FNZ 68 - Simuliidae (Insecta: Diptera) - Contributor notes
Craig DA, Craig REG, Crosby TK 2012. Simuliidae (Insecta: Diptera). Fauna of New Zealand 68, 336 pages.
(
ISSN 0111-5383 (print),
ISSN 1179-7193 (online)
;
no.
68.
ISBN 978-0-478-34734-0 (print),
ISBN 978-0-478-34735-7 (online)
).
Published 29 June 2012
ZooBank: http://zoobank.org/References/9C478D54-FEB2-45E8-B61C-A3A06D4EB45D
Contributor notes
Contributors Doug and Ruth (nee Heath) Craig were born in Nelson, New Zealand, and attended their local Colleges. Doug went to the then Canterbury College, University of New Zealand, Christchurch in 1959, where, in his first year, he failed both his major subjects, Botany and Zoology, but passed well in Physics! Ruth started university a year later and they met in Botany I when Doug repeated the subject. Both were doing biology degrees with a view to becoming secondary schoolteachers, as the demographic bulge of children from the post-World War 2 ‘baby boom’ was fast approaching and teachers were in short supply. The New Z.ealand Department of Education provided very good post-primary studentships to attend university in return for teaching an equal number of years. Ruth continued along that path and taught at Christchurch Girls’ High School. Doug, however, became beguiled by the aquatic insects, the Blephariceridae, and after finishing his B.Sc. (Hons) degree in the then Zoology Department, became Vida Stout’s first Ph.D. student and worked on the biology of those insects. When Vida took a sabbatical leave, and then a leave of absence in Sweden, Bob Pilgrim took over the supervisory details. As far as the secondary school teaching went, that was paid off by some ‘temporary assistant lectureships’ and buying the remainder out. Doug and Ruth were married in 1962. Immediately Doug finished his Ph.D. in October 1966 (with the now autonomous University of Canterbury), both left for Edmonton, in Canada; for Doug this was a sabbatical replacement position in the Department of Entomology, University of Alberta, and an opportunity for overseas experience. It was meant to last for just a single year, but with another year available, and then a position vacant, Doug was hired as departmental morphologist. So then with a family of two children (Jacqueline and Michael), two cats, and a mortgage, the stay became permanent. Good working conditions and colleagues helped too! Initially Doug worked with WHO funding on the embryology of simuliids in relation to their control in Africa where the female of these insects transmits river blindness. Ruth became a technician in Plant Science until daughter Jackie was born and then, after a child-rearing stint, became a sessional instructor in the Department of Zoology for a number of years. With parents and relatives still in New Zealand, return visits were a necessity, albeit expensive with a family, so trips were restricted to various sabbatical leaves. Stopovers were, however, made in Polynesia, Rarotonga, and Fiji to collect simuliids, and that resulted in discovery of many new species, which kindled an interest in biogeography of Pacific Simuliidae. Inbetween times a childhood interest of mucking about in running water was refined, and Doug spent a decade on proximate hydrodynamics of simuliid larvae and other aquatic insects. An earlier, but important aspect to that was a detailed understanding of the shape and structure of the larvae, garnered from having one of the first Scanning Electron Microscopes (SEM) in Western Canada. Originally full of glowing vacuum tubes—now just cold transistors—that laboratory, established in 1971, is still going strong, albeit with shiny new instruments. Doug retired in 1997 after 31 years teaching, having had quite enough of the changes that are taking place in universities nowadays. As an Emeritus Professor and still active with research grants, Doug, with Ruth (now a retired Registered Nurse), in the last decade have travelled widely across the Pacific collecting simuliids for taxonomic revisions. They have been as far west as Palau in Micronesia, completely around all the Polynesian island chains, some more than once, Vanuatu twice, and Fiji a number of times. It seemed only natural to eventually do a taxonomic revision of New Zealand Simuliidae. Having daughter Jacqueline, now an anthropologist living in Auckland, and a grand-daughter there too, made the decision relatively easy.
Contributor Trevor Crosby was born in Cambridge, New Zealand, and grew up in the central North Island towns of Raetihi and Piriaka (attending Taumarunui High School), with a year at Whangaehu (Wanganui Boys’ College). His family then moved to Karamea on the West Coast, and Trevor went to the University of Canterbury, Christchurch (in receipt of a post-primary studentship similar to his fellow contributors above) and gained his B.Sc. (Hons) in Zoology. The opportunity to do a Ph.D. on the simuliid Austrosimulium tillyardianum put secondary teaching on hold (subsequent employment with DSIR became approved service). He spent a year in Wellington as a DSIR science editor (bulletins and occasional publications), before moving to Auckland to join Entomology Division, DSIR as curator of NZAC, a position he held until 2009. He has been leader of the invertebrate biosystematics group (1980–1983, 1997–2007), and has been involved with the Fauna of New Zealand since its inception, being its editor since 1998. Collaboration with colleague Graeme Ramsay saw the publication in 1992 of the Bibliography of New Zealand terrestrial invertebrates 1775–1985, and later that year the database “BUGS on-disc” was published on CD as part of New Zealand’s first science CD, which now forms part of the backbone of the online BUGZ literature website. Trevor has had expert witness responsibilities in forensic entomology: his co-authored paper on using entomological evidence to prove importation of cannabis into New Zealand was awarded the 1987 Philip Allen Memorial Award by the Forensic Society of Great Britain; and the calculation of possible time of death using calliphorid maggots has assisted a number of New Zealand Police investigations. Since 1994 he has provided training in entomology and identification for phytosanitary purposes in the South Pacific (particularly Vanuatu and Samoa) and Asia (India, Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Viet Nam, and most recently Brunei). His interest in education has continued through being a school Board of Trustee member: Gladstone Primary (1998–2004), and Western Springs College (2001–present), and with his wife Bev he has run a Dyslexia Parent Support Group since 2000. Bev and children (Cameron, Karl, and Erin) have supported his various endeavours, but sometimes remind him of the family events he has missed while away on consultancies.