Fussing around with ants, I stumbled across this paper (doi:10.1653/0015-4040(2006)89[1:PBANSO]2.0.CO;2) (if the DOI doesn't work, try this link), which describes a new species, Pyramica boltoni. This paper is Open Access, so the question arises, how do I get it into a triple store? I could add the metadata about the paper (it would be nice to do this automatically via Connotea and the DOI, but some BioOne DOIs aren't "live" yet), but what about things like the pictures?
For fun, I grabbed Fig. 1, uploaded it into iPhoto, then exported it to Flickr using the FlickrExport plugin.
Flickr has an API, hence the image (and the associated tags) could be retrieved automatically. Hence, anybody with Connotea and Flickr accounts could contribute to a triple store.
Wow. Now I know the genus of ant that I was observing (and sketching) with the stereo-micro, after having discovered them crawling around in the leaf litter collected from Monte Sano, in Huntsville, Ala. That was in Botany lab (after lab was over, and I was just enjoying the use of the microscopes), as an undergrad, over ten years ago.
ReplyDeleteActually, I may have narrowed it down to at least the family, and perhaps several genii (genuses?)--after browsing through Wilson's "The Ants", but I honestly can't remember. I do remember reading about their preying upon Collembolans. How cool it is to stumble upon a blog and see a rarely seen or mentioned species that you've had the privilege of encountering, like meeting an old friend again, and catching up on life.
I wonder what species I was examining? To think, if I had pursued the matter, what might have come of it...