International Society of Hymenopterists

Our symposium at the Entomological Society of America meeting is set

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Fri, 18 May 2012 01:50:00 +0000

We had what I would call a tremendously enthusiastic response to our solicitation of student talks for this year's ISH symposium at ESA. Exciting! Here's the draft schedule, which I'd say is quite compelling:

New insight into an old genus: revising Disholcaspis Dalle Torre & Kieffer, 1910 (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae); Crystal McEwen, University of Maryland, College Park, MD
Phylogenetics and taxonomy of the enigmatic genus Coccobius (Aphelinidae: Coccophaginae); Jason Mottern and John M. Heraty, University of California-Riverside, Riverside, CA
Cremnops (Hymenoptera: Braconidae) of the World: a phylogenetic analysis; Erika Tucker and Michael J. Sharkey, Departement of Entomology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY
Employing polydnavirus genes to uncover cryptic species in Ichneumonoidea; Victoria G. Pook, Department of Entomology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY
Higher-level molecular phylogeny of Ophioniformes (Hymenoptera: Ichneumonidae); Andrés Herrera and Barbara J. Sharanowski, Department of Entomology, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB, Canada
Break (10 mins)
The origin and diversification of spider wasps (Hymenoptera: Pompilidae); Juanita Rodriguez, Cecilia Waichert, Carol D. von Dohlen and James P. Pitts, Biology Department, Utah State University, Logan, UT
The shape of things to come: A morphometric analysis of the Dryinidae chela in relation to host choice; Carly M. Tribull, Dept. of Integrative Biology, University of California-Berkeley, Berkeley, CA
Systematics of the "well-known" family Chyphotidae (Hymenoptera); Emily A. Sadler and James P. Pitts, Biology Department, Utah State University, Logan, UT
Gustatory and odorant receptor genes in Trissolcus basalis (Platygastridae: Telenominae); Elijah Talamas and Norman F. Johnson, Department of Evolution, Ecology, and Organismal Biology, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH
Business meeting
Announcement of best talk(s) with prize(s)
Foraging and pollination

Send any questions or comments to adeans @ gmail . com.

ISH Endowment Student Award 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Mon, 07 May 2012 13:58:00 +0000

Please join us in congratulating the first recipient of the International Society of Hymenopterists Endowment Student Award: Aline Christina Martins, from the Universidad Federal do Paraná, in Curitiba, Brazil.

Congratulations!

ISH at ESA: student research showcase

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Fri, 04 May 2012 12:56:00 +0000

Are you going to ESA this year? Are you a student whose research focuses on hymenopterans? Then you should think about submitting your oral presentation to the International Society of Hymenopterists (ISH) symposium! Our meeting will highlight student research, and we'll be awarding a cash prize and one year membership for the best talk!

We need your talk title and author list by May 11, 2012 - that's exactly one week from now. Questions and talk information should be emailed to adeans@gmail.com. We're looking forward to a great meeting!

ISH student symposium at ESA - cash prizes for best talk(s)!

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 15:38:00 +0000

Right on the heels of our 2nd student award this year (the ISH Endowment Student Award; results will be announced imminently!) I am happy to announce that the International Society of Hymenopterists is hosting a student presentation competition at the next Entomological Society of America annual meeting, in Knoxville. We'll award cash(!) prizes to the best talks by ISH student members. Contact Andy Deans (adeans @ gmail . com) for more details on how to submit your talk, and watch this space and our Facebook page for more information.

ISH Endowment Student Award - deadline extended

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:44:00 +0000

The deadline for the ISH Endowment Student Award deadline has been extended to March 2, 2012!

2012 dues are due!

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 04:03:00 +0000

Now is the time of year to join the International Society of Hymenopterists or to renew your membership for 2012. There are several methods to pay your dues:

pay with your credit card, using PayPal
pay with a check (or your credit card), using our downloadable form
submit a request for sponsorship

Note that student dues have been lowered this year, to $15! A hard copy subscription of the Journal of Hymenoptera Research is not included in the dues. All members receive the Society newsletter, Hamuli.

