RED COATS AND WILD BIRDS: MILITARY CULTURE AND ORNITHOLOGY ACROSS THE NINETEENTH-CENTURY BRITISH EMPIRE

“Red coats and wild birds: military culture and ornithology across the nineteenth-century British Empire” investigates the intersections between British military culture and the practices and ideas of ornithology, with a particular focus on the British Mediterranean. Considering that British officers often occupied several imperial sites over the course of their military careers, to what extent did their movements shape their ornithological knowledge and identities at “home” and abroad? How did British military naturalists perceive different local cultures (with different attitudes to hunting, birds, field science, etc.) and different local natures (different sets of birds and environments)? How can trans-imperial careers be written using not only textual sources (for example, biographies and personal correspondence) but also traces of material culture? In answering these questions, I centre my work on the Mediterranean region as a “colonial sea” in the production of hybrid identities and cultural practices, and the mingling of people, ideas, commodities, and migratory birds. I focus on the life geographies of four military officers: Thomas Wright Blakiston, Andrew Leith Adams, L. Howard Lloyd Irby, and Philip Savile Grey Reid. By the mid-nineteenth century, the Mediterranean region emerged as a crucial site for the security of the British “empire route” to India and South Asia, especially with the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. Military stations served as trans-imperial sites, connecting Britain to India through the flow of military manpower, commodities, information, and bodily experiences across the empire. By using a “critical historical geopolitics of empire” to examine the material remnants of the “avian imperial archive,” I demonstrate how the practices and performances of British military field ornithology helped to: materialize the British Mediterranean as a moral “semi-tropical” place for the physical and cultural acclimatization of British officers en route to and from India; reinforce imperial presence in the region; and make “visible in new ways” the connectivity of North Africa to Europe through the geographical distribution of birds. I also highlight the ways in which the production of ornithological knowledge by army officers was entwined with forms of temperate martial masculinity.

Plasma Homocysteine Is Not Subject to Seasonal Variation.

Background: Studies investigating the relationship between plasma total homocysteine (tHcy) and vascular disease usually rely on a single measurement. Little information is available, however, on the seasonal variability of plasma tHcy. The aim of this study was to investigate the seasonal variation in fasting plasma tHcy and related B-vitamin intake and status in a group of people who did not consume fortified foods or take B-vitamin supplements. Methods: In this longitudinal study, a group of 22 healthy people were followed for 1 year. A fasting blood sample and dietary information were collected from each individual every 3 months, i.e., at the end of each season. Results: There was no significant seasonal variation in plasma tHcy or in B-vitamin intake or status with the exception of red cell folate (significantly lower in spring compared with autumn or winter) and serum folate (significantly lower in spring compared with the other seasons). Although the between-person variation in plasma tHcy was high (47%), the within-person variation was low (11%). This low variation, combined with the low methodologic imprecision of 3.8%, yielded a high reliability coefficient for plasma tHcy (0.97). Conclusions: Although there was a small seasonal variation in folate status, there was no corresponding seasonal variation in plasma tHcy. The high reliability coefficient for plasma tHcy suggests that a single measurement is reflective of an individual’s average plasma tHcy concentration, thus indicating its usefulness as a potential predictor of disease. This, however, needs to be confirmed in different subgroups of the population.

Contribution of the UV component of natural sunlight to photoinhibition of photosynthesis in six species of subtidal brown and red seaweeds.

Field-collected specimens of three species of Laminaria and three species of subtidal red algae (Delesseria sanguinea, Plocamium cartilagineum and Phyllophora pseudoceranoides) were exposed to natural summer sunlight on Helgoland (southern North Sea) for up to 4 h at 15 °C. Dark-adapted variable fluorescence (Fv : Fm) was measured immediately after these treatments, and following 6, 24 and 48 h of recovery in moderate irradiances of white light. The response of plants to the full spectrum of natural sunlight was compared with that to PAR alone, UV-A + visible, UV-A + UV-B, or UV-A alone. The Fv : Fm values of all species were reduced to minimal values after 4 h in all of these treatments, but those of the more resistant species (Laminaria spp. and P. pseudoceranoides) were higher after shorter exposures to UV radiation alone than to PAR with or without UV. The recovery of Fv : Fm in all species was also more rapid in the two treatments that contained UV radiation alone than in those that included PAR. These results suggest that it is the high irradiances of PAR in natural sunlight which are responsible for the photoinhibition of photosynthesis of subtidal seaweeds and that the current ambient irradiances of UV radiation (either UV-B or UV-A) in northern temperate latitudes would not contribute significantly to this photoinhibition.

