American Museum Novitates

When I was a young kid, growing up in the Solomon Islands and mighty interested in birds, a man who was mentoring me sent me a photocopy of an issue of the American Museum Novitates. It was on the whistlers (Pachycephala spp.) of the Solomons by Ernst Mayr based on the results from the Whitney South Sea Expedition. It was the first proper scientific paper I had read, and I was stoked. I accumulated more which still remain some of my treasured possessions.

It is now very convenient (though slightly less exciting) that the American Museum Novitates are now online. There's a very handy search tool which makes things very easy. It's also an easy navigation to other publications of the American Museum of Natural History.

Marshall Islands Biodiversity report

It would appear that the UN Development Program has looked at the biodiversity of Kiribati and the Marshall Islands. At least, they've got a report to that effect. After a lot of fluffing around when I stumbled across the appendices of the report, I finally managed to find the contents page with actual links:
http://www.undp.org/bpsp/nbsap_links/nbsap_Kiribati.htm

It's worth a look, particularly because it has the brilliant Marshallese phrase "Eruj in jebarbar" - Excited like a reef crab. Use that in your next conversation....

Another project of the UNDP has completed was the "South Pacific Biodiversity Conservation Programme" - its writeup is found here.