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Publishing your natural history observations

12 June 2020

Publishing Natural History Notes

Traditionally, all accounts of the world around us were natural history observations. Early biologists had other jobs and practiced their natural history in their spare time. Professional natural historians were very often landed gentry for whom actually earning a living wasn’t a daily occupation. Philosophical clubs where these gentlemen (as at the time they were usually men - a trend that has thankfully changed) met and discussed their observations, and sometimes published the talks in pamphlet form for general circulation. These observations are at the core of the first publications in the first ever journal (see herefor some juicy examples). 

Accumulating natural history observations over time is a very powerful means of conducting science. However, this has largely fallen out of favour, due in part to the professionalisation of science and the proliferation of scientists who need to remain publicly accountable for their work. You can decide whether the demise of the monied classes that used their privilege to observe natural history was a good thing. But you can’t deny the power of the accumulation of many observations over a lifetime, which can be extremely important when you look at what cumulative observations can lead to, such as that of Charles Darwin and “The Origin of Species”. For a longer read on the interaction of ecology and natural history, have a look at this article in American Scientist.

In this series of blogs on writing and publishing, we have been mostly interested in hypothesis driven research (seehereandhere). But when you trace back the literature on which many of the original big ideas are founded (see here), they are almost always natural history observations. Hence, publishing natural history observations is important, and the recognition of this can be seen in the increasing number of journals that are prepared to accept manuscripts to accommodate these. 

What are natural history notes?

Natural history notes are accounts of novel information, once-off or multiple/methodical observations and range from a short paper to a few structured paragraphs. There are some observations that you know do have value, but are not necessarily in your line of enquiry or even direct interest. They expand our natural history knowledge, specifically with biological information not broad or detailed enough for a paper. But by growing the records of these published observations, we increase our understanding of behaviour, biology, and ecology. 


How do you decide whether your observation is worth a note?

Knowing what does and what doesn’t make a natural history note is probably related to your experience in the field, or down to how well read you are on a given topic. If you don’t know, and can’t easily find out (yes, google scholar is a good place to start -see here) whether or not your observation is important to record, then write and ask someone who would know. It is easy to communicate these days, and you might find someone that can help with relevant literature. You can always start by asking your advisor for some names. 

Of course, you may know (as soon as you make the observation) that it is noteworthy. So in this case, what should you record?


What should you record?

  • Time, date, location (preferably with GPS coordinates)
  • The species involved (and any potential interactions with any other species)
  • Environmental data (if you have it - remember that temperature and weather is very important for ectotherms)
  • Context and a description 
  • A picture, video, or sound recording of the observation (if at all possible)

Be aware that especially if you are in the field, it may not be possible to get some of this information again. So it’s really important to save as much as possible, even if you don’t use it all.  

Older biologists will likely tell you that there is no substitute for writing everything down in a field notebook. Actually, there is and you can record everything digitally, including dictating field notes. It’s then up to you to make sure that this is all backed up so that you don’t lose anything and light the touchpaper on the smug notebook holding oldies. Yes, your phone can do all this (and more), but you do need to keep your phone safe.

Whatyou must not do, is to try to remember anything in your head! This simply won’t work. It may be several years before you realise the importance of your observation, and by this time your head will have erased all of the important details. Notebooks are more fun to go back through, especially when they preserve some of your feelings at the time and often (for me) squashed invertebrates between the pages, that remind you of the genuine atmosphere. It becomes a kind of professional diary, and likely something that you’ll only ever be able to share with your future self. But it’s nice to share!


Where to publish your natural history note?

As you should know by now, my preference is for you to publish your work somewhere where it can be found by others. If at all possible, submit to something indexed in Web of Science or Scopus (see why here). 

Here are some ideas of places where you could submit your natural history note. Note that not all are equivalent, and you’ll only get very important observations into American Naturalist or Ecology, while nearly anything goes in Biodiversity Observations! In every case, you’ll need to consult the instructions to authors and make sure that your observation has what it takes. 

Indexed in Web of Science / Scopus

Not indexed

Herpetology Notes

African Herp News

American Naturalist

Herpetological Review

African Journal of Ecology

Urban Naturalist

Austral Ecology

Herpetological Bulletin

The Scientific Naturalist

(within Ecology)

Tropical Natural History

Bioinvasion Records

Biodiversity Observations

Once you’ve decided where you want to submit, I suggest that you download some of the published observations that will give you a good idea of the style that you will need to use. 


