Transcript Third PBI South African Field Trip October 6

Third PBI South African Field Trip
October 6 - 29, 2007
This third and final
PBI funded field trip
to South African
Eastern and Western
Cape Provinces
included
Dr. Randall T. Schuh
Dr. Gerry Cassis
Brenda Massie
We collected plant bugs and
host plants along the red dot
 2007 Field Trip Route
route (see right). Our expedition
began and ended at the Table Mountain National Park on the Cape Peninsula. We
drove through diverse habitats, from the fynbos biome on the Cape, to the succulent
Karoo vegetation in the Klein Karoo, and on to the semi-arid Great Karoo.
The field team visited colleague
Mike Picker (see below)
at the University of Cape Town.
Mike imparted his knowledge
regarding local habitats and
collecting sites in
South Africa
Permits arrived and we
headed out to collect
Miridae in the fynbos
vegetation at the Cape
Point and Silvermine
sections of Table
Mountain National
Park. Silvermine runs
northwest-southeast
across the Peninsula
and Cape Point covers
the southernmost area
of the Cape Peninsula.
Both areas are located
very near the Cape of
Good Hope.
Ceres, South Africa
Even though it was as dry at Buffelspoort as anyplace that
we had seen up until then, we managed to collect some
Lygaeoidea on sedges and Hypseloecus on a species of
Loranthaceae. We met friendly locals interested in giving
us access to their land in the name of scientific discovery.
We call this locality, “Matthew’s Piece of Paradise.”
We collected bugs at the Grootfontein College of Agriculture, located in the semi-arid
Great Karoo, near Middelburg, SA. Jacques, our guide, and Joan, the public relations
point person, kindly recommended collecting sites on the 11,418 hectare farm. In a
vegetation type that we had not seen elsewhere on this trip, the Great Karoo habitat
was extremely dry. According to Jacques, the prospect of better collecting presents
itself during the wet season, in late January and February.
We visited Grootfontein’s Museum (right) and
checked out a small plot of land (bottom left)
that has been continuously at-rest since the 1960s.
Notable residents included the tortoise and the
long-haired sheep.
Abandoned termite nest
with aardvark damage
The diversity of plants in flower in
South Africa never ceased to capture
our imagination.
Here are three groups of plants that
consistently produced bugs
throughout the Western and Eastern
Cape Provinces. Upper left is a
species of Asteraceae. Upper right is
a spent Aizoaceae. A Geraniaceae in
the lower left. All three groups serve
as hosts to the bugs in the subfamily
Phylinae that are of interest to the
PBI project.
For the PBI plant bug collector, collecting means
keeping a sharp lookout for plants in flower.
Periodically, a local farmer would inquire into our
activity. Most farmers allowed us to continue to collect
but one farm manager called the police. The police
questioned us politely and then sent us on our way.
Mesem sp.
Pelargonium sp.
Pelargonium sp.
While we were collecting at Neuwoldts
Pass, which is on the road to Algeria in
the Cedarburg Mountains, a Landrover
pulled up and the passenger asked Toby
“Collecting Miridae, I presume?” Soon,
another Landrover pulled up being driven
by heteropterist colleague (upper left)
from the Museum of the Humboldt
University in Berlin. Considering how
remote the locality is, this unexpected
encounter was a real surprise. The upshot
of stopping at that locality was a pleasant
break talking to our colleagues about
collecting insects in South Africa.
Results: 40 localities
100 host plants, and
5000 plant bug specimens