The UPLB Museum of Natural History recently received a sizeable donation consisting of thousands of shell specimens from the Baysac family of Binan, Laguna. The Baysac Family bequeathed the specimens to the museum after several correspondences by Janet Martires of Los Baños-based NGO Yakap Kalikasan with Coordinator for Collections Management, Jeremy Carlo B. Naredo.

The UPLB Museum of Natural History is advising all clients such as students, researchers and scientists, members of the academe, government and private sectors, as well as the general public that it is now implementing a new schedule of fees for (1) entrance to its Integrated Biodiversity Exhibit and Hortorium and (2) analytical services starting 01 January 2021.

The implementation of the new scheduled is approved by the Office of the Chancellor, through Memo No. 171 (see bit.ly/MNH-rates-approval) last 20 November 2020.

For quick reference, please download the schedule via this link: https://bit.ly/MNH-new-rates.

A new Philippine False Gecko, named Pseudogekko hungkag, has been described from Sorsogon province by an international team of herpetologists, after thorough study of field collections made in the Bicol Region from 2015–2017.

Camila G. Meneses, a junior researcher at the UPLB Museum of Natural History and member of the field expedition team shared that the discovery has been recently announced, and the descriptive article published, by the international, peer-reviewed journal Herpetologica.

Field biologists from the UPLB Museum of Natural History and their international collaborators are elated with the formal announcement of their rediscoveries of two reptiles – a skink and a gecko – as a result of field expeditions done in Sibuyan Island, Romblon in 2016 and 2017.

According to Camila Meneses, a junior researcher who led the two herpetofaunal survey expeditions in Sibuyan’s Mt. Guiting-Guiting, said that they have been able to find, collect and ascertain the identify of the secretive and elusive Brachymeles dalawangdaliri (Scincidae) and Pseudogekko isapa (Gekkonidae).

B. dalawangdaliri and P. isapa can only be found in the Romblon Island Group and nowhere else in the world.

Entomologists from the University of the Philippines Los Baños (UPLB), along with international orthopterists, recently wrote on the discovery of three insects new to science -- a katydid and two crickets -- from the protected areas of the UP's Land Grant in Paete, Laguna. The new species have been collected during a series of opportunistic samplings in the land grant's lowland mixed dipterocarp and secondary growth forests in April 2018, May 2019, and September 2019.

Katydids and crickets belong to the insect order Orthoptera which also includes grasshoppers, locusts, and their relatives. Some orthopterans are quite unique because they can communicate using vibrating sounds produced through friction by rubbing their legs.

To ensure continuity of public service while transitioning into the “New Normal” ushered by the CoVID-19 pandemic, the Museum will be adapting its services to reduce travel by clients to the Museum and the university.

Henceforth, the attached document “UPLB Museum of Natural History Protocol in Availing Biological Specimen Identification Services During the Community Quarantine Period” will be implemented effective 01 July 2020.

The said protocol will be in place until further notice.