What needs to be in your natural history note?

Rather like any scientific publication, your natural history note needs to have some context for the observation. If the total note is only a paragraph, then this might be only a sentence or two. But if your contribution is going to be several pages, then you’ll likely need several paragraphs that provide enough background information for the reader to know why your observation is significant. Include sufficient citations to previously published records where relevant.


The observation itself!Try to include as much of the information that you collected at the time as possible. The journal will likely have specific ways in which each of these is to be provided, so make sure that you follow their instructions. You can include links to videos or recordings that are archived somewhere formally (either at the journal or there are plenty of collections for this stuff). Most journals will allow you to publish a picture if you have one, and for some you will have to have a picture in order to publish. 

Lastly, provide some discussion about why you think the observation is significant. Does it provide new insight into this taxon? Does it allow you to make management recommendations? What further lines of enquiry should be made now that this observation has been recorded? How does your observation fit into the bigger picture?


Some examples

I have published a few natural history observations (certainly not as many as Martin Whiting), and I will publish more. I store these in a special place (see here). 

An example of a favorite isMeasey & Turner (2008):

This is the amusing tale of what happened when Adrew Turner decided to put a live caecilian into his mouth! Yes, sometimes your friends do odd things to amuse you, and it kinda backfires. Andrew suffered greatly, and as soon as he started reacting I got out my notebook and started recording his symptoms. I sat and watched him for several hours as he spat repeatedly out of the taxi window on our way back to the hotel. Yes, there was great mirth in the entire episode, but I knew immediately that there was important significance as there had been no publications on the subject of caecilian toxins at that time.

[once I’m back in the office I’ll upload an image of the notebook page]

According to Google Scholar, this note has been cited 3 times, so it wasn’t all for nothing! However, I still regret not having got to my camera fast enough to get the picture of Andrew with a caecilian in his mouth!

Thanks James!

Many thanks to James Baxter-Gilbert who originally gave a presentation for the MeaseyLab that inspired this blog post. James also edited this post - so thanks again!







  Lab  Writing

Writing the Materials and Methods section

09 June 2020

Writing Materials & Methods

Previously, we have covered writing a paper as aformulae, theintroductionand thediscussion. There’s no real reason why I haven’t covered Materials & Methods or the Results sections, other than they tend to be easier than the rest. Here I am going to share some ideas to get you started on your Materials and Methods section. 

You should start writing this section in your proposal, and you may have to alter parts of it when turning it into your thesis later (if you change your methods). For most people, it’s a relatively simple exercise, but here are some pointers to get you started.

The Materials and Methods section should be citation dense, especially if you have used standard methods that have been written up elsewhere. If there are different methods, you should also explain why you used one over the other, as reviewers or examiners may require this. 

If you are introducing new methodologies, then you can expect to write a lot in this section about exactly how this was done, as well as the background to the reasons why the new approach to the methodology was taken.

Your aim is to produce a coherent methodology that anyone in the next 200 years can pick up and follow in order to replicate your study. 


Sections or subheadings

As ever, I’m going to recommend inserting section headers into your Materials and Methods to help you break it up into bite sized chunks. These are principally for the reader, but will also make your job easier.


Study organism or study system

Having already written the introduction (see here), you will know that there isn’t too much space to write a lot of information about your study organism. However, often there is important background information that is needed on the species, which would be distracting or lose the flow of the introduction. By having a ‘Study Organism’ section at the start of your Materials and Methods, you can add in all relevant information in a paragraph or two. 

For example, if you are working on African clawed frogs,Xenopus laevis, this would be the section where you can explain their distribution, that they are principally aquatic, or that they are invasive on four continents. You probably won’t need all of these points, but just the aspects of this species’ biology that is relevant to your study. You should make sure you know whether or not the journal requires the taxonomic authority. If you are not sure, include it now -see here for an explanation

Similarly, if you are working on Guttural toads,Sclerophrys gutturalis, you can write in this section the known dates when they were introduced to Mauritius and Reunion, and how we know that those animals came from Durban. You can also give details of their natural range in sub-Saharan Africa. 

If you are working on a community of animals, or it is the geographical region that is more important than any single species, you should explain the study system here. For example, if your study is about the fynbos, then you should provide some background information about this kind of vegetation here. 

