Is the diploma course still running?

[Deborah Richardson]

A friend showed me a link that mentions the BTS sexing diploma. This sounds very interesting.. is it still going?

http://www.thebts.co.uk/bts_study.htm

[Stephen jordan]

A friend showed me a link that mentions the BTS sexing diploma. This sounds very interesting.. is it still going?

http://www.thebts.co.uk/bts_study.htm

I would have been interested in this too, plus a basic taxonomy course would be awesome and help us id spiders a lot better...atleast be able to narrow it down to a genus!

[Deborah Richardson]

Oooh, if there is a taxonomy course I want to do it! I am fascinated by all the variations and would love to know more about how they are related.

The page I quoted is part of the BTS site, so I assume it is valid.. perhaps when the new shop is finished there will be a link to do it

[Peter Roach]

This a very old link.
As far as I know the sexing course stopped a few years ago.
One of the admin should log on soon and let you know for definate though.,

[Eduard Johan Hijmensen]

the course stopped indeed:

http://thebts.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?7030-Bts-sexing-diploma-course&highlight=sexing

[Ray Hale]

The BTS Sexing Diploma was set up way back when John and Kath Hancock were on the Committee. As many of you will know John was instrumental in the identification of sex from sprematheca and indeed wrote a couple of excellent works on the subject. The course was designed to give others a chance to be able to sex their own spiders from the shed skins. It ran for a while and a number of people took the course and became proficient in sexing. The problem was that John would send the skins to the students who would be reuired to disect out, draw and determone the sex from the skin. When John ands Kath left the Committee ( they emigrated to Canada) it was taken over by none other than Richard Gallon. Richard, as Im sure you all know is one of the UK's leading taxonomists and again for a while it went well, Unfortunatly like all of us Richard has to work and found that trying to run the course and earn a living was a little too much. We decided to end it a couple of years back.

However...............it seems that there is some interst in taxonomy given this thread. So we will revist the course at our next meeting and look to providing some basic knowledge for those with an interetst.

Hope this helps

RAy Hale

[Stephen jordan]

The BTS Sexing Diploma was set up way back when John and Kath Hancock were on the Committee. As many of you will know John was instrumental in the identification of sex from sprematheca and indeed wrote a couple of excellent works on the subject. The course was designed to give others a chance to be able to sex their own spiders from the shed skins. It ran for a while and a number of people took the course and became proficient in sexing. The problem was that John would send the skins to the students who would be reuired to disect out, draw and determone the sex from the skin. When John ands Kath left the Committee ( they emigrated to Canada) it was taken over by none other than Richard Gallon. Richard, as Im sure you all know is one of the UK's leading taxonomists and again for a while it went well, Unfortunatly like all of us Richard has to work and found that trying to run the course and earn a living was a little too much. We decided to end it a couple of years back.

However...............it seems that there is some interst in taxonomy given this thread. So we will revist the course at our next meeting and look to providing some basic knowledge for those with an interetst.

Hope this helps

RAy Hale

Thanks Ray, I would be very interested in the identification side of things. I did read your book on Haplopelma you sent me but my laptop died with it on it. I don't suppose you could send me another pdf of it please?

[craig mcinnes]

There was talk of a taxonomy day here - http://thebts.co.uk/forums/showthrea...d-Taxonomy-Day but unfortunately it did not come to anything which is a real shame. It would be nice to see something like this happen or even some articles in the journal but I imagine most taxonomists already have their hands full juggling work, research, writing papers and having some sort of a life so I wouldn't get my hopes up.

[Neill House]

I would certainly sign up for something like this.. but with the pressure on people's time, perhaps it could be stretched beyond the normal expected period for such things?

[Ray Hale]

Watch this space....Ray G and ourselves are currently working on putting a taxonomy course together. It would be a one day event probably held at the Oxford Museum of Natural History. Nothing concrete yet but I hope to see Ray soon and discuss it with him.

Rah Hale

[Stephen jordan]

Watch this space....Ray G and ourselves are currently working on putting a taxonomy course together. It would be a one day event probably held at the Oxford Museum of Natural History. Nothing concrete yet but I hope to see Ray soon and discuss it with him.

Rah Hale

Excellent