Underexplored Freshwater Habitats in Ireland: Case Studies Using Riverflies

Ireland's freshwater landscape encompasses over 12,000 lakes and extensive river networks, primarily shaped by Pleistocene glaciation. Standard aquatic surveys consistently target riffle zones, boulder substrates, and macrophyte beds, systematically overlooking specialised microhabitats such as seeps, temporary streams, turloughs, and those with groundwater sources including springs and the hyporheic zone of rivers that may harbour unique invertebrate communities.

Using Ephemeroptera (mayflies), Plecoptera (stoneflies), and Trichoptera (caddisflies) as focal taxa, this talk examines distributional gaps and discusses species found in some of Ireland's specialised aquatic habitats, based on recent surveys carried out at various locations across Ireland.

Dr Helen James joined National Museums NI in January 2022 as Senior Curator of Natural Sciences. Previously, she was Senior Curator in the Department of Freshwater Invertebrates at the Albany Museum in Grahamstown, South Africa, where she was based for many years. Her research interests focus on biodiversity, systematics, biogeography and ecology of freshwater invertebrates, in particular the freshwater insect groups the Ephemeroptera (mayflies), Plecoptera (stoneflies) and Trichoptera (caddisflies). These insect groups are frequently encountered during ecological studies of freshwater ecosystems, and play an important role as bioindicators of the state of the aquatic environment they inhabit.

In the past, Helen’s research focus has been on African freshwater ecosystems, and she has expanded this to include those in the UK and Ireland. She has carried out several externally funded surveys of Irish freshwater ecosystems, looking at the biodiversity of the organisms living in them, and adding voucher material to the museum collections through this work. Making museum natural history collections and their associated data available for research purposes is of fundamental importance as past collections contain hidden treasures of biological information. Adding new voucher material to expand these collections is essential for ongoing tracking of species changes over time. Vouchers allow not only geo-localities to be recorded, but can be used to investigate changes in body size, wing length, fecundity and other more subtle metrics.

The 1-hour event will consist of a presentation followed by a Q&A with the tutor using questions provided by the live audience. This event is a one-off and will not be repeated. If you can't attend the live event, you don't need to miss out. Book a space and once we've processed the event content after the live event you will be sent a link to the content online.

entoLIVE is delivered by the Biological Recording Company, British Entomological & Natural History Society, Royal Entomological Society and Amateur Entomologists' Society, with support from Buglife, Field Studies Council and NBN Trust.