Introduction

General description

Additional information: 

The work carried out on the Galvagni Collection took three years of work (2016 - 2019) between reorganisation, restoration of some boxes and digital databasing. The collection as it entered the Museum was in a good state, even after some years of no maintenance by the owner. Nevertheless, to avoid any sort of possible infestation, it was subjected to freezing treatment using large refrigerators present in the Museum. Afterwards, the entomological boxes in the FMCR deposit began to be arranged, cleaned and restored. Finally the systematic collection, that part of the Galvagni Collection identified and arranged according to current taxonomy, was digitally databased in the Museum catalogue. This consists of 219 boxes and is available on the website www.fondazionemcr.it in the subsection Archives/Sections of the Museum/Zoology-Insects, after registration in the Museum portal (Fig. 1) or is downloadable here as a supplementary file (Suppl. material 1). The systematic collection contains samples pinned or glued on a label for a total of 32,046 specimens and some extracts of genitals or glands prepared on a slide, mostly in excellent condition. All specimens are accompanied by an identification label and collecting locality label indicating country, region, province, municipality, location, altitude and date of collection. On some specimens, not collected directly by Antonio Galvagni, there are also the coordinates of the collecting locality.

Figure 1.  

Database of FMCR available on www.fondazionemcr.it subsection Archives.

Project description

Sampling methods

Geographic coverage

Description: 

The Antonio Galvagni Collection is made up mostly (85%) of Italian specimens, plus others (15%) from the Mediterranean Basin and beyond. With this work, we want to underline the investigation carried out in the Italian regions. As shown in Table 1, Italian regions have different numbers of collected specimens and species: the Region Trentino Alto-Adige (TAA) is characterised by the higher number of collected specimens. This is due to the fact that Galvagni lived in TAA and, therefore, most of the excursions took place on his territory. This does not mean that some collections made in the other Regions are not complete; in fact, if the number of specimens by Regions are converted into the number of species for each Region, it is observed that most of the Regions in the systematic collection are optimally represented (Fig. 2, Fig. 3).

Table 1.

Download as

CSV

XLSX

Total of specimens, types and holotypes conserved in the Galvani’s systematic collection.

Orders	Number of specimens	Types	Holotypes
Mantodea	138	1	1
Blattodea	4434	32	3
Orthoptera	25014	320	33
Dermaptera	2450	29	3
Phasmatodea	10	0	0

Figure 2.  

Number of samples collected on the Italian territory.

Figure 3.  

Number of species divided by Regions.

Concerning the altitudinal distribution of Orthoptera, it is observed that there is a trend for which the Orthoptera increase with the altitude, showing a peak between 1800–2000 m, while the other orders are mostly found below 1400 m (Fig. 4). The reason for this is twofold: 1) a more intensive investigation effort on some medium-high mountain species, some examples are the genera: Miramella (n: 899), Podisma (n: 1438), Anonconotus (n: 521) and Italopodisma (n: 650);

Figure 4.  

Number of samples collected at different altitudes.

2) in general, the number of specimens collected is lower on the valley floor or in coastal areas, as these areas are often highly anthropogenised, therefore lacking suitable habitats.

Taxonomic coverage

Traits coverage

Temporal coverage

Notes: 

Antonio Galvagni began to capture specimens intensively from 1940 and continued until he lost the strength to collect; his collection covers more than 60 years of Italian natural history. From the trend of the graph in Fig. 5 comes an alternation of periods of intense capture and periods of stasis. These years were probably used to study the previously accumulated material. These data are due not to the seasonal trend, but clearly to an alternation of collecting and study periods.

Figure 5.  

Number of specimens captured during the principal years of sampling.

Even if there are peaks of collecting activity, during his whole life, Galvagni collected an average of 400 specimens every year.

