Beulah GarnerFRES | |
---|---|
Alma mater | University of East Anglia (BSc, MA) |
Scientific career | |
Institutions | Rothamsted Research, Horniman Museum, Natural History Museum, London |
Doctoral advisor | Alfried Vogler, Terry Erwin |
Beulah Garner FRES is an entomologist in the United Kingdom. She is Senior Curator at the Natural History Museum, London and is an expert of beetles, in particular the ground beetles (Carabidae).
Education and career
Garner grew up in Norfolk and was educated at the University of East Anglia where she graduated with a BSc in ecology in 1998. She worked at Rothamsted Research as a Senior Scientific Officer, before studying an MA in Museology back at UEA, graduating in 2008. During her Masters she worked as Assistant Curator at Norfolk Museums Service and then moved to the Horniman Museum, in 2010 she moved to the Natural History Museum, London where she is Senior curator of Carabidae, Cleroidea, Myxophaga and Archostemata.
Research
Garner researched crop protection and biodiversity in agroecosystems during her time at Rothamsted. Her work included the two-spotted spider mite, Tetranychus urticae, aphid controls on sugar beet crops and she also was part of a large project looking at invertebrate responses to genetically modified herbicide-tolerant crops.
As a museum curator she has collaborated on many publications relating to specimens in the NHM collection, including a guide on how to conserve insect specimens affected by verdigris, a problematic substance that develops on entomological pins underneath specimens; checkered beetles and a review of the taxonomic history of pelidnotine scarabs. In 2019 she was involved in work to help automate the identification of insects using imaging, testing a convolutional neural network to classify images of insect specimens.
She co-edited the Royal Entomological Society identification handbook Coleoptera Larvae with Max Barclay in 2019, it details the morphology of beetle larvae in the British Isles and includes dichotomous keys to help identify the taxonomic family or subfamily of a larval specimen.
Garner's thesis is on the 'Systematics and biogeography of Lebiinae: Carabidae: Coleoptera' at Imperial College London and the Natural History Museum, in the lab of Alfried Vogler and she was also co-supervised by the late Terry Erwin. She has worked on a taxonomic revision of the Carabid beetle genus Plochionus, which are beetles that hunt tent-caterpillars, she has also been involved in re-finding the type specimens of Carabus pallens, and has helped to develop rapid biodiversity assessments of tropical rainforest canopy fogging samples, using imaging to identify morphospecies before molecular sequencing, resulting in a larger diversity of species in the Agra genus of Carabid beetles than previously recorded.
Public activities
Garner is an advocate for the need for more women in entomology and support for them, particularly in countries with limited funding for science; in 2009 she was interviewed as part of a project about women in science by teacher and writer Alom Shaha. In 2014 she gave a talk for Ada Lovelace Day highlighting the victorian entomologist Evelyn Cheesman. She expanded on Cheesman's career in interviews for the NHM website and the Daily Telegraph; in 2015 she presented BBC Radio 4 programme on Cheesman, as part of the Natural History Heroes series. In 2019 she co-wrote a paper about Cheesman's career and contributions to science
In 2015 Garner talked with David Baddiel on BBC Radio 4's Today programme about the type of insect that Gregor Samsa transforms into in Franz Kafka's 1915 novella Metamorphosis. Later in 2015 she was interviewed on the Breaking Bio podcast, where she talked about the NHM beetle collections, and challenges that women face doing fieldwork.
In 2021 she gave an online talk about Beetles as part of the NHM's Nature Live series.
Honours and awards
Garner is a Trustee of the Panama Wildlife Conservation Charity, Council member of the Systematics Association, Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society, Chairperson of ColSoc: The Coleopterists Society of Britain and Ireland and President of the Amateur Entomologists' Society.
References
- BArnett, Sam. "Ada Lovelace Day". palaeosam.wordpress.com/. Palaeosam's Blog. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Dewar, A. M.; Haylock, L. A.; Bean, K. M.; Garner, B. H.; Boyce, R. (2000). "The ecology and control of the two-spotted spider mite, Tetranychus urticae, in sugar beet.". The BCPC Conference--Pests & Diseases 2000 : proceedings of an international conference : held at the Brighton Hilton Metropole Hotel, UK, 13-16 November, 2000. Farnham, Surrey: British Crop Protection Council. ISBN 1901396606. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Dewar, A. M.; Haylock, L. A.; Bean, K. M.; Garner, B. H.; Sands, R. J. N.; Ecclestone, P. M. J. (2001). "NOVEL SEED TREATMENTS TO CONTROL APHIDS AND VIRUS YELLOWS IN SUGAR BEET". Seed Treatment: Challenges and Opportunities. BCPC Symposium Proceedings No. 76. British Crop Protection Council. pp. 33–40. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Brooks, D. R.; Bohan, D. A.; Champion, G. T.; Haughton, A. J.; Hawes, C.; Heard, M. S.; Clark, S. J.; Dewar, A. M.; Firbank, L. G.; Perry, J. N.; Rothery, P.; Scott, R. J.; Woiwod, I. P.; Birchall, C.; Skellern, M. P.; Walker, J. H.; Baker, P.; Bell, D.; Browne, E. L.; Dewar, A. J. G.; Fairfax, C. M.; Garner, B. H.; Haylock, L. A.; Horne, S. L.; Hulmes, S. E.; Mason, N. S.; Norton, L. R.; Nuttall, P.; Randle, Z.; Rossall, M. J.; Sands, R. J. N.; Singer, E. J.; Walker, M. J. (29 November 2003). "Invertebrate responses to the management of genetically modified herbicide–tolerant and conventional spring crops. I. Soil-surface-active invertebrates". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences. 358 (1439): 1847–1862. doi:10.1098/rstb.2003.1407. PMC 1693272. PMID 14561318.