HYM Course 2012, at Tovetorp Zoological Research Station, Sweden

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 17:27:00 +0000

(posted on behalf of the HYM Course instructors)

We are pleased to announce the fourth offering of HYM Course (http://hymcourse.org/), scheduled for August 5–12, 2012 at Tovetorp Zoological Research Station, Sweden (http://www.zoologi.su.se/tovetorp/). The main objective of HYM Course is to provide participants with knowledge and experience in identifying parasitic and predatory wasps, sawflies, wood wasps, bees, and ants. Information on natural history is also presented, and that information is reinforced with fieldwork. Techniques used to collect, rear, preserve, and curate specimens are presented in a hands-on manner to allow participants to learn directly by doing.

The course is limited to 25 participants. Applications are due March 2, 2012. Students in Sweden are eligible for financial aid through the Swedish Taxonomy Initiative. Please visit the HYM Course website (http://hymcourse.org/) for details, including information on how to apply, costs for taking the course, and logistics of travel to and within Sweden. We look forward to seeing you there!

International Society of Hymenopterists (ISH) Endowment Student Award

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 02:27:00 +0000

The Executive Committee is pleased to announce the International Society of Hymenopterists (ISH) Endowment Student Award. Please note that this is a different award from the Student Travel Awards, already announced by the Society in November, 2011.

Applicants should follow the instructions below, and submit applications electronically to Andy Deans, Secretary, ISH (adeans @ gmail.com). Applications should clearly indicate that they are for the ISH Endowment Student Award.

Deadline for submission: ~~February 15, 2012~~ [UPDATE: deadline has been extended to March 2, 2012]

Purpose and value of the award: The Society has created this award to support and encourage predoctoral students working on the systematics, ecology, physiology or some other aspect of the insect order Hymenoptera, which is being undertaken as part of a predoctoral program (normally a PhD or equivalent qualification). They will be advertised on a regular basis through the Society, and an individual award will be valued at US$2,500. These funds can be used for any purpose that makes a contribution to a student’s research such as attendance at a conference, fieldwork, direct research costs or purchase of a piece of equipment. If for travel to a conference, the student also needs to be giving an oral presentation or poster.

Eligibility and application process: Only full-time predoctoral students are eligible to apply and they do not have to be members of the Society. From time to time, the Society may emphasize encouraging applicants from particular countries (see below*). The application needs to be written in English, in a font no smaller than Times New Roman 12-point, single-spaced with margins of at least 2 cm. The application must contain the following information:

Full name
Institutional address
Telephone number and email address
Name and email address of principal supervisor/major professor
Degree program (PhD, etc.)
Time since starting this degree (years and months)
Title of thesis/dissertation
Brief description of thesis/dissertation project (500 words max.)
Purpose for which award funding will be used (e.g. conference, fieldwork, research costs, equipment)
Explanation of how the award will enhance the student’s research (500 words max.)
Endorsement by principal supervisor/major professor AND Head of School/Department

Deadline and Selection Process: Applications must be emailed to the Secretary of the Society (Andy Deans: adeans @ gmail.com) by ~~February 15, 2012~~ [UPDATE: deadline has been extended to March 2, 2012], as an attached Word document or PDF . A committee of three senior members of the Society will assess the applications and select the winner. The decision of the committee will be final. The winner will be announced by the President of the Society.

*For the first competition, the Society particularly wishes to encourage applications from students who are resident in any country OTHER THAN THE 30 MOST DEVELOPED COUNTRIES as listed by the UN Development Program: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brunei, Canada, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kuwait, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Singapore, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, and United States.

ICE student travel award

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 14:52:00 +0000

We are pleased to announce the International Society of Hymenopterists (ISH) student travel award competition, in support of students who plan present their research at the International Congress of Entomology (ICE) in Daegu, Korea (August 2012). Four awards will be available, ranging from $500–$2000. Awardees are expected to present their research at the ICE and are highly encouraged to attend the ISH business meeting. To submit an application:

1) Join the Society! The 2012 dues are only $15 for students, and we have at least 20 sponsored memberships available.