Collection data

Usage licence

Data resources

Additional information

Acknowledgements

References

Alessandri G, Franceschini A, Lencioni V (2019)
Dragonfly biodiversity 90 years ago in an Alpine region: the Odonata historical collection of the MUSE (Trento, Italy)
.
Biodiversity Data Journal
7
(
7
):
e32391
. https://doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.7.e32391
Andreone F, Bartolozzi L, Boano G, Boero F, Bologna MA, Bon M, Bressi N, Capula M, Casale A, Casiraghi M, Chiozzi G, Delfino M, Doria G, Durante A, Ferrari A, Gippoliti S, Lanzinger M, Latella L, Maio N, Marangoni C, Mazzotti S, Minelli A, Muscio G, Nicolosi P, Pievani T, Razzetti E, Sabella G, Valle M, Vomero V, Zilli A (2014)
Italian natural history museums on the verge of collapse?
ZooKeys
456
:
139
‑
146
. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.456.8862
Berthold AA (1927)
Latreille’s natürliche Familien der Thierreichs aus dem Französischen mit Anmerkungen und Zusätzen von Dr. Arnold Adoph Berthold
.
Landes-Industrie Comptoir
,
Weimar
,
411
pp.
Buzzetti FM, Brizio C, Fontana P, Massa B (2019)
A new voice from Sardinia: Uromenus annae (Targioni-Tozzetti, 1881) (Insecta: Orthoptera: Tettigoniidae: Bradyporinae: Ephippigerini)
.
Zootaxa
4560
(
2
):
311
‑
320
. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4560.2.4
Camerano L (1838)
Descrizione di un nuovo genere e di una nuova specie di Ortottero Piemontese esistente nel regio museo zoologico di Torino (Anonconotus). Atti della Reale Accademia delle scienze di Torino
.
Atti dell'Accademia di Scienze di Torino
13
:
1190
‑
1192
.
Chapman AD (2005)
Uses of primary species-occurrence data, Version 1.0. Report for the Global biodiversity Information Facility, Copenhagen.
http://www.gbif.org/orc/?doc_id=1300. Accessed on: 2020-9-15.
Dovnar-Zapolskij DP (1932)
Zur Kenntnis der palearktischen Podismini (Orthoptera, Acridoidea)
.
Trudy Zoologicheskogo Instituta, Akademii Nauk SSSR
1
(
3-4
):
262
‑
265
.
Fieber FX (1853)
Synopsis der europischen Orthopteren mit besonderer Rcksicht auf die in Bhmen vorkommenden Arten
.
Lotos
3
:
90
‑
261
.
Fontana P (2017)
Il mio ricordo di Antonio Galvagni
.
Atti dell'Accademia Roveretana degli Agiati
VII, B
:
5
‑
24
.
Fontana P, Buzzetti FM, Massa B (2019)
A new rare species of Oedipoda Latreille, 1829 (Orthoptera: Acrididae) from South Italy
.
Zootaxa
4614
(
1
):
50
‑
60
. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4614.1.2
Hill A, Guralnick R, Smith A, Sallans A, Gillespie R, Denslow M, Gross J, Murrell Z, Conyers T, Oboyski P, Ball J, Thomer A, Jones RP, Torre J, Kociolek P, Fortson L (2012)
The notes from nature tool for unlocking biodiversity records from museum records through citizen science
.
ZooKeys
209
:
219
‑
233
. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.209.3472
Hoeksema BW, Land J, Meij SET, Ofwegen LP, Reijnen BT, Soest RWM, Voogd NJ (2011)
Unforeseen importance of historical collections as baselines to determine biotic change of coral reefs: the Saba Bank case
.
Marine Ecology
32
:
135
‑
141
. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1439-0485.2011.00434.x
Massa B, Fontana P (2016)
Ricordando Antonio Galvagni
.
Memorie della Società Entomologica Italiana
93
(
1-2
):
243
‑
244
. https://doi.org/10.4081/MemorieSEI.2016.243
Rambur P (1838)
Faune entomologique de l'Andalousie
.
2
.
A. Bertrand
,
92
pp.
Smith VS, Blagoderov V (2012)
Bringing collections out of the dark
.
Zookeys
209
:
1
‑
6
. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.209.3699
Suarez AV, Tsutsui ND (2004)
The value of museum collections for research and society
.
BioScience
54
(
1
):
66
‑
74
. https://doi.org/10.1641/0006-3568(2004)054[0066:TVOMCF]2.0.CO;2
Winston JE (2007)
Archives of a small planet: The significance of museum collections and museum-based research in invertebrate taxonomy
.
Zootaxa
1668
:
47
‑
54
. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.1668.1.6

Supplementary material