Alexander Lees
@alexanderlees.bsky.social
Birds, biodiversity science, natural history, politics. Professor Man Met Uni, Associate Cornell Lab of #Ornithology, Chair BOURC, Trustee @bou.org.uk SC @ras-network.bsky.social. Usually found in the #PeakDistrict or #Amazonia, he/him. Views own.
📢 NOMINATIONS OPEN For BOU committee membership. We have vacancies on: ➡️ Awards Nominations Committee ➡️ Grants Committee ➡️ Meetings Committee ➡️ Records Committee ➡️ Committee Shadowing Scheme Nominate now! bou.org.uk/about-the... Deadline: 26 Feb 2027 #ornithology 🪶
The Rare Breeding Birds Panel’s new report, ‘Rare Breeding Birds in the UK in 2024’, is out now in @britishbirds.bsky.social #ornithology #birds #UKbirding
AI is an attempt to hobble, if not outright destroy, the liberatory possibilities of information technologies—the ability to use voice, image, video, and text as authentic witness and testimony, in a globally accessible human archive that transcends distance and time, to easily contradict power
The Spook Who Sat by the Ring Doorbell@hypervisible.blacksky.app · 19h ago“As it stands, if people don’t like what they hear, they can simply turn something off; the system outlined by Microsoft describes an environment where people can instead adjust someone else’s speech to their personal taste.”
Judging by the situation in Sweden, it would be wise to recheck any vagrant Desert/Isabelline Wheatears to see if they haven't picked up an associate Asian Desert Warbler in the next few days #UKBirding
Stuart Reeves@stuartreeves.bsky.social · 3d agoI was trying to get better views of a Lapland Bunting on Kessingland Beach this afternoon when I caught sight of a wheatear out of the corner of my eye. It turned-out to be this cracking male Desert Wheatear.
Our new article is now available in early access at @commsbio.nature.com! We formally describe two new species of Amazonian howler monkeys, revealing previously unrecognized biodiversity! Please read, share, and help spread the word! 🐒🌿 Photo credit: Bruno Rennó. www.nature.com/articles/s42...
Good #vizmig today with at least 60 Whooper Swans east through Longdendale in 4 groups and Fieldfares coming in off the moors and falling out of the sky all day @derbyshirebirds.bsky.social #UKBirding
Alexander Lees@alexanderlees.bsky.social · 2d agoUnexpectedly epic day in Longdendale with 4 Great Egrets east mid morning (over Bottoms Reservoir) and then a dash up to Crowden for the 1st valley Great Grey Shrike since 2015 @derbyshirebirds.bsky.social #UKBirding
Less happy observations from Ross Back Sands y’day - Wigeon and 3 Pale-bellied Brents looking like bird flu sufferers. V. worrying given the 10,000’s of birds in the area, and the proximity to Belford where there was a poultry outbreak two weeks ago. Reported to DEFRA #NEbirding
Two more new birds this morning! #UKBirding
Ben Secker@bensecker.bsky.social · 3d agoFive Willow Tits caught this morning at @the-wildlifetrusts.bsky.social Wigan Flashes LNR - three new birds and two retraps. Interesting that most of the birds we caught had plumage aberrations on the cap, which happens often also at other sites. Sign of inbreeding? #UKBirding
Hats off to shooting lobby/GWCT who cleverly got this piece in Guardian during the UK consultation on impacts of gamebird shooting. Allerton's a commercial shoot. But its results of habitat creation boosting farmland birds are far from unique, 1/2 www.theguardian.com/environment/...
‘This is a robust recipe’: the experimental farm bucking the decline in UK birds
Allerton Project attracts abundant wildlife and its success can offers clues to reversing the sharp drop in populations
theguardian.com
Unexpectedly epic day in Longdendale with 4 Great Egrets east mid morning (over Bottoms Reservoir) and then a dash up to Crowden for the 1st valley Great Grey Shrike since 2015 @derbyshirebirds.bsky.social #UKBirding
Today on Volts: most of cleantech world seems to have accommodated itself to giant AI data centers, but @ketanjoshi.co is having none of it. He's been a relentless critic, tracking the hyperscalers' broken climate promises, rising emissions, & abysmal community relations. We get into all of it.
The (climate) case against (AI) data centers
A conversation with Ketan Joshi.
volts.wtf
Give the gift of a year of British Birds Young Person membership for under-25s, from just £25. With fascinating articles, remarkable birding stories and the latest insights into ornithology, it's a gift to inspire their passion for birds all year round. britishbirds.co.uk/subscribe
A juv Sabine's Gull and three Grey Phalarope at South Milton Sands, South Devon this week. Massive waves, sunshine and plenty of birders. #UKBirding
Yet again the mask slips from the bird shooting industry. The way that the carcasses, eggs and other waste from these game farms is ‘disposed of’ is a disgrace. And the reaction from the @gwct.org.uk is shameful. Behaviour like this doesn’t need apologists, it needs leadership.