2) Submit a 2-page (maximum) proposal that describes the following:

Intellectual merit – A summary of the talk to be presented, including relevance to the field of Hymenoptera research.
Broader impacts – How travel to the ICE will be a transformative experience for you (e.g., are there opportunities to collaborate, network, collect important specimens, etc.?)
Availability of other funding – Please indicate whether you have additional funding or the possibility of acquiring matching funds.
Your contact information.

3) Attach a letter (PDF or email preferred) from your adviser that verifies your research, your available funding (if applicable) and your enrollment in that graduate program.

Applications should be sent to adeans@gmail.com by ***December 31, 2011***. Awardees will be notified by January 15, 2012.

Next international meeting location announced

noreply@blogger.com (Irene Moon) — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 20:06:00 +0000

The next location for the International Society of Hymenopterists Meeting will be in Cusco, Peru in 2014. Cusco is a small city of great historical importance. It was the historic capital of the Inca Empire and is a world heritage site. The region is rich in natural and cultural opportunities for an extended visit, so please plan on joining us there for a once in a lifetime meeting with fellow hymenopterists!

The ISH symposium at ESA

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 16:28:00 +0000

As most of you are aware the Society typically hosts a hymenopterist symposium every year at the Entomological Society of America annual meeting. This year is no different, of course, and we have an interesting line-up of engaged speakers:

1:30 - Welcoming remarks
1:35 - Benjamin Wipfler and Rolf G. Beutel - Innovative morphological methods and their contribution to the placement of Hymenoptera
1:55 - Andy Deans et al. - New tools for deploying the HAO
2:15 - John Heraty Ant lust - tales of their eucharitid parasitoids
2:35 - Sébastien Patiny Supermatrix - supertree analysis of the bee Hymenoptera) phylogeny
2:55 - Mike Sharkey HymAToL results
3:15 - Phylogeny Roundtable: Where do we go from here?
3:35 - Business meeting
4:35 - Foraging and pollination

The symposium will be held Sunday, November 13, 2011, 1:30-5:30 PM, in Room D9 of the Reno-Sparks Convention Center. Hopefully we can post an updated schedule soon that includes details about the business meeting (lots of good stuff, we promise!) See you then!

Hamuli vol. 2 issue 2 published!

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Sat, 30 Jul 2011 02:27:00 +0000

Members should have received a link to the latest issue of Hamuli, the ISH newsletter. It's 28 chock-o-block pages of exciting, hymenopterist-relevant content. With its release the last issue now becomes available for anyone to download: http://hymenopterists.org/publications.php

On another note - we need a better system for reminding members to renew their membership. If you're curious as to whether you yourself are current check out this page - http://members.hymenopterists.org/
If your name is missing then you owe for 2011. We're working on a system (behind the scenes) that will help with email reminders. We're always looking for other ideas, though. Stay tuned!

Have an article for the next issue of our newsletter?

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 13:31:00 +0000

Have content for the next issue of Hamuli? The deadline for the July issue is June 30th! Instructions for submission are printed on the back of the last issue:

Have an article, note, opinion piece, news item, story, photo, poem, joke, or other item you’d like to publish in Hamuli? Current members of the International Society of Hymenopterists are welcome to submit materials for publication at no cost. Just send your text to the editor (adeans@gmail.com) as .rtf or .doc files, and please send include images as separate .jpg or .tif files (i.e., not embedded in the word processing file). Make sure images are of a reasonable resolution: larger than 500 x 375 pixels, with a resolution of 72 pixels per inch (or 28 pixels per cm).

Not a member of ISH? No problem! You can use the form below to become a member, or you can visit our website (http://hymenopterists.org) to join / pay dues electronically.

Don’t want to become a member, but you still want to publish in Hamuli? Or perhaps you want to advertise in Hamuli? Still not a problem! Just send an email to the editor (adeans@gmail.com) for an estimate.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Curator of Hymenoptera position available

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 12:59:00 +0000

Curator of Hymenoptera

The Zoologisches Forschungsmuseum Alexander Koenig (ZFMK), Bonn seeks to fill a new research position in the Department of Arthropods. The position is available immediately. Potential candidates will hold a PhD in zoology or related areas, have their research focus preferably on systematics of parasitic Hymenoptera, and present a substantial publication record in taxonomy, phylogenetics and other biosystematic disciplines. The candidate is expected to work in these fields from a sound theoretical basis and be able to apply an array of appropriate modern methods. He/she should be able to combine collection-based work with modern phylogenetic and/or ecological approaches. The candidate is also expected to integrate into ongoing research projects at the ZFMK and teaching programs at the University of Bonn, and to obtain competitive grant funds.

