A fish completely new to science was unveiled today in the presence of Her Majesty the Queen to launch the What on Earth biodiversity campaign for National Science and Engineering Week.
The new species was introduced at a special Commonwealth Day service at Westminster Abbey and will be on display at the Natural History Museum later this week for six months.
The fish was discovered by Dr Timo Moritz when he was doing fieldwork for the Natural History Museum in the rivers of southern Benin in West Africa.
Struck by the upright bright red-orange dorsal fin, Dr Moritz collected several specimens of the fish to bring back for the Museum’s collections. Back in the UK, he compared them with over 100 similar specimens collected from the area and realised he had found a new species.
Dr Moritz named the new fish Nannocharax signifier after its colourful fin – a signifier was a Roman soldier who carried the standard, a tall pole with a coloured flag identifying each legion.
The What on Earth campaign encourages everyone to get outside exploring the wildlife on their doorsteps. People can upload photos of plants, animals or fungi they don’t recognise to the What on Earth website so they can be identified by experts.
National Science and Engineering Week runs from 12–21 March with thousands of talks, shows and workshops on the theme of ‘Earth’ to tie in with International Year of Biodiversity.
Soil Association Organic Fortnight (3–17 September) is the UK’s biggest celebration of all things organic. Organic farming is a sustainable system of food production that works with nature, avoids the use of pesticides, and prohibits the use of synthetic fertilisers and genetically modified organisms.
It gives me great pleasure to start with a disclaimer. Most View articles are careful to note that they are the personal views of the writer – rather than a particular organisation. In my case, however, this is not one particular organisation, but amazingly, more than 40 organisations that have been involved with BioBlitzes this year.
And there it was. Boom. Back in London. Having cycled 3,000km, through eight different countries, to travel from the source to the mouth of the River Danube in just three weeks. That question was a sharp and sudden reminder that we were now back home, back on the bike, and back commuting to work. The adventure was over.
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