Update 1: Subterranean summary

It’s that time of year again, where academics realise they no longer know how to relax, and yet have promised themselves most sincerely to not do any work. Updating my blog isn’t work though, right?

The subterranean traps are one of the most novel and exciting parts of my work, and as such I have received a lot of contact through this blog from people wanting to give them a try. As such, I really should tell what I’ve found so far, and my next steps!

You can check out my other blog posts for details, and what carabids are and why they’re awesome https://beetlekell.wordpress.com/2018/08/19/subterranean-vs-standard-pitfalls-run-1/ but to quickly summarise- carabid trapping is dominated by what I will now refer to as ‘standard’ pitfalls. The beetle wanders along, as they do, and falls into a pot that some entomologist has fiendishly set level with the soil surface. Beetles will all survive the fall, but carabids will get pretty hungry in there, and are not at all sentimental about eating their brethren, so kindly the entomologist will grant them all a quick death with an alcohol solution or similar.

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The point of this is to measure ‘activity density’ which is how many and what species are actively walking in a given area at a given time. Scientists use this measure as a proxy for what carabids are actually in the area, carrying out predation for instance, or being affected by pollution perhaps. Problem is that it doesn’t actually measure all the carabids there- some might not walk across the surface often- many fly, many dig, or don’t like being out in the open. There are other measures- such as suction trapping, hand searching, soil coring, and emergence traps. But all of these are really time consuming compared to pitfalls, and some require special or expensive kit. Standard pitfalls are cheap, easy, and also can be compared easily between different sites and studies.

My particular problem with standard pitfalls is that I wanted to find out more about carabid larvae. This is important because when they are growing, they are actually more voracious predators than adults, as they need protein- and so this is vital to add to estimates of predation on crop pests. Additionally, a large proportion of a carabid’s life is spent in their subadult larval form. The larvae live in the soil, and whilst some species do come to the surface to feed (Harpalus rufipes larvae gather weed seeds and hoard them in burrows) most activity is underground. So I can’t really find out much about them with the standard pitfall approach.

I searched the literature, and tried out soil coring- a day’s (hard) effort returned one Harpalus rufipes larvae. I looked into ways to sift invertebrates out of the soil automatically, and it took some kit that I didn’t currently have. But before I went further, a very knowledgeable entomological colleague told me about subterranean pitfall traps. These are like standard pitfalls, but dug much further into the ground. A wire mesh covers the soil area between the surface and the catching pot, which invertebrates can pass though, and fall into the pot. You empty the traps with a pole and hook- like ducks at the fair!

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This was perfect- I tried it out, and it caught carabid larvae with much less effort, and in better condition for identification. The benefit of this versus a soil core is also that it returns the same timeframe as a standard pitfall, rather than a snapshot of what happened to be in the soil at the time that you dug a great hunk of it out. The one obvious disadvantage is a long setting in time, as the soil needs to settle (see previous for more detail).

And so (with much kind assistance) I made 60 subterranean pitfall traps, and put them in a careful experimental design, on an existing crop rotation experiment. I also included standard pitfalls as a comparison. There were replications of traps in different crops, different tillage and different areas relative to the edge of the field. This way I could pick apart the factors influencing what beetles were caught in what traps and where.

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Overall, after 2 runs of the experiment I came down firmly in favour of subterranean traps. The hook-a-duck emptying and resetting is quite fun, but mostly I found the samples were less subject to spoiling (by mice etc.) or desiccation (was the year of the drought 2018), and as such much nicer to handle and analyse.

In statistic analysis of the data I found which crop and which trap type were associated with the abundance of carabids, and which species were found where (community composition). It was only when I went right down to species level that I saw influence of tillage on a couple of species. The main story was that for my larvae, subterranean traps revealed a completely different picture of what was active in the crop area. If you look at the red crosses representing standard pitfalls, you might think that there were much less carabid larvae in barley under-sown with grass, but in fact this was just less surface-active larvae! The subterranean traps, the green circles in the diagram, showed that there were in fact the most larvae in this crop, maybe as an attribute of the enhanced soil biota and/or resources. If you want the full story check out my second published scientific paper here [ https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/afe.12397  ]

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But that one field could only tell me so much about the larvae. What I’m really interested in is how the larvae occur relative to landscape and management factors- particularly such interventions as field margins. So I deployed my traps again in 2019, across the ~330 ha farm at Rothamsted. Luckily another particularly innovative and dedicated entomological colleague had initiated experimental margins across the farm, in juxtaposition with different crops and landscape features- to investigate if they influenced distributions of moths. With a staggering amount of kind help, I ran 1134 traps in 10 margins, over 4 back-to back runs. See earlier posts regarding my complete exhaustion!

