International Congress of Odonatology 2017 Corbet session
The International Congress of Odonatology 2017 (ICO2017) will be held in the Gillespie Centre at Clare College Cambridge from 16 to 20 July 2017.
Registration will be on Saturday 15 July.
Special Session: Ten years since Philip
A special session to celebrate the work of Philip S. Corbet will be held in the Gillespie Centre at Clare College Cambridge
This session is planned to provide a brief summary of the life, times and contributions of Philip S. Corbet, followed by succinct reviews of progress and recent findings in fields such as seasonality, larval development, and conservation.
Philip S. Corbet (21 May 1929 – 13 February 2008) was the most influential dragonfly biologist of the second half of the twentieth century. His three major books each provided a synoptic review of the current state of knowledge, and a basis for the development of thousands of diverse studies. In this session we visit areas in which Philip was involved and review advances in the various fields.
A synoptic overview
Steve Brooks: Philip Corbet – his legacy
Philip’s early work, including his PhD, focussed on life histories, seasonality and larval development. On graduation he moved to Uganda, working both on freshwater biology and mosquito ecology. In Uganda he produced a series of papers describing larvae and establishing larval-adult associations, and assembled and proofed A biology of dragonflies. (And on posting the proofs back to the publisher the parcel was weighed. ‘How much?’, asked Philip, and the postal clerk, sad-eyed, slowly shook his head, ‘too much bwana, too much’.)
Frank Suhling: Corbet’s contribution to the knowledge of African dragonfly larvae and their ecology.
Andreas Martens: Ballistic defaecation as a widespread phenomenon in larval Anisoptera (Odonata).
From Africa Philip moved to Canada. The developing reports of regular seasonal movements of dragonflies on the eastern seaboard of North America excited him, migration added a new dimension to consider when attempting to understand dragonflies. This much later extended to studies into shorter range, but ecologically essential seasonal movements.
Mike May: Catching Up with Migration.
Manuel Ferreras-Romero and Boudjéma Samraoiu: Seasonality and life history of Mediterranean Odonata.
And Philip was a conservationist, recognising early on how easy it was for human activity to inadvertently destroy ecosystems and imperil species.
Mike Samways: The evolution of dragonfly conservation.
To protect habitats and species required an informed and engaged community, and solid data.
David Chelmick: British Dragonfly Society – Philip Corbet’s brainchild and still vital in today’s world.
Adrian Parr: UK distribution mapping project.
And understanding is always underlain by active science.
Gary Powney, Steve S.A. Cham, Dave Smallshire & Nick Isaac: Patterns of change in the Odonata of Britain.
Chris Hassall: The evolutionary ecology of urban dragonfly populations
Mike Siva Jothy: Courtship and physiological traits – why are some males sexier than others
Klaas-Douwe Dijkstra: Corbet’s successes and Moore’s successors: odonatology’s metamorphosis from scientific society to conservation community
Just some words:
Ola Fincke: Philip Corbet: mentor to a very green and grateful grad student.
Richard Rowe: Words – Philip: past, present, and future.
Presenters:
Stephen J. Brooks
Life Sciences, The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD, UK
David Chelmick
Macromia Scientific 31 High Beech Lane, Haywards Heath, West Sussex RH16 1SQ, UK
KD Dijkstra
Biodiversity Discovery Group, Naturalis Biodiversity Center, PO Box 9517, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands
Manuel Ferreras-Romero
1Universidad Pablo de Olavide, Sevilla, Spain;
Ola Fincke
Department of Biology, University of Oklahoma Norman, Ok 73019, USA
Chris Hassall
School of Biology, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 3JT, UK
Andreas Martens
Institute for Biology, University of Education Karlsruhe, Bismarckstrasse 10, 76133 Karlsruhe, Germany
Michael L May
Department of Entomology, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ 08901, USA
Adrian Parr
Odonata Records Committee, British Dragonfly Society c/o Natural England, Parkside Court, Hall Park Way, Telford TF3 4LR, UK
Gary D. Powney
1NERC Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Wallingford, UK
Richard Rowe
Research School of Biology, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 0200, Australia
Boudjéma Samraoui
Department of Biology, University of Annaba, Annaba, Algeria; Laboratoire de Conservation des Zones Humides, University of Guelma, Guelma, Algeria
Michael J. Samways
Department of Conservation Ecology, Stellenbosch University, Cape Town, South Africa
Mike Siva Jothy:
Department of Animal and Plant Science, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK
Frank Suhling
Technische Universität Braunschweig, Institute of Geoecology, Landscape Ecology and Environmental Systems Analysis, An der Wasserfurche 32 38162 Cremlingen, Germany
The congress logo is a stylised Anax imperator male to represent Philip Corbet’s pioneering work on seasonal regulation in this species. Philip’s Ph.D research was carried out in the Zoology Department at the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Vincent Wigglesworth, the renowned insect physiologist. Philip was his only ever ecology student.