We are pleased to announce a new small grant scheme for BAS members. The Stanley Dobson Award Scheme is intended to provide financial support to amateur arachnologists who are looking to advance their knowledge or field study of British arachnids. Encouraging amateur naturalists to engage in arachnology and expand their knowledge was very important to Stan and this Award Scheme has been established with support from his family as a lasting legacy, recognising his many contributions to the study of spiders and the British Arachnological Society. 

We are thrilled to announce that Peter Harvey is the first recipient of our new President's Award, given in recognition of exceptional contributions by individual members towards the public understanding of arachnology. He was presented with his award, an original painting by Richard Lewington of the Pirate spider, Ero cambridgei, by BAS President, Bill Parker at the Wat Tyler Country Park in Essex.

We're very please to announce that the BAS now has a bespoke iRecord recording form. This allows you to enter your UK spider, harvestman and Pseudoscorpion records. The form has optional ecological fields so that you can help improve our understanding of all of these fascinating species. You can also attach photographs of your sightings which will help with record verification.

BAS members and contributors will now have received their special issue of Arachnology with the proceedings of our 2021 symposium to honour the lives of Mike Roberts, John Murphy and John's wife Frances. This substantial volume contains eight papers based on the symposium presentations and an additional 16 contributions. All relate to Mike, John and Frances' interests and cover a very wide ranging topics. There should be something for everyone's interests!

The British Arachnological Society strongly condemns the invasion of Ukraine. The arachnological research and conservation community is international, working together towards common goals regardless of differences in language, culture, religion and political views. We now stand in solidarity with our colleagues and friends in Ukraine, Russia, Belarus and across the world. Our community entirely rejects this violence and urges a peaceful solution. 

Huge thanks to the small team who organised this symposium and to all the wonderful speakers for agreeing to celebrate with us the lives of John and Mike, and Frances Murphy. For those who missed it, the uniformly high quality, fascinating talks ranged across diverse topics including the role of women in arachnology (past, present and future), the origins of spiders in the geological record, how to measure spider diversity, revisions of certain genera and higher classifications, and spider phylogeography.

The BAS offers small grants to its members to help with the costs of research and survey (normally £500-£2,500) and attending courses and conferences (normally up to £500). Full details of our grants, including application procedures, can be found here.