Unfortunate circumstances this year precluding time in the lab have hampered my analysis of the samples, but I have been lucky enough to secure the help of two talented entomologists in getting through the cornucopia of samples I collected. Already we are finding fascinating things, particularly a lot more larvae of various species.

So watch this space for the outcomes… Hopefully I will find time to update you on this before next Christmas!

So much fieldwork…

Gosh I am tired, but a rainy day has afforded me a pause for reflection (well, mostly catching up on admin work- but a smidge of reflection).

I’ve been out sampling my carabid beetle friends in experimental margin treatments (grass and wildflower mixes) across the farm estate here at Rothamsted. I had thought that this would mean less drudgery than I had last year at Brooms barn, but in actuality it has just meant the opportunity for more actual work, and less travel time. Which is fantastic in terms of data collected, but not so brilliant on my poor tired feet…

Turns out I vastly underestimated the time associated with purely emptying and resetting multiple traps over the estate. I have 305 traps, over 10 locations, over 4 runs. That adds up to a lot of beetle pouring! Without the monumental efforts of my diligent supervisors, kind colleagues, and my lovely Mr- I would have been quite stuck to say the least 🙂 teamwork makes the dream work as they say…

Anyway 3/4s down- nearly there. Powering through for the dataset… but going through 1134 samples is gonna take awhile before I can play with it…

Update 2: The #Beneficial beetles Survey

“The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men, Gang aft a-gley” -Robert Burns

I’m sure everyone has a tale of sadly cancelled plans this year, and PhDs are among the most woeful. The downfall of carefully planned experiments, time sensitive work, and seasonal sampling has seriously threatened the outcomes of many projects underpinning thesis work for Doctoral qualifications. I’ve been much luckier than most, in that my fieldwork was all out of the way (though Cov19 has hampered my sample analysis) but it did put a major crimp in the social science aspect of my work.

One of the many bees in my bonnet when it comes to science, is the way that it is not often tied to application- more often shoehorned in at the end of the project as ‘this could be used for’. Since my Undergraduate dissertation working with farmers on different sites, I have seen that the major factor in agro-ecological (farm/wildlife) science is the way it is applied by land managers. In my masters study, I discovered that this is mostly down to perceptions, attitudes, and the resultant decisions that farmers make on a daily basis. So I built this social science aspect into my PhD from the start.

I’ve never spoken to a farmer who didn’t like nature. It’s what makes their crops and livestock grow after all! Many have knowledge and deep appreciation of the natural world, and have been keen for me to tell them how they can adjust their practices to help nature. The problem is that our farmers already work under a cavalcade of constraints. They have to think about markets and economy, the British weather, and weeds/pest/disease outbreaks to say the least- and balance it with their own needs, and the needs of their families. Then ecologists come along and ask them to do something that might affect the productivity of their land!

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Luckily for my work, carabids are an easy sell. They actually have the capacity to help farmers. They are proven efficient predators of crop pests and weed seeds, and we know a lot about farm measures that could help boost their numbers. So, on the first glance it would seem all I need do is connect the dots- tell farmers how great carabids are, and how to help them. Well basically yes, but it’s a bit more difficult than that!

Firstly, how do I tell farmers how great carabids are? Farmers are busy people, they have a lot of information thrust at them on a daily basis, and it’s hard for them to find enough time and to know what is important.

Secondly, we don’t really know that much about what will help them, in application. The results of Agri-environment schemes for beneficial beetles are mixed- some studies find positive results of certain interventions, such as field margins in abundance of diversity of carabids, but it doesn’t always translate into carabid presence in crop areas, when they are needed. There would be no point in putting field margins in, if all the beetles preferred to stay there and not ‘spill-over’ into the crop, as many studies assume.

I had planned to pull these questions together with a social science study, getting farmers to come in for workshops, finding the best methods of communicating to them, and also finding out from them their needs and preferences so that I can design my final distribution models to meet actual needs.