As a curator, the successful candidate will be responsible for caring, managing and further increasing and developing the Hymenoptera collections at the ZFMK. He/she will also be involved in the self-administration of the institute and is expected to demonstrate commitment to community engagement in his/her field of research.

The successful candidate will be employed for an initial period of five years, after which he/she will obtain tenure depending on his/her performance. Salary corresponds to grade TV-L/13 in the German Public Service scheme.

The ZFMK is a fellow institute of the “Wissenschaftsgemeinschaft Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz” (WGL Science Community) and works in close cooperation with the University of Bonn. It comprises internationally important scientific collections, libraries, electron microscopy unit, and bioacoustic, histological and molecular laboratories.

Interested applicants should submit a CV, complete publication record, a statement of teaching experience and research funding, certificates of university degrees, and selected publications in hard copies to the following address:
Heike Lenz
Zoologisches Forschungsmuseum Alexander Koenig
Adenauerallee 160
D-53113 Bonn, Germany

E-mail inquiries: <h.lenz.zfmk@uni-bonn.de >

applications due: April 15 2011

We have a new president elect!

noreply@blogger.com (Irene Moon) — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 18:46:00 +0000

Dear Colleagues,

99 ballots were received in the recent ISH election for President-Elect.

All three candidates received very strong support. As one of you mentioned, with three candidates of this caliber, we couldn't lose.

But John Heraty had a substantial margin, and he is the next President-Elect of ISH. Congratulations, John! John will take over from President MIke Sharkey at the end of 2012.

Our thanks to all of you that voted, and best wishes to you all,

Jim Woolley

Proctos newsletter now available

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 19:04:00 +0000

Thanks to Michael Elliott at the Australia Museum we now have several issues of Proctos, the proctotrupoid newsletter, scanned as PDFs and available for your perusal. Based on the volume/issue numbers we have I suspect we're missing a few. As far as I can tell, Proctos isn't available on the Web anywhere. Do you know where we can find any missing issues? (see also the ISH publications page)

Update: We got a copy of volume 2, issue 1, so now the question is - are there any issues after volume 3, issue 1?

Hamuli volume 2, issue 1 published

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 03:01:00 +0000

The next iteration of the ISH newsletter, Hamuli, was published today - a beefy 35 pages worth of articles, photos, and miscellanea. If you were a member last year you should have gotten the link as an email from the secretary (me!). This issue will be available to members only until August, 2011, and future issues will open for members in good standing to publish free of charge. Membership has its privileges! Why not join or renew today? There are multiple ways to join or renew membership in the International Society of Hymenopterists:

electronically via Paypal
old skool way, by check (with the membership form PDF)

Hamuli accepting submissions until January 15

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Wed, 29 Dec 2010 14:10:00 +0000

We're accepting submissions for Hamuli (volume 2, issue 1) until January 15, 2011. The goal is to publish this issue by the end of January. Please send anything you might want to include—poems, jokes, photos, news, announcements, specimens for exchange, methods, opinions, whatever—as .rtf, .doc, or .docx or, for images, as .jpg or .tif. You can email your submission to andy_deans@ncsu.edu.

Previous issues of Hamuli can be found on our ISH publications page.

New Membership Form Now Online

noreply@blogger.com (Irene Moon) — Thu, 02 Dec 2010 16:32:00 +0000

Our yearly membership drive is about to begin! Membership has been down the past few years but we are hoping to dramatically change this trend with new initiatives by the society.

First we are expanding our session at the Entomological Society of America Meeting to incorporate a series of talks that would be interesting to anyone with a fascination for Hymenoptera or fun and adventurous fieldwork. This year you'll find us Sunday, December 12, 2010 from 1:00 PM-5:00 PM in the Ascot (Town and Country Hotel and Convention Center) in San Diego. Our yearly business meeting will follow the talks. Session details (speakers, times, etc.) are listed on this blog.

