved around the same time as the lycophytes and horsetails. They could easily be confused with palms, but unlike palms they are not flowering plants. Cycads belong to a group of plants called the gymnosperms, a name that literally means ‘naked seed’, and refers to the plants’ reproduction with seeds that are not encased in an ovary. Cycads can survive for over 1,000 years and are very slow growing. Today, the majority of the 200 surviving species are threatened with extinction.
Cycas revoluta, a cycad, growing in the Conservatory at Oxford Botanic Garden
Other living gymnosperms that evolved alongside cycads include the conifers, of which there are many, and ginkgos, of which today there is just one surviving species: Ginkgo biloba, pictured growing at Oxford Botanic Garden
Another ancient and unusual group of gymnosperms that evolved alongside cycads and lycophytes are Gnetophytes, which include plants such as Ephedra, Welwitschia, and Gnetum. There are about 40 living species of Gnetum, and they are tropical evergreen trees, shrubs and lianas. Before DNA sequencing technology, they were believed to be the closest living relatives of flowering plants due to the sugary sap they produce to attract pollinating insects, like the nectar produced by flowers.
Fossils of Ephedra date back as long as 120 million years ago. They are pollinated by both wind and insects, and are found across all continents except for Australia. With small, scale-like leaves they are highly adapted to arid environments, growing in sandy soils with direct sun exposure.
But perhaps the most familiar gymnosperms are the conifers. Conifers include the world’s oldest tree, the bristlecone pine, and the world’s largest tree, the giant Sequoia. There are over 615 species of conifers, most belonging to the pine family, Pinaceae.
Brachyphyllum expansum, an extinct conifer which belonged to the family Araucariaceae – famous for including the monkey puzzle tree
A monkey puzzle tree, Araucaria araucana, at Oxford Botanic Garden
Flowering plants
The evolution of flowering plants – the angiosperms – 125 million years ago, was the start of a global botanical competition with gymnosperms, and it changed the appearance of our planet forever. The fossil record shows the earliest flowering plants bloomed alongside the dinosaurs, and probably looked something like a magnolia.
Magnolia stellata blooming at Oxford Botanic Garden
Unlike the gymnosperms, the angiosperms reproduce with flowers and their seeds are contained within protective ovaries. Despite their relatively late emergence, the diversity of flowering plant species was accelerated by their evolution alongside insect pollinators. Today, of the roughly 350,000 known plant species, 325,000 are flowering plants.
Whilst more famously known for their foliage, acers are also angiosperms. This fossil of Acer tricuspidatum is 30 million years old, from Oeningen, Switzerland
One of the many Acer species showcasing its autumn colour at Harcourt Arboretum
For April Fool’s Day, our Senior Collections Manager Darren Mann recounts the story of an elegantly fake butterfly – Papilio ecclipsis –asking whether it was a piece of scientific fraudulence or practical joke that went awry.
James Petiver, a 17th-century London apothecary, was renowned for having one of the largest natural history collections in the world. Petiver (1665-1718) published some of the first books on British insects and created common names for some of our butterflies.
Volume 3, Plate II of Jones Icones – the two lower images are of Papilio ecclipsis
On plate 10 of his Gazophylacium naturae et artis — an illustrated catalogue of British insects (1702) he figured a unique butterfly that “exactly resembles our English Brimstone Butterfly were it not for those black Spots, and apparent blue Moons in the lower wings”. It was given to him by his late friend and butterfly collector William Charlton (1642-1702). This butterfly was later named Papilio ecclipsis by the father of taxonomy himself, Carl Linnaeus, in his 1763 work Centuria Insectorum Rariorum, and it became known as the Charlton Brimstone or the blue-eyed brimstone.
Petiver’s collection was purchased by Sir Hans Sloane (1660–1753), who later donated his entire ‘cabinet of curiosity’ to the nation, becoming the foundation for the Natural History Museum, London, originally part of the British Museum. It was here that wine merchant and naturalist William Jones (1745-1818) examined and later figured Petiver’s specimen in his Icones, an unpublished masterpiece of some 1,500 watercolour images of butterflies.
