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It is now housed in 12 steel cabinets, each containing 12 Cornell-type glass-topped drawers. There was, ten years ago, no intention on my part (as Adviser and Curator) to start an insect collection. The reasons: no interested Omani was available to continue the curation into the future, and I am not an entomologist by training.
However, several very kind donations of identified specimens began to change the situation. First, in May 1983 K. M. Guichard, and Dr. N. Jago and Dr. G. B. Popov, of what then was the Centre of Overseas Pest Research, UK, donated a large representative collection of Orthoptera, all collected in Oman. Then, in 1985, came more Orthoptera from George Popov, and mounted and identified beetles and some other insects from Dr. M. Brancucci, Natural History Museum, Basel, Switzerland. Both the latter were of great help in the preparation of the public exhibition of insects in the new Oman Natural History Museum.
When the exhibits were complete many specimens remained from these donations which clearly deserved proper curation and secure housing, and the Minister for National Heritage & Culture agreed to purchase twelve cabinets from U.S.A. Soon, as the result of collecting in Oman since 1976, we had a good, growing Collection. Biting flies (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae) came from Dr. R. P. Lane in 1986; beeflies (Diptera: Bombyliidae) came from K.M. Guichard in 1987; Neuroptera from H. Hölzel, Austria, in 1988; mantids from Dr. A. Kaltenbach, Vienna, in 1989; and then in 1989, 1992 and 1993 identified collections of micro-hymenoptera from Dr. J. T. Huber, Canadian National Collection of Insects (CNC),Ottawa, Canada, who visited Oman in February 1986 and has given me much encouragement. A representative collection of mosquitos (Diptera: Culicidae) came from R. Irving-Bell in 1991. Other visitors included J.C. Deeming, National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, UK, who set out the reference collection of Diptera and Hemiptera in 1990 and 1992. In this period we also set up reference collections of Lepidoptera, Thysanura, ants and some other groups.
More recently, many sphecid specimens were identified and others donated by K. M. Guichard in 1994; he had visited the Sultanate in 1976 and 1977 (see Profile in Sphecos 4: 7). Dr. W. Schneider visited in 1994 to set out the collection of Odonata, and Dr. M. W. Balkenohl revised our large collection of Coleoptera in October 1995. A recent acquisition is a collection of insects (including 30 Aculeate Hymenoptera) by Dr. Michael Gillett, United Arab Emirates University, Al Ain, Abu Dhabi, from nearby Oman since 1993.
Many smaller collections of Hymenoptera have been made over the years – and continue to be made – by residents and visitors. Some specimens are mounted and retained unidentfied, but most of the small specimens are sent to J. T. Huber at CNC, where they are currently being examined by him, and by several other specialists such as J. LaSalle (Eulophidae), L. Masner (Platygastroidea), J. Sharkey (braconids), and D. Wahl (Ichneumonidae); material is also in the care of Dr. D. J. Brothers (South Africa) and Dr. L. Kimsey (California). Other names on det labels on Museum specimens include C. van Achterberg, Z. Boucek, J. C. Deeming, A. T. Finnamore, G. Gibson, J. S. Noyes, A. Polaszek, W. J. Pulawski, and H. Townes. With their excellent support and that of the collectors the collection of parasitic and Aculeate Hymenoptera now occupies eight drawers, two of which are for Sphecidae.
A list of species of the parasitic and Aculeate Hymenoptera of Oman has been prepared by me; based on the Collection and on published accounts it was edited by John Huber, Woj Pulawski and Arnold Menke. This is Oman Natural History Museum Check-list No. 5 (8 pp. including a brief bibliography). Nearly 600 species are listed, of which sphecids number 185 species of 58 genera. However, actual specimens of sphecids held total only 100 examples of 51 species.
Although the ONHM Collection is small, it is a start! Our aim is to develop it into a national reference collection, as for other groups. It is clear that there is great scope for further collecting in the Sultanate. The fauna is surprisingly rich, with many species which are rare in collections. For instance, males of the rare genus of sphecids, Heterogyna, are often collected at light, but no females have been found. Like others, this small Museum is constrained by lack of time, expertise and funds, and of specialists with time to help determine the collections. Our work is publicised in a free leaflet, which has led to further interest among the public, and to help by Omanis and volunteer Friends of the Museum in processing collections for study. Any reader who wishes to consult the Collection, or who would be interested in accepting groups for determination and return – or who wishes to visit Oman to collect more, is invited to write to: The Director, Natural History Museum, at the above address or fax 968.602735.
Around the 30's he moved to Asuncion to work with the Ministry of Agriculture, bringing a part of his collection and eventually depositing it in the basement of the Banco Agricola (now Banco de Fomento) where Winkelried had his last office. That collection was said to be there after his death and had been considered lost by most foreign entomologists.
The story is not clear, but recently Blanca Barrios of the Museo Nacional de Historia Natural del Paraguay (MNHNP) discovered that the Instituto Agronomico Nacional (IAN) in Caacupe had a collection of A. W. Bertoni's. He asked for and obtained this collection for the MNHNP. Early this year I asked Siemens Bertoni, Winkelried's nephew and Director of the MNHNP at that time, to investigate what happened to the collection in the Banco de Fomento. He found that the collection was no longer there and nobody knew where it was. Suspicions then fell on the Ministry of Agriculture. Was it possible that the IAN collection was the one from Banco de Fomento that was missing? That suspicion has in part been confirmed by me because the MNHNP collection now contains types of most, and possibly and hopefully all, of the species of Vespidae described by Winkelried. However, it may be that Winkelried Bertoni himself gave this collection to people in the IAN.
On the other hand, Puerto Bertoni still has its museum and there are still wasps there, as well as other insects, deteriorating because of the poor condition of the building and the climate of the place itself.
It is very fortunate that in the MNHNP the vespid collection is in good shape, but I hope to unify the whole collection, deposit it here and begin to study it with the help of anyone else who is interested. But there are some difficulties: people in the Ministry of Agriculture show no real understanding of the importance of museum work and have little interest in moving the Bertoni collection to a national museum where it would be available to the scientific community. Because of this we have a limited supply of material and cabinets for the collection; this is the one thing limiting my work with the Bertoni collection at the moment. I need to expand it into secure boxes because the original ones are very small, without chemical protection, and the specimens are crowded together.
In August I submitted a proposal for a project to save the insect collection of the museum of Puerto Bertoni and to deposit it in the MNHNP, but I faced great difficulties because of the problems mentioned above. If it is not possible to deposit the whole collection in the MNHNP, I hope to save at least the type material and other important specimens. It is clear, nevertheless, that the collection we now have in the MNHNP will stay here, and that is very fortunate because it is the most important part of the collection of A. W. Bertoni. At the moment people helping with this project, apart from me and John Kochalka in the MNHNP, are Jim Carpenter, Arnold Menke and Abraham Willink. I hope people abroad will take interest in this project and wlll be able to help us at least with information about points of which we are not aware, and if someone is interested in helping with materials or funding please write to me.
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