Keys are improving significantly and can now be used by both the scientist in the labaratory and amateur in the field. My identification guides give you an indication of what can be identified in the field and what can’t together with more photographs. Camera technology and photographic identification is improving significantly and it is now possible to get great macro photo’s in the field with just an iPhone that if you know the features you can identify at home. However some species you can only split by looking at the features under a microscope and a collection to compare some species significantly aids learning therefore collecting is still required.

With the increase in volunteers, amateur naturalists and interest from children and general public it is really important that we do everything that we can to protect the species by only taking neccessary samples and protecting their habitats and not damaging it as we seek to collect or identify.

The first question is where to find them. They all have habitat preferences and that is a really good starting point. Some will have specialist habitats like Aphelocheirus aestivalis that can only be found in fast flowing water under stones or in weed beds, however others may be more generalist like Notonecta glauca that can be found most ponds, lakes and canals. Knowing the habitat preferences water for water bugs can make searching much easier.

There are also some key habitat groups and those can also determine how to catch them.

There are many that are surface bugs like Gerridae, Velidae and Hydrometridae. For these you can use sight to target, stealth to approach and a net to bring down over the top of them quickly. This is more effective if it is the first thing you do when you approach the water as other activities will push them out of range. It can be any net but i use my "Professional pond net" wooden handled, 5’ tall with a net 250mm wide and 1mm mesh. I now have handle extensions and find that 10’ is more efficient but anything longer is perhaps a little heavy to handle. I also have seen an extending 8/10’ handle with a large tea strainer on the end be very effective for surface bugs.

In still water habitats you have to create the water, vegetation or substrate disturbance to catch them. To do this i first sweep along the edges of any deeper water to catch any fast moving species, i then disturb the substrate with my net to cloud the water and then sweep through that a number of times. This can disturb and disorientate them and you can create a current and sweep back through that and also they pop up onto the surface or higher in the water and you can go back through that again. You can then do a similar action with the vegetation quite strongly that will knock them off the vegetation and then sweep through the water collecting. Finally i then go along the edges of the bank in the grass or mossy areas sweeping my net through and back again. Sometimes a smaller net or tea strainer here can catch some of the smaller insects and disturb the habitat less. In order to be consistent in sampling I generally dip for 3 minutes for a sample but divide this between the various different habitats that are present in the feature being surveyed.

In moving water that you can stand in then you can use the kick sampling method. With this you position yourself in the water facing downstream with the net on the bottom facing towards you. You can then use your feet to disturb the insects on the bottom and they will follow the waters flow and into your net.

There are a number of humane ways you can kill your sample. The first you can transfer the live specimens to a bowl and add boiling water. This will kill them instantly but it will not alter their feature or colouration. You can also add them to a killing jar with Ethyl Acetate fumes for a short time. You can also submerge them in a 70% alcohol solution. I use Isopropyl Alcohol (IPA) which is an electronic cleaning solvent and also a 70% Industrial Methylated Spirits (IMS) both of which are readily available. My preference is that i carry glass tubes with IPA on field trips and submerge them at the point of capture that way i can keep samples specific to the survey and retain with habitat information and grid references. If they are being returning to the site after identification then a simple bucket with a lid will sufice. However it is good to add some vegetation and maybe some small aquatic insects ( water fleas) as food.

The last question is how to store them. There are a number of methods that you can use to store bugs including pinning, carding and in alcohol. In order to choose the right method i usually ask why am i storing them and what for.

If it it is just for identification then return as many live as you can but if they have been killed then i identify and the put in a glass alcohol container from entomological suppliers (usually 40x11mm) but if i don’t have many then i go smaller. I use a waterproof paper label with the date and location written on in pencil. I buy a waterproof paper notebook and cut small labels from that. That is then filled to above the bugs with IPA/IMS. To do that i have a large pipette and then store the tube upright in a tub. I keep all the years sampling together, that way you can quite easily search if you need a specific bug. I do find that in some cases this means searching and re-identifying again but i don’t have to do it that frequently. If you have one from a tricky couplet that you expect to be challenged then i will put that in a glass tube of its own with a label for species, date and location. That also goes into the tub but will make searching a lot easier later. Also don’t forget that if you don’t want to store then you can take photo’s these days of the id features using macro or microscope cams and this can be just as food if your id is questioned. We should encourage the id questioning and challenging too, as it is a great learning tool.

For some of the trickier species is it great to keep a reference collection that you can refer too. When you see the pronotum’s of Sigara dorsalis, S. falleni and S.distincta angside each other it is much easier to compare your specimen. Therefore the preferred method for water bugs is to card you species using soluble glue so that you can take them off easy. However you can also store them pinned or even in a collection of alcohol tubes. This is useful if you are training and want to frequently put them under the microscope and view both sides. If the bugs are very small or you want to see both sides of the bug you can get pre-printed cards of points. When you mount the bug you can attache to the point so you can see both sides.

Carding is fairly straight forward and i use the Pre-cut insect cards, paste on some coleopterists gum and lay your insect on face down. You can then arrange the legs so that they look neat. I pre-print on A4 card some standard labels and cut them to size and write on the date, location and species. I then use a 26mm or 35mm continental pin (depending on the container) and stab both the insect card and then the label and use a mounting block so i get the same distances every time.

If you are pinning then you would stab the inch in one of the Hemielytra near to the Pronotum and then add the same label and also use a mounting block.

For general storage i use a range of plastic containers with 6mm foam glued to the bottom. I always like to have a lid so if they get infested or damp it is localised. However If you are making a formal reference collection i like the wooden boxes and arrange them in taxonomic order with computer printed labels and the neater the better. I have found that it is best to create that in one go and then you can ensure that it is all using all the labels are the same labels,pen, pins and materials but also your samples are mounted the same way.