Do vesicle cells of the red alga Asparagopsis (Falkenbergia stage) play a role in bromocarbon production?

The Rhodophyceae (red algae) are an established source of volatile halocarbons in the marine environment. Some species in the Bonnemaisoniaceae have been reported to contain large amounts of halogens in structures referred to as vesicle cells, suggesting involvement of these specialised cells in the production of halocarbons. We have investigated the role of vesicle cells in the accumulation and metabolism of bromide in an isolate of the red macroalga Asparagopsis (Falkenbergia stage), a species known to release bromocarbons. Studies of laboratory-cultivated alga, using light microscopy, revealed a requirement of bromide for both the maintenance and formation of vesicle cells. Incubation of the alga in culture media with bromide concentrations below 64 mg l-1 (the concentration of Br- in seawater) resulted in a decrease in the proportion of vesicle cells to pericentral cells. The abundance of vesicle cells was correlated with bromide concentration below this level. Induction of vesicle cell formation in cultures of Falkenbergia occurred at concentrations as low as 8 mg l-1, with the abundance of vesicle cells increasing with bromide concentration up to around 100 mg l-1. Further studies revealed a positive correlation between the abundance of vesicle cells and dibromomethane and bromoform production. Interestingly, however, whilst dibromomethane production was stimulated by the presence of bromide in the culture media, bromoform release remained unaffected suggesting that the two compounds are formed by different mechanisms.

rbcL sequences indicate a single evolutionary origin of multinucleate cells in the red algal tribe Callithamnieae.

In the Ceramiaceae, one of the largest families of the red algae, there are from 1 to 4000 nuclei in each vegetative cell, but each tribe is homogeneous with respect to the uninucleate/multinucleate character state, except for the Callithamnieae. The goals of this study were to analyze rbcL gene sequences to clarify the evolution of taxa within the tribe Callithamnieae and to evaluate the potential evolutionary significance of the development of multinucleate cells in certain taxa. The genus Aglaothamnion, segregated from Callithamnion because it is uninucleate, was paraphyletic in all analyses. Callithamnion (including Aristothamnion) was monophyletic although not robustly so, apparently due to variations between taxa in rate of sequence evolution. Morphological synapomorphies were identified at different depths in the tree, supporting the molecular phylogenetic analysis. The uninucleate character state is ancestral in this tribe. The evolution of multinucleate cells has occurred once in the Callithamnieae. Multiple nuclei in each cell may combine the benefits of small C values (rapid cell cycle) with large cells (permitting morphological elaboration) while maintaining a constant ratio of nuclear volume: cytoplasmic volume.

rbcL sequences reveal multiple cryptic introductions of the Japanese red alga Polysiphonia harveyi.

In Europe, the last 20 years have seen a spectacular increase in accidental introductions of marine species, but it has recently been suggested that both the actual number of invaders and their impacts have been seriously underestimated because of the prevalence of sibling species in marine habitats. The red alga Polysiphoniaharveyi is regarded as an alien in the British Isles and Atlantic Europe, having appeared in various locations there during the past 170 years. Similar or conspecific populations are known from Atlantic North America and Japan. To choose between three competing hypotheses concerning the origin of P. harveyi in Europe, we employed rbcL sequence analysis in conjunction with karyological and interbreeding data for samples and isolates of P. harveyi and various congeners from the Pacific and North Atlantic Oceans. All cultured isolates of P. harveyi were completely interfertile, and there was no evidence of polyploidy or aneuploidy. Thus, this biological species is both morphologically and genetically variable: intraspecific rbcL divergences of up to 2.1% are high even for red algae. Seven rbcL haplotypes were identified. The four most divergent haplotypes were observed in Japanese samples from Hokkaido and south-central Honshu, which are linked by hypothetical 'missing' haplotypes that may be located in northern Honshu. These data are consistent with Japan being the centre of diversity and origin for P. harveyi. Two non-Japanese lineages were linked to Hokkaido and Honshu, respectively. A single haplotype was found in all North Atlantic and Mediterranean accessions, except for North Carolina, where the haplotype found was the same as that invading in New Zealand and California. The introduction of P. harveyi into New Zealand has gone unnoticed because P. strictissima is a morphologically indistinguishable native sibling species. The sequence divergence between them is 4–5%, greater than between some morphologically distinct red algal species. Two different types of cryptic invasions of P. harveyi have therefore occurred. In addition to its introduction as a cryptic sibling species in New Zealand, P. harveyi has been introduced at least twice into the North Atlantic from presumed different source populations. These two introductions are genetically and probably also physiologically divergent but completely interfertile.