Botany Curator Leon Perrie and Science Researcher Lara Shepherd are working with David Glenny from the Bioeconomy Science Institute to investigate the relationships among Aciphylla, also known as taramea, speargrasses, or Spaniards. Here they introduce a newly described species. It’s relatively easy to suspect something might be a different species,Read more
Landhoppers are tiny, jumping crustaceans that live in the leaf litter on the forest floor. Northland entomologist Olly Ball, University College Cork’s amphipod expert Alan Myers, and Te Papa geneticist Lara Shepherd recently revealed that New Zealand’s landhoppers are far more diverse than previously thought [1], with many new speciesRead more
Landhoppers – tiny, jumping crustaceans – are a vital yet often overlooked part of Aotearoa New Zealand’s invertebrate fauna. Northland entomologist Olly Ball, University College Cork’s amphipod expert Alan Myers and Te Papa geneticist Lara Shepherd have just described a new species and genus of landhopper from Manawatāwhi Three KingsRead more
A new species of orchid, the elegant leek orchid, has recently been described and named by botanists from Te Papa and Ōtari Native Botanic Garden. The elegant leek orchid is found from the central North Island south to the Auckland Islands but is very uncommon and classified as threatened. Curator Botany Carlos Lehnebach and Science Researcher Lara Shepherd introduce us to the new species.Read more
Landhoppers are an important, but often overlooked, component of our invertebrate fauna. Northland entomologists Olly Ball and Steve Pohe teamed up with Te Papa geneticist Lara Shepherd and University College Cork’s amphipod expert Alan Myer to summarise the current knowledge of New Zealand’s landhoppers. Their new paper shows that landhoppers are far more diverse than we thought, with many new species hiding right under our feet.Read more
Three species of Aotearoa New Zealand forget-me-nots (Myosotis, Boraginaceae) have been described in a paper by Te Papa Botany Curator Heidi Meudt and her colleague, Jessie Prebble (Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research). Each of these species is endemic to the South Island but has a restricted geographic distribution. Meet the new species below and find out how to recognise them in the field. All three species have also been beautifully illustrated by Bobbi Angell.Read more
Recently the Botany team at Te Papa dedicated a week to curating several boxes of plant specimens – we called it the Botany Blitz! Our aim was to crack open boxes that have been patiently waiting – months, years, or in some cases decades – to be processed and databased. During our Blitz, we catalogued many specimens, learned new things about our collections, and discovered many fascinating stories along the way. Botany Curator Heidi Meudt processed one of the boxes from the botanist Thomas Kirk.Read more
In January 2022, our Botany Curator Heidi Meudt went on a chock-a-block seven-day field trip to Southland with Department of Conservation botanist Brian Rance and several others. The aim of this trip was to collect several species of forget-me-nots growing in the ultramafic Livingstone Mountains and nearby hills. Heidi talks about what they were looking for and the environment the forget-me-nots were growing in. Read more
A fossil discovery in New Zealand has revealed a new species of seal that once called Australasia home. Eomonachus belegaerensis is the first monk seal, living or extinct, ever found in the Southern Hemisphere. Its presence in our region turns the evolution of southern seals on its head. Curator Vertebrates Felix Marx talks about what this discovery means.Read more
Botany Researcher Heidi Meudt is on a mission to find and make new research collections of all native New Zealand forget-me-nots. It can be a challenge to find some of them, particularly if we don’t know a lot about them or where they are to be found. Read more
A new species of liverwort has just been identified in Wellington and named after local amateur botanist Rodney Lewington (1935–2018). Botanist Lara Shepherd tells us more about liverworts and Rodney’s contribution to New Zealand botany.Read more
Finding and naming new species is a core part of the job for Te Papa’s scientists. More than 2500 animal and plant species have been named by museum staff since 1865. A recent example is the fern Asplenium lepidotum, described by myself and Pat Brownsey. This brings the number ofRead more
Sunfishes (family Molidae) are large, distinctive, oceanic fishes found worldwide. Scientists generally agree there are two species of sunfish – the oceanic sunfish (Mola mola) and the bump-headed or short sunfish (Mola ramsayi). However, recent DNA analyses of sunfish samples collected and sequenced overseas has indicated the presence of aRead more
We asked you to suggest a species name for a newly discovered New Zealand forget-me not. In addition to some creative descriptive and geographic names, many of your suggestions were commemorative. The practice of naming species after famous people (real or fictional) dates back over 250 years. Are such names just aRead more
Please note: This fern has since been named. The You Called Me What?! exhibition celebrates 150 years of scientific discovery at Te Papa. A big part of this has been the scientific naming of more than 2500 animal and plant species by museum staff since 1865. We’re now giving youRead more