Secondly we are moving in 2011 to an open access publication model. More information about the new look of the Journal of Hymenoptera Research will be discussed at the ESA business meeting (details above) and on this Website.

Thirdly the ISH newsletter Hamuli is in rapid production. Deadline for the next issue is 31 December 2010. We'd love to have your stories from the field, news items, interesting or funny photos, opinion pieces, jokes, poems, etc. Whatever you think is newsworthy. If you missed it the last issue of Hamuli is available for download here.

You can renew (or join!) online using PayPal or by sending us a check or credit card information in the mail. Please see the membership page for forms, details and contact information.

ISH at the ESA 2010 Annual Meeting

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Thu, 02 Dec 2010 01:48:00 +0000

It's that time of year again. December 12, the day of our next ISH symposium and business meeting, is rapidly approaching, and we are looking forward to what will definitely be a fun program. Here's the list of talks, which mainly focus on fieldwork:

1:00 PM – Welcoming Remarks
1:05 PM – Ant diversity in the pine forest – a comparison of east Texas and Belize. Jerry L. Cook, Sam Houston State University
1:25 PM – Eucharitids and fire ants - Systematics and Biological Control - when the rubber meets the road in Dominica. John Heraty, University of California-Riverside
1:45 PM – Bees, sea breeze, and MPs: Establishing bee species inventories at U.S. Naval Base Guantánamo Bay in Cuba. Seán Brady, Smithsonian Institution; Sam Droege, USGS
2:05 PM – Parasites and inquilines of Trypoxyon manni (Crabronidae) in Trinidad, West Indies. Allan W. Hook, St. Edward's University
2:25 PM – Litter-mania in Honduras: Project LLAMA 2010 Field Season. John Longino, The Evergreen State College; Robert S. Anderson, Canadian Museum of Nature
2:45 PM – Field notes from Down Under: Accumulating Aculeates in Australia. Craig M. Brabant, University of Wisconsin; Laura Breitkreuz, Museum für Naturkunde; Stefanie Krause, Museum für Naturkunde
3:05 PM – ISH Business Meeting

Following the business portion of the symposium we'll gather for drinks and casual socializing. Do you have any items for the agenda? Will you be attending the ESA annual meeting this year? See you then!

Hamuli - the new ISH newsletter

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 03:52:00 +0000

The inaugural issue of Hamuli (PDF, 3.8MB), the new Society newsletter, is now available! And the amount of content provided by ISH members was truly astounding. Thanks to everyone for helping make this happen! Feedback is greatly appreciated, so that future issues will be even better. (I know the layout isn't perfect, but what else should be fixed?) I used Adobe InDesign (CS3) to put it together, so if anyone knows any tricks or wants to have the original .indd file let me know!

The deadline for volume 2, issue 1 is December 31, 2010, so get your writer's caps on!

UPDATE: A. Dal Molin pointed out that I introduced a typo into her article about Pe. Moure. He passed away this year (2010), not in 2009. My apologies to all. This typo is fixed in the newest PDF version, available at the link above.

follow-up to the modestly bold proposal

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Fri, 28 May 2010 19:18:00 +0000

Well, I think the suggestion that we harness the spirit of our past hymenopteran newsletters and channel it into a new ISH newsletter has really resonated with some of our members. In the run up to our business meeting in Kőszeg next month I thought I would share some of the comments and suggestions for newsletter names:

Great ideas for the newsletter. You are right that we did wait in anticipation for the next of our specialty newsletters. We all knew who Roy Snelling, Jim Carpenter, and Chris Starr were and what their opinions were. Also the hundreds of others who contributed. For a name we have to think about the audience -- just us, the greater public, both, or some other population or combo. Should the title be humorous, amusing, catchy (like NewsISH, or something more relating to our beloved creatures (perhaps Sphecos n.s., which ties the past to the future, just as some journals used to do). If we want an anatomical or hymenoptera-specific title, something like The Propodeum would do well, as it distinguishes our critters from all others.
I think this is a great initiative and one that is well overdue. As a suggestion, what about something clear and simple, such as Hym News.
When a name was being chosen for the journal, someone inventive suggested Hamuli. I don't know who came up with it, but I thought it was a wonderful name.
Just to float an idea - I know we are also looking for cool articles, but one of the features of older (mostly more specialist) newsletters is that people contributed articles that featured who and what was going on in their lab, requests for info/specimens, etc. I for one would be happy to supply an update of what's going on here...As one who is rapidly becoming one of the old farts in the field, I am always happy to hear about all the new start-ups!
I think I prefer a more generalized name for the newsletter.
That’s a great idea! Sphecos is a good model, and since it ended along with Arnold Menke’s retirement it has always been a major source of information for me. It was also just fun to read what is going on worldwide. The good thing was the mixture of serious scientific information and personal biogarphies, collecting reports and all sorts of fun. What was really a success in Sphecos was short biographies of hymenopterists, which Arnold has organized for a while. This could be a good idea for a regular section in the new newsletter, perhaps one biography per issue. So I strongly support this idea, and I promise to submit brief contributions regularly.
The name: Sphecos was great, because it is just the Greek work for wasp. There are other similarily generalized words from Latin and Greek, but none of them is really convincing. As an example, Bembix, but there is a German journal with that name. There are plenty of possible taxon-names. My favourite in sphecids is Zyzzyx, a South American bembicine genus. The name is quite complicated but has a high recognition value. The etymology was not given in the original description, but it is assumed that it refers to the buzzing sound of a flying wasp. A combination of a taxon name and the information what it really is (as a subheading) would perhaps be a good solution: Zyzzyx – The ISH-Newsletter or better Zyzzyx – The hymenopterists newsletter. Another idea that just came to my mind: WaspNews. Perhaps also in combination with the subheading: WaspNews – The ISH-Newsletter or WaspNews – The hymenopterists newsletter.
One of the most valuable contributions to Chalcid Forum was John Huber's yearly listing of publications pertaining to chalcidoids. Some of us had our own bibliographic searches, but John's was always the most complete. Such a list for hyms would be most useful if it did not become too grand. Of course posted on the internet it probably doesn't make much difference how much stuff is in the newsletter. We were constrained by costs.
We are delighted by the idea and give it our full support and encouragement. We favour the name Sphecos in memory of Menke’s extremely useful production by that name. We were very sorry that it ceased and have greatly missed it.
I'd prefer something generalized like ISH Newsletter, because this properly reflects the content. But I would clearly object Sphecos, Scaphion, Symphytos, etc. because this parallels already existing or formerly existing newsletter titles. In addition, the title should cover all Hymenoptera taxa. If the pretty unemotional title ISH Newsletter should not be accepted, I'd therefore prefer something like Hyms or purely Hymenoptera.
Here is a suggestion for the newsletter name: The Hamuli.

Please keep the comments coming, either as emails to the secretary (my email is andy_deans at ncsu dot edu), comments to this post, or as direct suggestions at the ICH in Hungary.

UPDATE (1 June 2010): A couple more suggestions/comments appeared in my inbox recently:

I vote for Hamuli, which is distinctively hymenopterological, short, easy to remember (and spell) and arguably kinder to the ears than, say, The Propodeum or Hyms. I’m not in favour of titles like Wasp News or Sphecos because they seem to exclude some types of hymenopterans. My second choice would be ISH News.
I would vote for the most generalized one. It would be difficult to find a taxon name or a body part that would please everyone and that hasn't been taken yet.
I’d prefer a more general title, like ISH News – although the suggestion NewsISH is clever. If memory serves, the name Hamuli was something Scott Shaw came up with when we were considering names for J. Hym. Res. – credit where credit is due. It’s not bad at all.
I like Hamuli! The word is an eye catcher and sounds interesting (like the content will be, hopefully), and it is an autapomorphic character for the Hymenoptera. I agree with those comments objecting to using an old name for new newsletter. At least for me Sphecos was of less interest than the Chalcid Forum and Symphytos. Also, I wouldn’t call it newsletter but bulletin, sounds more serious. My suggestion: Hamuli – The Hymenopterist’s Bulletin. For me the most important reasons to read a newsletter is to see what others are currently doing, field and museum notes, an overview of recent publications, and requests for material.