Unfortunately, workshops involve lots of people working together in a room, and Cov19 scuppered that plan completely. So it was back to the drawing board. I decided to do some content that would work remotely, and appealed to farmers to take part in a wider survey: the #Beneficial beetles survey  https://www.rothamsted.ac.uk/news/researcher-makes-internet-appeal-after-covid-19-stymies-her-research . I promoted my survey widely; using agricultural media- appearing on podcasts, in newsletters, and articles; and social media- my personal twitter and kind promotion by other academic and agricultural bodies.

Fortunately for me, many fabulously altruistic farmers recognised the importance of my work, and kindly took part.- I got over 160 responses to the first phase, much more than I expected. For the next phase, to discover a bit more about how to communicate, I designed some informative materials. With the talented Gary Frewin from Rothamsted’s comms team, I produced a 3 minute animation- it’s awesome- go look https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNyTzU96yYA&feature=youtu.be . I also came up with a carabid ID quiz https://readingagriculture.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_byGTrOfFP9TG2Ud   and a pitfall trapping factsheet https://www.rothamsted.ac.uk/sites/default/files/How%20to%20pitfall%20trap%20on%20your%20farm.pdf .  These were very successful, getting far more views and interaction than the survey responses alone!

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  Giving a zoom talk from the comfort of my home

 I then gave interactive talks to farmer groups on 3 occasions, telling the attendees about carabids, their ecology, and conservation in farmland. On a personal note, these talks really kept me motivated as lockdown began. I loved that I could still interact with farmers meaningfully. I always get so much from presenting, and it’s great that remote presenting can still deliver the same dialogue. Afterwards I asked attendees to look at the aforementioned materials and take my survey. The hypothesis being, that their perceptions and attitudes may be different to those farmers completing the survey without extra information on carabids.

I’ve still got to finish writing up the findings of the survey, but *SPOILER ALERT* there’s not as much difference as I expected (think this is due to self-selection bias of interested participants) BUT there is a key difference in future intent to implement measures beneficial to carabids, which has implications to how scientists might effectively communicate research to farmers. I can also report on which measures are favoured more generally and may be useful to target for agri-environmental interventions. Watch this space.

Isolation introspection

I don’t do well with uncertainty.

As a result of post-traumatic stress I have a need to control my environment, due to my stomach condition I have a need to control my diet, and as a result of my muscular/skeletal/neurological oddities and reynauds syndrome I need to control my work schedule and ergonomics carefully. Also I’m in the final year of my PhD, which means a really tight controlled schedule.

So you begin to see how an interruption to my carefully crafted routines could make me go off the deep end.

I sank into despair at first. I couldn’t work, couldn’t get my special foods, and couldn’t gym to keep myself healthy and sane- my world felt upside down. But the worst was the lack of control – other people were clearly able to turn my life around and were actively limiting the activities I felt vital to my self-image and self-worth.

Thinking back to that I seem like a special snowflake in my reaction, but I’m sure many of you felt the same. A kneejerk reaction is – how does this affect me? And I am not unique in all my disorders, everyone struggles with similar issues to a lesser or greater extent. I’m not alone, and neither are you- I’m sharing my experience to reiterate that it is okay to not be okay and tell you that any situation can lead to greater good, if you let it.

So, the first thing I did when the reality of Covid-19 hit me was go outside, sink to my knees and weep. Really sob. I am human and I have feelings and that’s okay. I allowed myself to express my despair fully, to wallow in it with myself, until the tight black ball in my chest diminished. I fully recommend this, even if you feel stupid- shout and scream and stamp and hit (soft) things if you feel like it, your mind sometimes needs the physical outlet.

The next thing I did was count my blessings. I’m alive, healthy and have options for all my problems. It could be worse, I’m not in the trenches, there are no bombs, other generations have dealt with tremendously more disruption than we are currently facing and they got through.

Then I started to deal with things. One thing at a time, with absolutely no pressure. Absolutely none. I gave myself credit for just getting out of bed some days – I’m sure many people reading this will understand just how hard that is sometimes. But just keep breathing, get through this moment and the next and the next and it gets easier.

And I am doing just fine now, better in some ways even. It has really shown me exactly what I need to survive, not just what I felt I needed.

