In strange waters again

…after a minor brake I thought I’d start blogging again… 

It sure takes a bit of effort to get used to the Dutch waters again. Seeing different species,  and more rubbish (if you don’t mind me being so direct) and last but not least using the very different, less intensive way of counting the samples. 

Why does for example the species Hortobagyiella verrucosa not want to drift in the Finnish waters? Or has somebody seen it here already? 

Now that I come to think about this name, Hortobagyiella … it probably has something to do with our far-away relatives, the Hungarians. There is this big nature park in Eastern Hungary called Hortobágy (notice the long a and the soft -gy sound). And there was this famous Hungarian algologist called Tibor Hortobágyi, who has written a bunch of algae books. So did the author of the genus Hortobagyiella, L. Hajdú, dedicate this genus to mr. Hortobágyi? Could be. His name is included in several other species too, maybe I’ll come back to this interesting subject later.  

I remember when I was for the first time in Hungary, actually quite near this national park and I was thinking where on earth have I heard this name before: Hortobágy… “Is it maybe a name of a famous Hungarian wine?”, I wondered. But soon I realised that I ‘ve seen the name many, many times in different algae books.  

This again made me think, how typical a Finn am I actually? If I immediately associate a strange word rather with alcohol than with my beloved algae, I must be a real stereotype for a Finn.

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