- Haughton, A. J.; Champion, G. T.; Hawes, C.; Heard, M. S.; Brooks, D. R.; Bohan, D. A.; Clark, S. J.; Dewar, A. M.; Firbank, L. G.; Osborne, J. L.; Perry, J. N.; Rothery, P.; Roy, D. B.; Scott, R. J.; Woiwod, I. P.; Birchall, C.; Skellern, M. P.; Walker, J. H.; Baker, P.; Browne, E. L.; Dewar, A. J. G.; Garner, B. H.; Haylock, L. A.; Horne, S. L.; Mason, N. S.; Sands, R. J. N.; Walker, M. J. (29 November 2003). "Invertebrate responses to the management of genetically modified herbicide–tolerant and conventional spring crops. II. Within-field epigeal and aerial arthropods". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences. 358 (1439): 1863–1877. doi:10.1098/rstb.2003.1408. PMC 1693277. PMID 14561319.
- Beulah, Garner; Alessandro, Giusti; Malcolm, Kerley (2011). "Conservation of Insect Specimens Affected by Verdigris". NatSCA News (21): 50-59. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Leavengood, John; Garner, Beulah (May 2014). "Nomenclatural notes on some checkered beetle (Coleoptera: Cleridae) types of the Natural History Museum, London (BMNH)". Zootaxa. 3760 (3): 301–35. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.3760.3.1. PMID 24870084. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Moore, Matthew; Jameson, Mary; Garner, Beulah; Audibert, Cédric (April 2017). "Synopsis of the pelidnotine scarabs (Coleoptera, Scarabaeidae, Rutelinae, Rutelini) and annotated catalog of the species and subspecies". ZooKeys (666): 1–349. Bibcode:2017ZooK..666....1M. doi:10.3897/zookeys.666.9191. PMC 5534527. PMID 28769631. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Hansen, Oskar L. P.; Svenning, Jens-Christian; Olsen, Kent; Dupont, Steen; Garner, Beulah H.; Iosifidis, Alexandros; Price, Benjamin W.; Høye, Toke T. (January 2020). "Species-level image classification with convolutional neural network enables insect identification from habitus images". Ecology and Evolution. 10 (2): 737–747. Bibcode:2020EcoEv..10..737H. doi:10.1002/ece3.5921. PMC 6988528. PMID 32015839.
- Barclay, Maxwell; Garner, Beulah (1 August 2019). British Coleoptera larvae. A guide to the families and major subfamilies (1st ed.). Royal Entomological Society. p. 280. ISBN 9781910159033. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Garner, Beulah; Terry, Erwin (November 2015). "Pantropical Carabidae: studies of the genus Plochionus Dejean 1821, the tent-caterpillar hunters". Entomological Society of America Conference. doi:10.13140/RG.2.1.4935.2725. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Beulah, Garner; E. Geoffrey, Hancock (December 2018). "The 'Lost' Types of Carabus Pallens Fabricius, 1775 (Coleoptera: Carabidae: Lebiinae) from the Banks and Hunter Collections: Lectotype Designation, Redescription, and Distribution". The Coleopterists Bulletin. 72 (4): 845. doi:10.1649/0010-065X-72.4.845. S2CID 92051827. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Beulah, Garner; Alfried, Vogler; Terry, Erwin; Laura, Zamorano (August 2019). "The carabids in the trees: rapid biodiversity assessment of an Ecuadorian rainforest". ARPHA Conference Abstracts. 2. doi:10.3897/aca.2.e39251. S2CID 202179741. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Kimbrough, Liz (6 January 2021). "Canopy beetles and flowering trees rely on each other in the Amazon, study". news.mongabay.com/. Mongabay. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Shaha, Alom (30 March 2009). "Why Science is Important". blog.sciencewomen.com. Women in Science. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- "Worldwide Events 2014". findingada.com/. Finding Ada Network. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Lotzof, Kerry. "Lucy Evelyn Cheesman: the woman who walked". www.nhm.ac.uk/. Natural History Museum. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Shaikh, Sameeha (11 October 2018). "Evelyn Cheesman: the 20th century entomologist who helped to open the door for women in science". The Telegraph. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- "Natural History Heroes: Evelyn Cheesman". bbc.co.uk. October 2015. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- Beulah, Garner; Grace, Touzel (February 2019). "The Person Herself Is Not Interesting" Lucy Evelyn Cheesman's Life Dedicated to the Faunistic Exploration of the Southwest Pacific". Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals. 14 (4): 495–530. doi:10.1177/155019061801400407. S2CID 198667545. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- "BBC Radio 4 - Today". www.bbc.co.uk/. BBC. 5 May 2015. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- "BB 88 - Beetles and Battling Sexism with Beulah Garner". podcasts.apple.com. Breaking Bio podcast. September 2015. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- "Nature Live Online: The Beetles". www.nhm.ac.uk. Natural History Museum London. Retrieved 10 August 2021.
- "BEULAH GARNER". panamawildlife.org. Panama Wildlife Conservation Charity. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- "Beulah Garner". systass.org. Systematics Association. 4 October 2017. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
- "Who We Are". ColSoc. The Coleopterists Society of Britain and Ireland. Retrieved 3 February 2022.
- "Council officers". www.amentsoc.org. Amateur Entomologists' Society. Retrieved 3 August 2022.