• I have tried new foods (only two made me ill so far!).
• Home workouts forced me to go running, which I had avoided before due to fear.
• I can work on a new aspect of my work that I didn’t think I would have time to explore.
• And I slowed down, calmed down and am reconnecting with my deepest self and with others.

So please, try to take the positives. Yes, I’m gutted that I cannot count my beetles like I wanted to nor build my models in the scheduled time; move into a lovely new house with my boyfriend, or get the tattoo I have been waiting a year for. But I can’t control that. You’ll have things you’re gutted about that you can’t control – let them go and take power over what you can control.

Seems like we are in this for a good while longer. Be kind to yourself. This is horrifically difficult – but you are doing great! Raise your head up, we can get through this and we can be better. 

 

It’s okay to not be okay

Recently I’ve been struggling. And it’s okay. It’s so prevalent in the PhD life that people are so totally unsurprised to hear this. Even research colleagues and support staff are all feeling the pressure and it’s nice to commiserate.

But it is more than that- I’ve had a lot of problems with my mental health over the years. From depression to severe anxiety, I really thought I’d got it under control. These feelings never truly go away, they’re our bodies natural defence mechanisms and as such only become a problem when they go into overdrive. However, it seems I had never tackled the root cause of the problem, and with personal and general work pressure, the bad stuff started to show its face again.

This is not a sign of weakness- as much as my influenced and conditioned thoughts try to tell me it is! Inspired by young scientist’s diary’s brave post (reblogged in my last post), and my recent mental first aid training, I think it is necessary to share my experiences. There is too much glorification of overworking and not enough wellbeing focus in this sector. This needs to change.

I’ve been finding it hard to think straight, keep my priorities in line and get my work done effectively. The most important component in my project is me! And if I’m not working to my full potential, just like any other component, I need to understand why and fix it.

I’ve been taking time for myself- yoga and meditation, affirmations and positive thinking, and getting out with my friends more. This is working; my old negative patterns of thinking I am weak, knocking myself down every time something isn’t perfect, taking things personally when my project wasn’t going well- I am making changes and turning this around. Now I tell myself:

Done is better than perfect.

My best is good enough.

I really am doing great work.

Other people’s progress does not equate to your own.

My wellbeing is the most important thing.

It still is hard to not think I’m flaking out on my work. I love what I do but I cannot let it define me. I’m lucky in the support I have- but a few bits of advice from my recent experience:

• Talk to others, friends, co-workers, staff support, mental health first aiders, mentors, supervisors. All of them are there to help you, in slightly different ways. You are part of a team and not a burden, people really do want to help.
• Work in wiggle-room and plan in your wellbeing activities. Also plan for the worst- I have researched what support is in place for time off and extensions, just as a safety net. They don’t necessarily have to be used.
• Don’t feel weak. Don’t feel alone. It is no different me going for counselling, as someone attending a course of physiotherapy. I know this- and getting towards fully feeling it- so I’m making myself post this, so others start to feel the same way.

I hope this post helps and anyone who wants to chat about this, I can be there to hear you.

#4-Coming out: I am a quitter

So important to share experiences like this. amazing honesty ❤

Young Scientist Diary

I was once told I was brave for quitting my PhD studies. I did so after about 18 months of giving it all I had. At the time and for the previous 5 years, doing a PhD was all I had in mind,  but I refused to sacrifice my health. I could only make this difficult decision when I started thinking along the lines of:

“The quitter I want to be is someone who gets out when there’s no value to be added, or when that value comes at the expense of something more important.”

From <https://www.lifehack.org/articles/productivity/why-im-trying-to-become-a-quitter.html>

Following on my realisation on the above statement, I felt at peace and I never regretted my decision to quit. I moved countries to work as a Research Technician in a great team for over 3 years and when another PhD position came out, I applied. It was the right time, place…

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Busy busy…

A very quick update:

It’s that awkward time for ecological scientists, when we are initiating our fieldwork, whilst frantically trying to finish off all the analysis and write up that we should have really  completed over the winter.  Ah well, the best laid plans of mice and men….

I am currently rushing through my paper resubmission;  trying to get a bearing on two other papers  I have in the pipeline;  designing some engagement activities; sorting through my samples from last summer (still 😦 );  making some trap parts;  and awaiting one last field to be drilled with oilseed rape, so I can start my summer sampling!