Jones’ Icones, held in the Museum’s archive, is the subject of numerous articles and is still examined by butterfly specialists the world over. Many of the specimens figured by Jones are no longer in existence, being ravished by pests or lost over time, so all that remains of these butterflies are the painted images within.
A drawer of British butterflies from the cabinet of William Jones. The Common Brimstone butterfly is the fourth from the right on the top row
When visiting London, Danish entomologist Johann Christian Fabricius (1745-1808) studied the paintings that Jones made and described over 200 species of butterfly new to science. Fabricius also visited the British Museum where he examined Petiver’s specimen of ecclipsis. In Entomologia systematica (1793) Fabricius revealed the enigmatic ecclipsis to be no more than a painted and “artificially spotted” specimen of the Common Brimstone (Gonepteryx rhamni). So, the dark spots and blue eyes were merely artistic licence, but whose?
Iconotypes, published by Thames & Hudson, will be available from October 2021
Petiver’s specimen, seen by both Jones and Fabricus in the British Museum in the late 18th century, had mysteriously disappeared by the following century. It is said that when Dr. Gray (1748-1806), Keeper of National Curiosities at the Museum, heard of the deception he became so enraged that he “indignantly stamped the specimen to pieces.”
It is still unclear whether this was an example of scientific fraud by Charlton, or if it was intended as a practical joke that went awry.
There remain two specimens of ecclipsis in the collection of the Linnean Society. Although it is uncertain who created these, it is believed that these replicas were made by none other than our very own William Jones, as he was one of the few who had the artistic skills to undertake such work. The forthcoming publication of Iconotypes, showing Jones’ Icones in all its splendour, will hopefully demonstrate how he had both the knowledge and the skill to recreate these fascinating fakes.
Links and References
Salmon, M., Marren, P., Harley, B. (2001) The Aurelian legacy: British butterflies and their collectors. University of California Press.
By Nina Morgan – geologist, science writer and Honorary Associate of the Museum Picture research by Danielle Czerkaszyn, Librarian and Archivist
The expansion of the railways in the 19th century offered more than just faster travel times. The growing rail network opened up the potential for introducing the wonders of geology, scenery and history to the travelling public at large. It also made it possible for geologists working in the field to import the comforts of home. And it spawned a new form of popular science and travel writing – describing geology and scenery from the train.
The geologist John Phillips, then based in York but later first Keeper of the Museum, was among the first to recognise these advantages. In 1841 he was on assignment mapping with the fledgling geological survey in southwest Wales. He expected the project to last several months, so rented a house in Tenby and – missing his home life – asked his sister Anne, along with Mary, her maid, and Cholo, their dog, to travel from York to Tenby join him.
Letter from John Phillips to his sister Anne, 28 April, 1841 (OUMNH Archive)
It was a marathon journey. In a long letter to Anne written on 28 April 1841, he provided her with detailed instructions about how to achieve it. Although it is clear that Phillips had become very familiar with the train timetables, he was not so sure about the rules for travelling with dogs. Two days later he wrote again to Anne to say:
“How you will bring poor Cholo I do not even conjecture. Perhaps they will let him be with you in the carriage…. Pray have a good courage then all will go right.”
John Phillips’s popular railway guidebook, 2nd edition, 1855 (OUMNH collection)
Phillips’s book, Railway Excursions from York, Leeds and Hull, first published in 1853, was a popular success. It went through several editions and was republished several times under various titles. Along with references to geology, the book included much historical background about the buildings, sights to be seen, and advice on the top ‘tourist destinations’ and how to reach them.
Phillips’s book inspired other geologists to jump onto the platform, and as new lines opened, so new railway geology guidebooks began to appear. Notable examples include the Geology of the Hull and Barnsley Railway by Edward Maule Cole, which appeared in 1886; and Yorkshire from a Railway Carriage Window, included as Part 2 in the massive Geology of Yorkshire by Percy Fry Kendall, Emeritus Professor of Geology at Leeds University, and Herbert Wroot, Honorary secretary of the Yorkshire Geological Society, which was published in 1924.
