I have taken exactly 1 programming class. I know about this squints at gap between fingers much Python.
I really, really want to build a tiny little database thingie for plant taxonomy. I have enough Python written up to make a JSON dictionary or a CSV that I can then feed to a web thingie that makes pretty force-directed graphs. I'm a very visual person, so to relate to this data I want floating bubbles GIMME FLOATING BUBBLES THEY MAKE ME HAPPY.
I'm trying to figure out how to download/scrape or whatever the info from places like calflora and the USDA plants database to populate my thing. In the meantime I've manually typed up about 500 partial entries.
I'd really like to at least be able to generate a taxonomy tree. From the species binomial it should be easy to just relate each plant to its parent branches-- species, genus, family, order, class, phylum, kingdom. Simple, right? Ish?
Later I also want to be able to tell my bubble cloud to rearrange itself according to, say, which plants need more or less water, which ones are edible, which ones grow together in different habitats in different areas, all sorts of different things.
Oof. I miss being in class, where I could go to the computer lab and hunker over this sort of thing with buddies.
One of the things I hate and think I'm really bad at, is going through old miscellanea and deciding
(a) whether to keep it (relatively straightforward) and
(b) where to put the stuff I keep.
Which category does it fit in? Is it sentimental stuff I never look at but can't bear to toss? Is it something that's occasionally useful if only I remember that I have it and where I put it?
Is it something I want to peruse for a while and then should just throw out (like my university course notes from 15 years ago) #SpringCleaning#taxonomy
Recent genomic studies show that the parasitic fly Braula evolved within Drosophilidae, flies we know as the workhorses of genetics. See link.
The problem: Braula was named in 1818.
Drosophila was named in 1823.
By the rules of priority, if we organize taxa by their ancestry, then the correct family placement for all these flies, including everyone's precious Drosophila melanogaster, is in Braulidae, not Drosophilidae.
Hello again everyone. I just moved instances so this is my reintroduction.
I'm trained as an entomologist and ecologist with some interests in statistical #ecology and #taxonomy.
Although these days I find myself working more with #UrbanEcology and #SciComm, with some projects looking at the relationship between Malaysian food, art and biodiversity, as well as some ongoing #CitizenSci initiatives to study urban fireflies.
"Is death a condition?"
"What is broader than civet cats?"
"What is a mosquito when it's not being a vector of infection?"
"Can a newborn be an audience? What about an outdoor farmers market?"
"Are 'wildlife photo opportunities' a 'place' "?
"How big does something have to be before it's zoonotic and not just a "Parasitic arthropod"?"
Trying to figure out how to use hashtags productively. Especially when taking notes in Obsidian, I often don’t know whether to link a term to its own note, turn it into a hashtag, or both.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tag_(metadata) reads: “(...) Tags are generally chosen informally and personally by the item's creator or by its viewer, (...) may also be chosen from a controlled vocabulary. (...)”
I have been doing taxonomy work for almost 20 years now and, without fail, every single time I have to review a geolocation facet I get the Beach Boys "Kokomo" stuck in my head... #taxonomy#occupationalhazards#music
Support is urgently requested to help keep Kew Herbarium at Kew.
The Director and Trustees intend to move the #Herbarium over an hour away from its current location at the heart of Kew.
Separating the herbarium from the gardens, library, and laboratories will cripple the ongoing taxonomic work at a time when we are facing a dire biodiversity crisis.