…So then I will be terribly busy again with fieldwork…  but I hope to update you all with exciting pictures at least 🙂

Seasonal cake thoughts

And now for my annual kneejerk reaction to festive marketing overload:

 Why is it that our society can’t get past the economic valuation of wellbeing? If a child has too many toys, other children are often jealous; but the majority of parents would feel concern about the child’s mental (and often physical) wellbeing in the long run. If it is generally accepted that money and possessions (after a basic level of subsistence) do not bring happiness, then why do we continue buying into the neoliberal dream of market based freedom? Are people that desperate for short term catharsis that it overrides the dissonance, or are we really sheep; to follow the herd to a perceived green pasture?

Habits are hard to change. I know this, it took excruciating pain of gastric illness to spark a change in my consumption patterns. But I really would think society is advanced enough to put forward some better systems; and the need really is escalating.

We’re not happy. The divide between rich and poor is growing. The planet can barely support us.

There is hope though. I feel we’re getting towards the turning point: the environmental movement is grinding the gears and starting to convince entrenched systems that ‘progress’ is not necessarily positive. You only have to cite the Green revolution; and closer to home, the influence of post war productivist agriculture on our countryside. The results are irrefutable (if you’re unfamiliar with these- google will bring you up to speed I’m sure; or if you fancy an impassioned hour-long lecture, feel free to query me).

Now sustainability is a buzzword. Though we have still yet to fully discern what it means, and how we can carry it out- whilst ensuring a sufficient, safe, and healthy diet for all. Just a shame so much time is wasted in meaningless bureaucracy, prevalent in ambiguous and inaccurate measures that guide and measure policy towards human wellbeing.

But the basis of this is still our beliefs. Whilesoever as we allow materialism to govern our lives, the cycle of insustainability and societal divides will continue. Change has to be bottom up. We should never forget that we do have influence over governance. Sadly, as it is recently seen in the influence of a misinformed few over a fearful majority (I like the E.U. ☹).

I think the key to this is reconnection, across the whole of society. Chiefly to me, the disconnect between consumers and food production; and the rift between agricultural science and application for sustainable food production are achievably reconcilable. If we can get people to see the impacts of their consumption; especially to local environments; they will likely change their patterns quickly. If we can get convincing and applicable findings tailored to on farm management decisions; farmers are likely to take them up with alacrity.

No-one wants to damage the environment. No-one wants to store up trouble for the future. They just need to know what, why, and how they can have an impact. This is what drives me to carry on with my work, in spite of the odds.

I think we can have our cake and eat it: so long as it’s part of a balanced diet.

this cake isn’t mine: but isn’t it amazing! see https://waiber.com/research-cake/sustainability-cake/

The best of times…

It’s that time of year again, when ordinary folks get together in misty eyed reminiscence- and introverted scientists escape the festivities to (finally) update their blogs…

This year really has been a rollercoaster ride. As my title suggests, I think it has actually been the best year of my life- but not as the phrase continues: the worst; rather the most challenging.

Moving south to pursue my PhD studies was one of the most scary things I’ve ever done. As a former agoraphobic, anxiety prone creature of habit, making a new life so far away was very difficult. But I’ve never felt so accepted as I do at Rothamsted. There are so many weird and wonderful individuals that I have so much in common with, and so many people who have travelled much, much further from home to reach their goals. The community here continues to comfort and inspire me.

My work has been hard too. This year has seen a cavalcade of setbacks to my project, a battle with the elements, continual adjustments to experimental design, steep learning curves in techniques, and associated health problems. I’ve managed to get one set of robust field data, and one paper submitted, with two more in the pipeline! All with more than a little help from my friends. It’s also been great to help out with other projects and initiatives in the institute, commiserate on fieldwork failure, and celebrate project successes.

The best thing about this year has been regaining a work-life balance. Admittedly I love my ‘work’; but in my MRes it was literally all I did, and I suffered because of it. This year I’ve had more time to diversify my work related interests. One of these that I find very important is science communication. I had a great time participating in Rothamsted’s Festival of Ideas- and my ‘tree of trade-offs’ concept was a big success. I also helped with the insect survey exhibit and did a flash talk about my work. I’ve participated in a teenager engagement event for LEAF (linking environment and farming) and helped with Soapbox science public engagement. I’ve already planned a large farmer engagement project (watch this space), and applied to present at Soapbox science 2019.