If relevant, you may need to provide a map with the location of samples that you used in this section. My preference is to try to provide a composite figure that will also include an image of your study organism (if relevant). 


Animal husbandry

If you have kept animals in the lab in order to do experiments, then here you can provide details of their welfare: housing, feeding, light:dark cycles, temperature, etc. If you bred animals to produce your study life-history stage, all relevant information is needed here. All this information should be available from your ethics application. Some journals will want you to include the details of your ethics permission here.


Repetitive methodology

If you’ve used the same methodology for each part of your data collection (like DNA extraction, sequencing, etc.), you should have a section that explains all of this prior to any experimental manipulations done. It’s best to go to look to see what other people have reported on in order to know what level of detail to include. For example, 20 years ago it would have been important to include detailed information of how you extracted DNA from tissues. Today, you can probably say that you used a standard extraction kit or salt extraction without saying more. 


Experimental manipulations & data collection

If you have done more than one kind of experiment, it’s probably a good idea to give each a separate subheading. Be consistent with these subheadings between the Materials and Methods and the Results.

One very important point here is to fully explain the collection of all of the variables that are used in your analyses. Remember to use exactly the same names for your variables here, as you have in the introduction (and will use in your graphs, figures and Results sections). It’s very important that the reader gets this consistency across sections. Please also remember to include all units that you collect data in (there is a space between numbers and units!), and the accuracy of the measuring equipment used. 

Equipment: Many journals require that you name the company that you bought equipment from as well as the town and country where it was made. This is to help others that might want to buy the same equipment (although it’s a bit outdated in these days of multinational companies). You should try to get all of the model numbers of equipment as you do the work, so that you are not scrambling later on to find out what they were. It’s really quick and easy to take a picture of this at the time. 

If you have built or designed new equipment for your Materials and Methods, you can expect to make a diagram of this here, if it can’t be adequately described in a paragraph. 


Data analysis (or Data analyses if plural)

This section is getting increasingly longer as people do ever more fancy statistical manipulations. As above, it’s very important that you use the same names for the variables as you have introduced and collected them. In addition to explaining the specific tests that you performed, you should explain what roles the variables have as dependent, independent, or random variables in your model.

The independent variablehas variation that does not depend on that of any other measured. These are usually measured by you during the experiment.

The dependent variableis usually the one that you are testing to see whether any of the independent variables explain it.

Random variablesare subject to variations outside of your experimental control but that you want to make sure do not influence your interpretation of the dependent variable. Examples of random variables might be the order in which you did the experiment, or the position in your experimental setup).

You should be familiar with the terms above from when you formulated your hypothesis (see here for a refresher). 

Any transformation of any of the data that you collected (e.g. log, ln, cosine) should be mentioned here, along with tests that you performed to ensure that they adhere to the conditions required for the statistical test that you conducted. 

Give the name for each package in R that you use, together with its citation. Also give a citation to R as well as the version that you used in your analysis. If you don’t use the latest version of R, then your reviewers may want to know why, so always remember to update your version of R when you do your analysis.


Did you leave anything out?

By following your Materials and Methods, anyone else should be able to repeat your work. If there isn’t enough detail for someone else to conduct the same experiment or survey, then you will need to add this information somewhere. For example, a list of sampling points or a database of sequences might be needed in Supplementary Information.

TheMaterials and Methods section can often get overly long, and is relatively easy to edit to make it much shorter. In journals where there is a word count limit, you may want to move some of the Materials and Methods into a supplementation information section. 

  Lab  Writing

Publicity for Biological Invasions in South Africa

05 June 2020

Publicity for our new book: Biological Invasions in South Africa

Today is Environment Day, and to celebrate, Brian van Wilgen has been given interviews to journalists about our new book: Biological Invasions in South Africa. Since the book was released free online in March (see blogpost here), the chapters have been downloaded 154 thousand times! 

Some of the great information shared in this book is about alien trees that consume ~5% of our scarce water resources, in South Africa. Invasive species pose a direct threat to the survival of almost half of 1 600 native species listed in South Africa’s Red Data List. The book provides information on 1 422 alien species including plants, birds, mammals, fish, reptiles & amphibians. 

A newpaper article in the Witness:

You can listen to Brian's interview on this podcast or this radio interview.