A modestly bold proposal

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Tue, 18 May 2010 14:38:00 +0000

I think that we (the ISH) need to be more consistent and more ambitious in producing an engaging, content-rich newsletter. Compare, for example, the past issues we have on file with the newsletters produced by some of our sibling organizations:

North American Dipterists Society (Fly Times and Tachinid Times)
The Orthopterists' Society (Metaleptea)
The Coleopterists Society (multiple coleopterist newsletters)
Lepidopterist Society (News of the Lepidopterist Society)
Dragonfly Society of the Americas (Argia)

And reminisce about relevant newsletters that previously circulated in our circles: Sphecos, Ichnews, Chalcid Forum, Notes from Underground, and Melissa (and even more recently, Skaphion and TIGER Newsletter).

Newsletters are a great medium for healthy debates, opinion pieces, taxon requests, classifieds, advertisements (could generate some revenue?), news, anecdotes, natural history notes, photos, stories, and even poetry. While reading through the pages of the old hymenopterist newsletters I got the sense that people eagerly anticipated their next issues and were even willing to pay for its production! Is that true of the current ISH newsletter?

Recent discussions between ISH officers and select members (i.e., those who were able to attend the last two ESA meetings, at least) focused, in part, on 1) our alarming drop in membership during the last two years and 2) how we can recruit more bee and ant researchers into our ranks, as well as more non-taxonomists. A more formalized newsletter—one that is fun, enlightening, and interesting—would, perhaps, inveigle droves of outlying hymenopterists to join the Society. The newsletter could also serve as a broader forum for discussing these alarming trends, as it would reach all members who might have some constructive input. Persistent communication also encourages people to remain as members.

A plan for a newer, bolder newsletter

I propose that we set a goal of publishing TWO newsletters per year, one in the summer and one in the winter (just in time to include a dues reminder! These dates also fall between issues of JHR). The newsletters will be distributed via email as a link to a PDF hidden on the ISH website (i.e., no large attachments to clog your inbox). After 6 months the PDF will be made available to the general public, and the secretary will parse the articles into blog posts (one per article) that are published here and fed to Facebook, Twitter, and other Web resources as necessary. In this way the content reaches more people than any one medium alone. This also gives ISH members 6 full months to digest the content before the public can feed on it.

These newsletters could be organized into sections, for example:

reports from the executive
latest ISH news
taxon-specific pages (i.e., recapture the glory of Sphecos and other newsletters)
field and museum notes
updates from members' lab
updates about Hymenoptera-related workshops (bee, ant, and Hym courses)
collector's corner (notes about collecting methods and localities)
research notes (no taxonomic descriptions though)
opinion pieces
fun and challenging questions (name that body part or name that mystery taxon)
Hymenoptera in art and literature
summary of recent and noteworthy publications in Hymenoptera research
book reviews

We'd accept submissions from anyone, and as secretary I am happy to serve as the editor. I'll add this item for discussion at the ISH business meeting in Kőszeg, but you can always send me your feedback before then, either as an email (@ncsu.edu: andy_deans) or as a comment to this blog post.

If there is broad support for this new effort we'll need to decide on a name for this newsletter. Do we name it after a hymenopteran? Or a body part? Or something more general? We should decide by early July, so that we can publish a summer 2010 issue!

ISH Constitution

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Mon, 17 May 2010 15:37:00 +0000

The proposed changes to the ISH Constitution and bylaws were accepted by the membership. The new constitution can be viewed as a Google Doc and downloaded in multiple formats.

2010 Hymenopterist Congress circular is up!

noreply@blogger.com (Andy Deans) — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 21:58:00 +0000

We posted the first circular for the 7th International Congress of Hymenopterists (PDF), which happens June 20-26, 2010. The program is well organized, with lots of opportunities to collect throughout Hungary before, during, and after the meeting. More information is available on our Hymenopterists Congress page. We hope to see you then!