Otherwise I’ve thoroughly enjoyed being active in Rothamsted’s gym committee, improving my own fitness and helping others to do so (mostly with shiny, shiny new kit). I’ve had some time to indulge in my art again. And I’ve actually left the house to go out of an evening: events at Rothamsted’s ‘pav’ are great, with people who love dressing up as much as I do!

It’s been a hectic year, but in retrospect this has made my successes all the sweeter. With good friends and fun to balance the stress and uncertainty, it really has been the best of times.

Here’s hoping for a challenging yet fabulous 2019!

Also- couldn’t write a retrospective without honourable mention of a certain dark entomologist; without whom I would most certainly have expired this year- from heat exhaustion if nothing else. Thanks Mr.

“How should you be? You should be like a rocky promontory against which the restless surf continually pounds. It stands fast while the churning sea is lulled to sleep at its feet. I hear you say, ‘How unlucky that this should happen to me.’ But not at all. Perhaps say instead, ‘How lucky I am that I am not broken by what has happened and I’m not afraid of what is about to happen.’ For the same blow might have struck anyone, but not many who would have absorbed it without capitulation or complaint.”

– Emperors Handbook, Marcus Aurelius.

 

Subterranean vs standard pitfalls: Run 1

 

Having learned some valuable lessons from the pilot run (see last post); and encouraged by initial data analysis showing potential differences between both trap type, and plot; I decided to start the first run of trapping with subterranean and standard pitfalls at Brooms barn.

Unfortunately the grass was harvested just before my run, damaging and obscuring the traps in these plots; so for this first run we set out in just wheat and barley. Still, this comprised 14 of the 20 plots I will be using from the rotation experiment (see picture) and 42 traps of each type!

The weather conditions were still rather unfortunate, and combined with my long pole markers not being delivered (finding traps still time consuming), my gingerness under extreme high temperatures forced us to split the setting and collecting into two offset trap occasions.

The drought did provoke some interesting distinction in the trap types however: the standard pitfalls nearly all dried out, despite my entomologically expert assistant advocating extra water in in the trap fluid. This caused the traps to be filled with live specimens: particularly carrion beetles who were attracted to the rather ripe odours; an unanticipated pleasure for me, since they are so gorgeous!

This is a great comparison to the subterraneans that did not dry out, and had a pretty equal volume of coleopteran catch, including smaller and undamaged beetles, yet more general invertebrate catch (since live carabids predated). Whilst this run is obviously biased: I cannot know to what extent the subterranean nature of the trap affects the catch composition, against in-trap predation; it suggests a clear advantage of subterranean traps in drought conditions.

Pitfall trap sorting

The time since the traps were collected on the 26th and 30th of July has been spent entirely counting beetles. So many beetles. Around 3,800 carabids. Identification has been a steep learning process, even given my past experience. I haven’t yet identified all the tiny ones, but I wanted initial data to present at an upcoming conference, hence the full on rush. A couple of tips:

• 1) Don’t rely on just one guide. Alex Greenslade of the Rothamsted insect survey kindly pointed me to Duff, which I found much more accessible than Luff, and some great online guides including mike’s insect keys (https://sites.google.com/site/mikesinsectkeys/Home/keys-to-coleoptera/carabidae). I found going between these sources was much easier and cleared up subjectiveness in singular interpretation.
• 2) Ask others. If you’ve been banging your head against a dichotomous key for hours, it’s easy to lose the plot. Chris Shortall and Dion Garrett, my entomological PhD colleagues, have been most benevolent in this regard.
• 3) Utilise past data/ collections. Consulting species records for Brooms barn gave me a springboard on a couple of species, and Alice Mauchline, my Reading uni mentor kindly lent me her beautiful reference collection of carabids, caught in agri-environments.

Though I have just started data analysis, I am already seeing some stark differences in trap type (incorporating those weather biases of course) and crop. I have also found some larvae, despite an overall dearth of soil moving invertebrates!

With so many traps I hope to pick apart some nice nuances, especially since the experimental plots comprise till and no till treatments… The next run should elucidate and further the distinctions, especially with inclusion of soil core samples and grass plots.

But if you want to know more you’ll have to wait awhile; or come and chat to me at Ento 18! https://www.royensoc.co.uk/event/ento-18