The_Royal_Entomological_Society_Book_of.pdf

Insect Conservation and Diversity (2012) 5, 330 doi: 10.1111/j.1752-4598.2012.00183.x BOOK REVIEW The Royal Entomological Society book of British insects FRANCISCA B. SCONCE Department of Life Sciences, Imperial College London, Silwood Park Campus,...

Insect Conservation and Diversity (2012) 5, 330 doi: 10.1111/j.1752-4598.2012.00183.x BOOK REVIEW The Royal Entomological Society book of British insects FRANCISCA B. SCONCE Department of Life Sciences, Imperial College London, Silwood Park Campus, Sunningdale, UK The Royal Entomological Society Book of British Insects, by Peter C. Barnard. Wiley-Blackwell, October 2011. RRP £39.95, would be very helpful to those initially familiarising themselves (400 pages), ISBN 978-1-4443-3256-8. http://eu.wiley.com/ with the subject. WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-1444332562.html. Overall presentation of the book is clear and simple, following the systematic nature of the content. I do feel, however, that the One does wonder initially when looking through it, for whom images used let down this otherwise excellent work; some are The Royal Entomological Society’s Book of British Insects will be undoubtedly beautiful and descriptive, but many are of a low most useful for? It is described by the publisher as being for ‘stu- resolution and poor quality. At a time when macrophotography dents… amateur entomologists… professionals’, and looking at is increasingly popular and images are widely distributed online, the level of detail included, it seems to exploit a niche between instead of having photographs that are for the most part from a textbooks such as Gullan and Cranston’s ‘The Insects: an outline single person, this book could have been a showcase for some of of Entomology’ and field guides such as Chinery’s ‘Insects of Brit- the excellent insect photographers in the UK. ain and Western Europe’. At the end of his forward to the book, Quentin Wheeler The chapters each describe a different insect order and are describes the British insect fauna as playing a role ‘as a natural grouped monophyletically; this aids a reader’s understanding of laboratory of biodiversity exploration’. I feel that recent initia- the relationships between insect groups, a feature not found in tives such as OPAL, Bioblitz events and television programmes many books. Background information on biology and ecology such as Springwatch are part of a push to involve the general pub- is included for each order, with a classification of subtaxa and a lic and budding naturalists with this so called natural laboratory. list of any species of conservation concern. In particular, there is The new generation of entomologists also has technology on information on each family, with suggested references for help their side: excellent identification guides for many insect groups with identification, which is the real value of this book: it covers are available online, up to date taxonomic information is avail- 558 families of British Insects, including those lesser known. able through sites such as the Scratchpads, and many recording For the author Peter Barnard, this book could be seen as a schemes now have online record submission, some such as the natural progression from his 1999 work ‘Identifying British UK ladybird survey have Smartphone applications for iden- Insects and Arachnids’, written while he was at the Natural tifying and submitting species records while out in the field. History Museum in London. An extensive reference list is pro- The Royal Entomological Society Book of British Insects is vided for each order, with much of the information from the available as a e-book, and I think this is where it will come into 1999 book included, as well as more up to date works and its own. With information on each insect family and hyperlinks URLs to information online such as societies for insect orders, directing to further information online, the book can act as an families and recording schemes. A slight weakness I feel is the interactive ‘Encyclopedia of British Insects’, gathering the wealth index, which surprisingly for a book aimed at students of of information available electronically to us. In this form, I Entomology, has very few English names. I think that these would recommend this book to all Entomologists.  2012 The Authors 330 Insect Conservation and Diversity  2012 The Royal Entomological Society