Spectacular Symbiosis: Leafcutter Ants pt. 1

by Alex Taylor

Of all the animals with which we have the honor of sharing the world, leafcutter ants have to be  amongst the most impressive.  Over the last ~50 million years, the 47 species of leafcutter ants have achieved remarkable evolutionary success, extending their range from Mexico to Argentina. They are the dominant herbivores in the tropical Americas, and can be major agricultural pests, stripping small trees of their …

What’s in a Name

by Colin Roberts

In 2012, The Melbourne Code was published. Though it sounds like Dan Brown’s next novel, it is actually the result of a week long conference of botanists called the International Botanical Congress (the next conference will be in Shenzhen, China in 2017), and it’s the eleventh revision of the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICN). The ICN is basically a …