Monday, July 31, 2006

Name Your Own Spider

An interesting addition to the new-species news: the Queensland Museum is selling naming rights to approximately 200 species of spiders recently discovered in Australia. For $5000 (AUS) you can pick the spider and have it formally descibed in a journal with a name incorporating your own name (or whatever moniker you'd like).

COMMENT: This is one of several recent examples of a novel approach to raising money for conservation and research. At least one bird and one monkey have been named by sponsors. It may seem a little crass to some scientists, but it works.

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