The role of amateurs in entomology

Abstract

Natural history including entomology is a unique academic field in which amateurs can contribute. A typical contribution is elucidation and publication of regional insect fauna as scientific basic data. Actually many academic societies in insects have been active for a long time in Japan and have continued their efforts to publish findings in this field. In addition, some amateurs have developed their research in morphological taxonomy, mainly to publish description of new species. In the field of ecology, I have been studying the polymorphism of ladybirds with two professional researchers since 2003. In this process, their advice was essential for our experimental design of what kind of data should be taken and data analyses to show the phenomenon. Therefore, if amateurs receive professional back up, and participate in various academic societies, it becomes possible to publish their paper and contribute to ecology. In the present paper, I discuss the role of amateurs in entomology, based on my experience and knowledge learned from both amateur and professional researchers in the past twenty years when I continued my research as an amateur.