Channel 4 News@channel4news.bsky.social · 3d agoThe dark side of Britain’s gamebird shooting industry www.channel4.com/news/the-dar...
Which Willet is it? AviList now recognises two species. Read more ⬇️ www.avilist.org/annual-avili...
Ornis Fennica Vol. 103 Issue 3 is out now! Read about migration dynamics, breeding-time movements and parasitism in this issue reaching from warblers, tits and grassquits to egrets and eagles, and from Europe to Asia and South America. ornisfennica.journal.fi/issue/view/1... #ornithology #OpenAccess
I remember reading pages of yellow-spined National Geographic issues as a kid, and marvelling at the photos, the stories, and the natural world. And now @adriftlab.bsky.social is in it ourselves, albeit for sad reasons. www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/arti... #ornithology #PlasticPollution
These Seabirds Are So Full of Plastic They’re Starving to Death
Researchers found one sable shearwater on Australia's Lord Howe Island with nearly 900 pieces of plastic in its stomach.
nationalgeographic.com
EARLY VIEW in IBIS Museums, taxonomic uncertainty and ‘lost species’: a case study of the Critically Endangered Siau Scops Owl | onlinelibrary.wiley.... A. J. Berryman, J. A. Eaton | #ornithology 🪶
'Distribution, density and conservation of the Black-hooded Antwren in Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil' by 'Italo Aleixo de Faria' freely available for one month 📚 https://cup.org/4ijVUjj #Ornithology
Cardiovascular Physiology of Sauropods - www.annualreviews.org/content/jour...
Cardiovascular Physiology of Sauropods
Dinosaurs dominated terrestrial ecosystems for more than 160 million years under fluctuating atmospheric conditions that profoundly shaped their cardiovascular physiology. Evidence from phylogenetic b...
annualreviews.org
I've been following these Whooper Swan cygnets since they hatched in Iceland in June! 🦢 We GPS-tagged the family in August, and I've nervously followed their first migration to Britain, just as Storm Beolo struck 🌪 After 104 hours & a tricky tour around the North Sea, they've finally made it! 🎉
NEW BLOG: ornithologist and drone expert Andy Harmer provides guidance on the use of drones for finding and monitoring nests tinyurl.com/RBBPdrones #ornithology #birds
Using Drones for Finding and Monitoring Nests
Using Drones for Finding and Monitoring Nests In recent years improvements in drone technology, and their increased affordability, has meant they have become a familiar part of modern life, with ...
tinyurl.com
The Report on Rare Birds in Great Britain in 2025 is available to journal subscribers, or as a single-purchase hard copy from our shop. Packed with fascinating records, fantastic images and the stories behind Britain’s rarest birds. Read more: britishbirds.co.uk/journal/volu...
Israel has committed war crimes and crimes against humanity in Palestine, the latest report from a UN Commission of Inquiry has concluded.
Support for Bolsonaro was very high in frontier and post frontier agribusiness regions of Amazonia along the arc of deforestation. Pre-frontier regions voted Lula. Lula's loss would have inevitably changed deforestation trajectories again.
George Monbiot@georgemonbiot.bsky.social · last wk.The stock markets and bond markets are no supporters of democracy, and we should never allow them to dictate the limits of politics.
I don't know who is behind tidyecology.com (maybe an AI?) but it has an amazing coverage of tutorials for all kinds of statistical modelling in #ecology with #rstats
Tidy Ecology: R & QGIS tutorials for ecologists
Reproducible R and QGIS tutorials for ecologists: diversity, ordination, occupancy and spatial analysis, each with the model checks that go with it.
tidyecology.com
Lads, if I was you I would try to make it less obvious who it is that is baying for more fascism, crackdowns on democracy, corruption and looting of the world’s wealth
1/3 This DOTTEREL blog appeared on this day in 2015 🎂 wadertales.wordpress.com/2015/10/28/u... Latest RSPB report shows that decline in Scotland is now estimated at 89% www.rspb.org.uk/whats-happen... #ukBirding
Peer review is broken because genAI has increased academic productivity by reducing barriers to submission (but at the same time compromising manuscript quality) and is now being sold as the fix for a problem that it has fostered.
Springer Nature@springernature.com · last wk.How can AI support researchers in peer review? Springer Nature and Google DeepMind are partnering to co-design an AI peer review assistant that helps reviewers navigate manuscripts and focus on where their scientific judgement matters most. Learn more: spklr.io/63320EVgT8