Funding

03 June 2020

Funding databases

Funding is one of the most important aspects of doing science, and something that different emphasis is placed on in different parts of the world. In North America, in particular, graduate students are expected to be able to demonstrate that they are able to raise their own funds, as this is expected of them in their jobs as academics. No matter where you are, your CV will be greatly improved by showing prospective employees (or labs) that you can generate your own funding. North America has a lot of opportunities to apply for funding for all sorts of reasons. There are less opportunities elsewhere, but the pool of people applying is also smaller. There are now so many opportunities, that several databases exist to help you find appropriate funding for your particular situation.

Our focus today is to have a look at some of these portals, and to quickly consider some of the major reasons why you might want to apply for funding.


Reasons you might want to apply for funding:

  1. To improve your CV. Even if it’s only a small amount of funding that you apply for, it will make your CV look better. You might also want to search for prizes. Academic prizes carry both money and that feel good, look good feeling that CVs need.
  2. Your project is unfunded. If you are completely unfunded, or you have a bursary but no running expenses, then you are going to need money to do your work. The more work (particularly field work) that you want to do, the more money you’ll need to raise.
  3. Your project is funded, but you want to do more. Although CIB bursaries come with running expenses, if you want to do a lot extra (like side projects or paying assistants to collect extra data) then all of this is possible if you can raise some more money to do it. 
  4. You want to attend a conference or workshop. There are great opportunities for travelling around the world, but they cost money and international conferences are often very expensive.
  5. Publishing in Open Access journals. I find the idea of putting cash into the pockets of publishers abhorrent, but you may have little choice. There are some opportunities to get funding for OA publishing. 


It is clear that without making an application, you won’t get any funding. But where do you start?

  1. Databases. There are many databases, but here we’ll mention 3 that are easy to use. 
    1. Mendeley:https://www.mendeley.com/

This is probably my favorite. It’s easy to use and apply or remove filters. You can use the same login that you have for the referencing software and SCOPUS. 

  1. Stellenbosch University Open 4 Research:https://www.open4research.eu/stellenbosch

For this you’ll need a sun.ac.za email address to register, but you’ll get access to their research database. It is nice and logical to use, and you’ll find local and international funding opportunities. 

  1. Research Professional:https://www.researchprofessional.com/ 

You’ll need to create a login for this site, although you might get an in with your university address. This provides you access to what could well be the same database as those above. This is a slick database and relatively easy to use.

If you are South African, or studying in South Africa, the NRF has a lot of opportunities to get funding. They have travel funds specifically for attending workshops and conferences, and students from our lab have a good track record of getting money for this. It’s well worth applying. You’ll need a login for the nrf, but you must have this if you are a student in South Africa. 

  1. Opportunities in your department or societies:

Probably the most likely place to get funding is where you already have an “in” (where you are already known). This will include professional societies where you are a member, or your department or university. These places also have prizes, so it’s good that you know what is on offer in order to benefit the most. 


  Lab  Writing

INVAXEN video now out

27 May 2020

BiodivERsA has officially released the INVAXEN video

Yes, it's the moment that you've been waiting for so long. The INVAXEN video was the result of winning a competition to publicise the outcome of the project. The output was a collaboration between INVAXEN researchers, BiodivERsA and the company Squarefish. It was quite illuminating to see the process of the script, storyboard, animation and then hiring the voice-over and music. 

Here's the finished product:

And the blurb underneath:

This animated movie shows the results of the INVAXEN project (“INVAsive biology of XENopus laevis in Europe”) which studied the biology, ecology, and impact of the highly invasive African clawed frog (Xenopus laevis). The scientists developed models to predict future invasion patterns and passed on their scientific findings to local stakeholders to collaborate with them on conservation actions. The video shows how BiodivERsA-funded projects not only excel in their scientific research, but also how relevant they are at societal level, and how they can help with management practices on the field. ~ This research was funded by the ERA-Net BiodivERsA, with the national funders ANR (France), BelSPO (Belgium), DFG (Germany), FCT (Portugal), part of the 2012-13 joint call for research proposals on invasive species and biological invasions. The Belgian Biodiversity Platform & BiodivERsA led the production of this video, along with the INVAXEN researchers and the animation & motion design studio Squarefish.

  Frogs  Lab  Xenopus
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