Project launches a website with 10,000 legs!

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Click to enlarge

Project launches a website with 10,000 legs!

A FREE, easy-to-use, on-line invertebrate and host plant database will shortly open up the world of plant-feeding insects to all New Zealanders.

The database pulls together information that has traditionally been scattered in scientific literature, biological collections and scientific libraries – making it accessible to anyone around the world via the web.

The project has been made possible thanks to two New Zealand Crown Research Institutes, Crop & Food Research and Landcare Research, with the support of the TFBIS programme administered by the Department of Conservation.

Research leader Dr Nicholas Martin, of Crop & Food Research, says the database was originally developed to keep track of information about leaf mining insects and gall forming insects, as well as mites, but has grown to the point that it is now a broad insect-plant database, linking New Zealand plants with their insect and mite herbivores.

“I think Plant-SyNZ will be a wonderful tool for gardeners, students, teachers and anyone involved in native plants and native ecosystems,” says Dr Martin.

“It does not assume too much knowledge and is supported by web pages that explain the concepts used, such as what is a herbivore, what is a host plant, and explanations on how to use the various tools such as the invertebrate identification charts.

“Most people think that any insect feeding on a plant is a pest, but native herbivores are part of New Zealand’s biodiversity and they have as much right to exist in our native ecosystems as any other native animal.”

Dr Martin says the database will keep on expanding but at present it contains the names of 1386 plant species, 2482 insect and mite species and 6209 herbivore-host plant associations.

Dr Martin says the project is particularly important to him because he believes there are a lot of untold stories about New Zealand’s native invertebrates and plants.

“One of my favourite plants is the pohutukawa. I know people get concerned sometimes by the holes that appear in the leaves. But the holes are made by a tiny native beetle that only lives on pohutukawa and related plants. Pohutukawa also supports a native fly Fergusonina. This insect is fascinating because it has a mutual and complicated dependency on a nematode worm. This worm helps the fly form a stem gall on the plant and the fly lives inside this gall feeding on the tissue. In the natural environment, these insects are not harmful to the plant.

“The Plant-SyNZ database is about making these important connections between plant and plant-feeding insect.”

To find out more about the herbivores that may be living on your native plants visit the database at www.crop.cri.nz/home/plant-synz

ENDS

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