Meet Craspedotropis gretathunbergae, a new snail species discovered in Brunei on the island of Borneo, now named in honor of Greta Thunberg. The discoverers say that Caenogastropod land snails, such as this species, are likely to suffer because of climate change, hence they named it after the world’s most beloved climate activist.
The group of citizen scientists, on a guided expedition with the scientific field trip company Taxon Expeditions, collected the snails as they were foraging among vegetation at night along the south bank of the Belalong river in Brunei Darussalam (Borneo). The tiny snail is approximately 2 mm long and 1 mm wide with grey tentacles and a concave shell.
The newly described snail belongs to the so-called caenogastropods, a group of land snails known to be sensitive to drought, temperature extremes and forest degradation. Researchers say they named the mollusc after Greta Thunberg to acknowledge the fact her generation will be responsible for fixing problems they did not create. The discoverers have approached Ms. Thunberg and learned that she would be 'delighted' to have this species named after her.
Check out the link in the tweet above for more pictures from the expedition.
Here are some figures of the snail shell from the paper —
You can see the snail in action in the video below -
The Kuala Belalong Field Studies Center
The discovery site is close to the Kuala Belalong Field Studies Center in Brunei shown below. "Kuala" means "confluence of rivers"; Belalong is the river flowing through the Ulu Temburong National Park.
You can see a few images of the Centre and the area around it in the video below -
Here is a video to get a feel for how the rain forest in Brunei looks and feels like -
Taxon Expeditions
Taxon Expeditions is a Netherlands based organization which focuses on education and biodiversity discovery. They organize expeditions to remote areas for people interested in nature and science and help them make scientific discoveries. International experts are engaged to guide them through all the steps of real scientific research. Together, they discover, name, and publish completely new species of organisms. Their website states -
Always wanted to be a modern Darwin and discover new species of wildlife? Then join Taxon Expeditions! We offer a unique experience in biodiversity hotspots around the world for the untrained biodiversity enthusiast. Our experts will teach you the tricks of the trade of discovering, naming, and describing new species. You will enter the forest with bug nets and jars, and emerge with previously unknown creepy-crawlies that you get to name yourselves in top-notch scientific journals!
Nelloptodes gretae
This is not the first organism named after Greta. Just a few months ago, a tiny beetle from Kenya was named Nelloptodes gretae by the Natural History Museum in London. The newly discovered beetle belongs to a group of some of the smallest known free-living animals — it is less than 1 mm long, has no eyes or wings, and belongs to the Ptiliidae family of beetles which includes some of the smallest insects in the world. The beetle was first collected in samples of soil and leaf litter from Nairobi, Kenya by Dr. William C. Block in the 1960s.
Dr. Michael Darby, a Scientific Associate at the Natural History Museum, London, who named the beetle, said: ‘I chose this name as I am immensely impressed with the work of this young campaigner and wanted to acknowledge her outstanding contribution in raising awareness of environmental issues.”
Liturgusa algorei
This speedy praying mantis species was named after Al Gore in 2014 for “environmental activism including his efforts to raise public awareness of global climate change.”
Spintharus berniesandersi
On a related note, Bernie Sanders has a species of Spiders named after him. A couple of years ago, Professor Ingi Agnarsson of the University of Vermont and his undergraduate students discovered 15 new species of "smiley-faced" spiders—and named them after, among others, David Attenborough, Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, Leonardo DiCaprio, David Bowie and Bernie Sanders.
Organisms named after Obama
And let’s not forget the love and respect for Obama among naturalists. Here are a few of nature’s creatures, living and ancient, lovingly named after Obama -
Taxon (Name)
|
Organism Type
|
Aptostichus barackobamai
|
Spider, found in northern California
|
Spintharus barackobamai
|
Spider, found in the Caribbean islands |
Nystalus obamai
(video)
|
Bird, from Bolivia |
Caloplaca obamae
|
Lichen, found on Santa Rosa Island, CA
|
Obamadon gracilis
|
Extinct reptile, 66 million years ago
|
Paragordius obamai
|
Horsehair worm, found in Kenya
|
Baracktrema obamai
|
Parasitic flatworm, found in Malaysian turtles |
Etheostoma obama
(Obamafish!)
|
A very rare Fish, from eastern North America
|
Tosanoides obama
|
Fish, discovered in Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, Hawaii. |
Obamus coronatus |
Extinct soft-bodied animal from the Ediacaran Period, 580-540 million years ago |
Check out the links to previous diaries below for stories about organisms named after Obama and other Democrats.
Epilogue
It is a great honor to have a marvel from nature named after you and to be recognized by scientists and researchers all over the world. It is an honor generally bestowed to progressives, since Science definitely has a liberal bias😉
Further Reading
- Craspedotropis gretathunbergae, a new species of Cyclophoridae (Gastropoda: Caenogastropoda), discovered and described on a field course to Kuala Belalong rainforest, Brunei — bdj.pensoft.net/...
- New species (beetle) named after climate activist Greta Thunberg — www.nhm.ac.uk/…
- Nelloptodes gretae (beetle) — en.wikipedia.org/…
- Spintharus berniesandersi — en.wikipedia.org/…
- Obamus coronatus - an Organism from the Precambrian Eon named after Obama =- www.dailykos.com/…
- Science, Students, Scholars and Spiders have a Liberal Bias ;) — www.dailykos.com/…
- Famously Named Organisms — www.dailykos.com/...