Once again the heady aroma of cedar-wood oil and mountant filled the classroom at Belstead House as 17 students enjoyed a weekend of mounting insect parts under the guidance of Ernie Ives. Many of those present had attended last year's class, which was on mounting whole insects but some new students were welcomed also. Ernie's excellent demonstrations were clearly visible to us thanks to the use of Colin Lamb's Russian stereo microscope, fitted with a beam-splitter, allowing a video camera to be used at the same time as both eyepieces.

Subjects tackled included head & mouth-parts of the stable fly, flesh fly, cranefly, wasp and bee, butterfly and moth and hoverfly. Wings from hoverfly, hornet and, everone's favourite, earwigs (several stains were tried for these) were attempted as were back-swimmer (Notonecta) head and legs. Some students tried legs or other parts of the Giant Columbian Bird Eating-Spider - not found in the grounds of Belstead House!

Everybody went away with several complete mounts and jars full of partially prepared specimens to continue working on at home. Our thanks to Ernie for his patient and expert tuition and to the staff of Belstead House for catering for us.

In 2000 and 2001 there has been a waiting list for the courses. Next year it is expected that Ernie Ives will be the tutor for two classes on preparation and mounting of marine life. The dates for the courses are:

Further details and application forms for these Practical Microscopy Courses will shortly be available from Belstead House.
E-mail belsteadhouse@talk21.com