When you go for a walk in the bush, you enter the realm of small species. Insects abound in our natural world, but many of us rarely take the time to look for them or wonder about their stories. Whether you make it 100 metres out of the Remarkable Cave car park, or all the way to Crescent Bay, here’s a chance to tune into the incredible diversity and intrigue of the insect world. Full of scandal, sex, murder, and mystery, you’ll never look at a clump of leaves or rotting tree bark the same way again.
Talk by Dr Cathy Byrne and Dr Simon Grove with music by Warren Mason and Ben Salter.
Suggested Walking Location
Remarkable Cave to Crescent Bay, Tasman Peninsula
The new and improved day walking tracks are taking visitors from the Remarkable Cave to Crescent Bay and Mount Brown. The walking tracks include short walks to a new coastal viewing area and Maingon Blowhole and longer walks to Crescent Bay, Crescent Bay Lookout and Mount Brown. Click here for more information.
Photo credit: HilACT
Meet the presenters
Dr Cathy Byrne
Dr Cathy Byrne is the senior Curator of Zoology at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery. Cathy is a lepidopterist by trade, and describing and classifying new species of native moths constitutes most of her research at the museum. This is no mean feat as 75% of Australia’s fauna are undescribed or new to science. Cathy has worked on Australian Lepidoptera for almost twenty years and is the only lepidopterist in a paid position in Australia.
Photo credit: ABC
Dr Simon Grove
Dr Simon Grove is Senior Curator, Invertebrate Zoology at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery. His professional interests extend across most of the invertebrate groups present in Tasmania or in the surrounding waters; but he has particular expertise in the study of beetles and other insects, and in marine molluscs. He is the author of numerous academic papers on these topics and on forest ecology and management, as well as popular articles on various natural-history themes, often illustrated with his own photos. He maintains two web-sites on Tasmanian insects and marine molluscs respectively, as well as a Flickr account featuring close to 3,000 photos of Tasmanian invertebrates.
Meet the musicians
Warren Mason
Warren Mason was born in Dirranbandi, south east Queensland in the year 1969. Growing up in Goodooga, a small Aboriginal community in north west New South Wales, he now lives in Tasmania with his wife and three children. He is a proud indigenous man with lines to the Yorta Yorta and Yuwaalaraay tribes.
Warren is hoping to use a range of mediums in his art practice, with all works linking back towards the idea of healing scars. Incorporating his loves for art, music, story and knowledge sharing in this process. Land and country have always influenced the journey warren has taken with art.
Photo credit: Barry C.Douglas
Ben Salter
Ben Salter is one of Australia’s most highly regarded performers and songwriters. Whilst also a founding member of a number of acclaimed Australian ensembles including Giants of Science, The Gin Club & The Wilson Pickers, Salter’s primary focus is his solo practice. Since 2010 he has released two EPs, a pair of live albums and five studio albums including his latest “The Summer Of The Loud Birds”. Salter had collaborated, written and performed with artists as diverse as Mick Thomas, Tim Rogers, Liz Stringer, Bernard Fanning, Gareth Liddiard and Marlon Williams, to name a few. He has toured relentlessly both across Australia as well as throughout Europe and Japan. He currently resides in the Southern Beaches region of Tasmania.
Feature image credit: Dearna Bond
ABOUT SCI ART WALKS
Sci Art Walks is a project by Beaker Street Festival, an annual celebration of science and art in Hobart, Tasmania. The unusual circumstances of 2020 inspired us to innovate, and create something that would get people away from their screens and out into nature. You might say Sci Art Walks is a project for a pandemic. In times of uncertainty and anxiety, many of us find solace in our natural world. Creating these episodes was also a great opportunity to continue to facilitate collaborations between scientists and artists, and showcase some of the amazing talent and groundbreaking scientific research coming out of Tasmania.
CREATED BY MARGO ADLER, CHRIS TOWNEND, AND ROSIE PIDD
9 EPISODES
