A tiny bark-cleaner no one had recorded in India takes its name from the Nilgiri hills

High in the damp, shaded forests of the Nilgiri Mountains, scientists from the Zoological Survey of India found something small and new: a barklouse, now named Allocaecilius nilgiriensis after its home. It is only the second member of its genus ever recorded in India, and the thirteenth known worldwide. Barklice are a quiet clean-up crew, grazing harmlessly on mould, fungi, algae and dead debris on tree bark in the shola and evergreen forests of the southern Western Ghats. This one gives itself away by brown patches on its forewings and other fine details the team documented in both males and females — clearing up confusion that builds when a species is known from a single sex. A whole species, living its life on bark, noticed at last.

SDG 15 · Life on land — Mechanism: tech innovation