Join the ABMI to discuss the future of environmental monitoring in Alberta. During our recent Stakeholder Needs Assessment process, we heard the call for more outreach about the ABMI’s activities. With that in mind, we’ve been working to offer new ways to connect with our monitoring work, data products, and broader research and development program. [...]
A modified version of this post recently appeared as part of the ABMI’s regular feature in the Alberta Society of Professional Biologists’ newsletter, BIOS Quarterly. Here at the ABMI, we like to say that you manage what you measure—that the more we know about our living resources, the more likely we’ll be to responsibly manage [...]
ABMI at the Royal Alberta Museum: Learning About Wetlands Through Aquatic Invertebrates from ABMI on Vimeo.
Beneath the surface of Alberta’s wetlands lives a diverse community of aquatic invertebrates. For most of us, the species that call wetlands home only become recognizable after individuals reach their adult phase, and take the form of flying insects like dragonflies and mosquitoes. Taxonomists, however, like those working in the ABMI’s Processing Centre at the Royal Alberta [...]
“In 10 years, the ABMI will likely increase our knowledge of Alberta’s Chironomids 10-fold over the previous 200 years. We want to know how effective Chironomids could be in biomonitoring, and we’re right on the doorstep of that kind of information.” – Rob Hinchliffe, Aquatic Invertebrate Taxonomist, Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute and the Royal Alberta Museum [...]
Porsild’s Bryum Provincial Recovery Team video by Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development Along the Whitehorse Creek in Whitehorse Wildland Park in Alberta’s Rocky Mountains lives an Endangered* species. It’s green and cushy, and it loves water. Porsild’s Bryum is one of more than 1,000 species of moss found in Canada. Like many moss species, [...]
From upper left (clockwise): Sphagnum magellanicum, photo: M. Luth; Polytrichum commune, photo: M. Luth; Anthelia juratzkana (liverwort), photo: R. Caners; Scorpidium scorpioides, photo: R. Caners; Brachythecium rivulare, photo: R. Caners Part 1: Introducing Bryophytes It’s a beautiful spring day and you are walking through a lush, green boreal forest somewhere in northern Alberta. The sunlight [...]
“Spending your life staring through a microscope, obsessing over tiny features on tiny things that no one cares about but you.” If you think this is the life of a taxonomist, you’re not entirely wrong – but you’re overlooking a key truth. Without taxonomists we wouldn’t have labels for species or a common language to [...]
Bryologist Richard Caners studies a moss specimen in a peatland near Cold Lake, Alberta. “The best aspect of my job is the fact that I get to study and work with bryophytes every day.” – Richard Caners, Bryologist for the ABMI and the Royal Alberta Museum – Anyone who meets Dr. Richard Caners walks away a convert. [...]