Some time ago we received an update from Barbara Esteban Albornos, a Masters student in ecology and sustainable development at Linköping university, supervised by Markus Franzén. For her thesis she is investigating the effect of fire on beetle diversity, and has been doing her fieldwork in Småland since May this year. We are looking forward to seeing her results!
The field season in Finsjö is almost coming to an end! My traps for insects were put out in early May and the last collection will be towards the end of August, aligning with the months of more activity for the insects in Sweden. In my researched area, I distributed 30 window, 30 pitfall and 6 Malaise traps, divided in three areas: burned forest, protected unburned forest and unprotected unburned forest. All traps are filled with 70% propylene glycol to preserve the fallen insects in between rounds, since the samples are collected every 2 weeks. So far, I have also started sorting insects in the lab into major taxonomy groups. Although no results are evident yet, I have observed a diversity of beetle families and subfamilies like Cetoniidae, Elateridae, Curculionidae, Coccinellidae and Carabidae, and even some genus like Ampedus that is very linked to burned areas.
Barbara Esteban Albornos