Illustrations from Geology from a Railway Window, part 2 of The Geology of Yorkshire by Percy Fry Kendall and Herbert B. Wroot, 1924 (OUMNH collection)
Network rail
As the railway network expanded throughout Britain, so did the number of authors keen to describe the geology of their part of the country from the windows of a train. In 1878, the Geologists’ Association organised an excursion to examine the geology exposed in railway cuttings along the Banbury and Cheltenham District Railway from Chipping Norton to Hook Norton. Participants were advised to take the train from Paddington to Chipping Norton, with luggage directed to The White Hart, Chipping Norton.
In 1886, Sir Edward Poulton, later Hope Professor of Zoology at the University of Oxford, published an account of The Geology of the Great Western Railway journey from Oxford to Reading. Then in 1945, the Oxford geologist W.J. Arkell published his classic paper, Geology and Prehistory from the train, Oxford to Paddington; and in 2005 Philip Powell, a former curator and now Honorary Associate at the Museum, paid tribute to Arkell’s methods of observation by adding a final chapter outlining the geology that can be seen when travelling on part of the Cotswold Line from Moreton in Marsh to Reading, to his 2005 book, The Geology of Oxfordshire.
Meanwhile, the geologist Eric Robinson, now retired from University College London, prepared numerous handouts for his students and amateur guides describing the geology that can be seen from trains leaving from various London stations.
Left: Edward Bagnall Poulton, Oxford-based entomologist and evolutionary biologist, 1856–1943 (OUMNH Archive) ; Centre: The Geology of Oxfordshire by Philip Powell, 2005 (available from www.gravestonegeology.uk, and the OUMNH shop); Right: W.J. Arkell, Oxford-based geologist and palaeontologist, 1904–1958 (OUMNH Archive)
Times past
Along the way all of the ‘railway geologists’ painted vivid pictures both of the geology and the countryside as they saw it, and their descriptions – especially those from the earlier publications – provide a valuable insight into landscapes and railway lines now lost.
“A railway tour is life in a hurry,” Phillips proclaimed in his pioneering railway book. He clearly enjoyed the rush, and so did the many other geological authors and lovers of the countryside who followed in his tracks. Even today, with a railway geology book in hand, those delays along the line can turn into a real pleasure – depending where you’re held up, of course!
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I love a good joke, or even the odd bad joke. I am now on the lookout for new insect jokes. This is where you come in. We want to hear your insect jokes, both ones that you have heard and ones that you have created yourselves. Here are a few ideas and examples to get you started and in the zone:
Traditional Jokes
There are some jokes that have been around for a while. Most people know the original form, and enjoy making up new variations of those same jokes. Here are some insect versions of popular traditional jokes:
Examples of Traditional Jokes (Knock Knock! Who’s there? Abby! Abby who? A bee just stung me; Why did the insect cross the road? To get away from the pesti-side; Doctor Doctor. I keep seeing an insect buzzing about my head! Don’t worry! It’s just a bug that’s going around.)
Puns
Many jokes rely on puns, some clever, some less so. A pun is a play-on-words, and makes use of different possible meanings of the same, or similar, words. To illustrate this I will tell you about some of my insect puns:
They are un-bee-lieveable. I hope they are not fly-ing over your head. Some people find them annoying. Do they bug you?
As you can see you can drop them into general conversation, they can be incorporated into a story or they can form the punchline of your joke:
Joke with a pun as the punchline (What is a grasshopper’s favourite sport? Cricket)
Another word for pun is paronomasia, though this term is a little too pun-usual for my taste.
One liners
A one liner is a joke that is made up of just one line or sometimes even just one sentence. You have to listen closely, or you may miss the punchline. You may not even realise that the person is telling a joke until they have finished:
I saw a fantastic film about a really large insect. It was XL ant!
No doubt you can tell better insect jokes than the ones above. Please share them with us in the comments below.
