A lovely biodiversity story for your Wednesday. www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Country diary: A beetle with a prehensile anus? Thanks to local wildlife recorders, I know one lives here | Gwyneth Lewis

Ceredigion: Let’s sing the praises of this network of volunteers who move slowly and look hard, gathering vital wildlife data – and finding fantastic species

theguardian.com

I can’t say enough good things about this book, which my entire lab read together several years ago. It was hugely helpful to me even after tenure, and I consider myself to be a strong writer who usually loves writing!

Princeton University Press@princetonupress.bsky.social · 7h ago

A fully updated and expanded edition of the acclaimed writing guide for scientists. The Scientist’s Guide to Writing, 3rd Edition by @stephenbheard.bsky.social is out now! Order yours: press.princeton.edu/books/paperb... #Science #Education #Writing

This is genuinely astonishing: a piece by the Globe and Mail’s editorial board lamenting the “new normal” of wildfires and summer smoke and no mention whatsoever of a) climate change, or b) the burning of fossil fuels that causes it. #cdnpoli www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/edit...

Globe editorial: A summer season of fire, smoke, ashes and fear

The carefree feeling of summers past has been incinerated as wildfires rage across the country

theglobeandmail.com

Please share: Full-time PhD position on Butterfly Evolution at High Elevations 🦋⛰️ The project aims to understand the evolution and adaptation of Andean white butterflies using genomics. DEADLINE: September 11, 2026 More info: pavelmatos.wordpress.com/join-us/

Join us

Opportunities Below are the positions currently open in our lab. Open PhD position (full time) Comparative and Population Genomics of Butterflies at High Elevations. The project aims to understand …

pavelmatos.wordpress.com

Tossed by the Wind Emily Carr 1939

By Luck in the Morning Heidi Holloway 2025

Haha! I have just started using up all my old pieces of hoarded fabric... it is very fun!

Liz Renner, Ph.D.@lizrenner.bsky.social · 22h ago

I just cut into this PRISTINE yard of vintage fabric that's been overlooked since 1973! 🤯 It's easily one of the nicest scraps I've acquired by accident for free ninety-nine. Sewists, you have my permission to use the nice fabric before you're pushing daisies.

Did you know that The Map Center is the only map store in the country that is directly above a brewery? Tomorrow at 6:30 at Discipline Brewing, Robert Isenberg talks about his new book about bike-packing Canada for Lonely Planet. So if you like beer, bikes, travel or beer, you should join us.

Every now and then comes a paper that makes me wish I was still teaching first year biology...

Julien Kimmig @jkimmig.bsky.social · yesterday

Welcome to the CAMBRIAN FECAL REVOLUTION. We didn't name it the Cambrian fecal explosion for obvious reasons. I'm happy to share this paper on fecal matter and its role in Cambrian ecosystems. So if you want to read a really shitty paper (50 days free access): authors.elsevier.com/a/1nYg8cZ3X7...

Zhashagi Light Luke Swinson ~ Anishinaabe n.d.

We were extremely fortunate to come across these Daceton armigeum... A myrmecine trap jaw ant! Behold their majesty! ibycter.com/guyana-a-myr...

New #OpenAccess #ConservationNote in #RESInsectConsDiv Mapping wild #bee diversity and flower use for an effective #conservation of the Doñana #biodiversity hotspot doi.org/10.1111/icad.70121 @manusaunders.bsky.social @curromolina.bsky.social @nermonper.bsky.social @ibartomeus.bsky.social

Just in case anyone on here still has images or other stuff hosted on the digital collections portal iDigBio, make sure you have your own copies. Servers are shutting down permanently on August 31st 2026. idigbio.gbif.us/post/2026/me...

The short version is: after a month the AI has not given me any good reasons to trust it, and I am honestly freaked out by the confidence with which it weaves completely wrong facts into prose, and the confidence with which it writes and professionally formats entire sections of bullshit.

I started using AI tools because an awful lot of people in academia are using it, my students will certainly be using it, and while I hate AI for so many reasons, I cannot in good conscience just dismiss the whole AI thing based on vibes. I need to know what it is doing, and how to use it.

Getting prepared for our upcoming bug hunts at Portsmouth Natural History Musuem, portsmouthmuseums.co.uk/events/moth-..., its shocking how small a percentage of UK invertebrates this waste high pile of ID guides actually enable you to ID. They are a multitude and intricate in their diversity!

Hey @cbcnews.ca when are you going to start using this platform? And could we also have CBC at large on here? Pretty please?

Here's the working prototype of my setup. It's a 3D-printed black block with a socket to hold a watch glass, and a 3D-printed diffuser that sits on top of the block. Recessing the glass greatly reduces stray light & glare. #NaturalHistoryCollections #Macrophotography #FocusStacking #DIYImagingStage

Craig B@mutillidae.bsky.social · 6d ago

I've been working on a better setup for capturing focus-stacked images of immature insects in alcohol...and it's working well. 🙂 #NaturalHistoryCollections #Macrophotography #FocusStacking #Psephenidae #APennyForYourThoughts

Happy long weekend, Canada! The pace of life is frenetic. The market will grind you into dust. The news is a churn of wretched comings and goings. Here's a short post and reminder that you deserve and have permission to read more books. www.davidmoscrop.com/p/the-long-w...

The Long Weekend Edition: Permission To Read More Books

Look, I'm a doctor. No, not that kind. But I'm still issuing this as a prescription. Put the phone down and go spend time with your To Read pile.

davidmoscrop.com

"But remember that books exist as a class of their own, long-form, permanent, and magical, with their own particular, extraordinary effects that we ought to recognize and treasure."

Canada Hardcover 🇨🇦@canadahardcover.bsky.social · 5d ago

Good piece from @davidmoscrop.com on the benefits of reading.

Please repost widely! #AcademicSky 🧪⚒️❄️🛰️

Dr Dan Shugar 🇨🇦@watershedlab.bsky.social · 3w ago

Are you a Canadian PhD student or recent grad (or international person with a PhD from Canada or currently in Canada) and want to do geohazards or geomorphology research with me @ucalgaryscience.bsky.social , get in touch! 🧪⚒️❄️🛰️ nserc-crsng.canada.ca/en/funding-o...

Congratulations Violet Onsongo on her new #dragonfly paper! Evolution and biogeography of the widespread dragonfly genus Orthetrum (Odonata: Anisoptera: Libellulidae): Massive dispersal in the tertiary - Systematic Entomology - Wiley Online Library resjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Evolution and biogeography of the widespread dragonfly genus <fi>Orthetrum</fi> (<fc>Odonata: Anisoptera: Libellulidae</fc>): Massive dispersal in the tertiary

Ancestral range reconstruction supports an early widespread Afro–Eurasian distribution, rather than a single-region origin, reflecting connectivity among Africa, Europe and Asia during the Tertiary......

resjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Just hit a new record for number of reviewers invited -- 24, and still counting. (If you're reading this and want to review a plant macroecology paper, lmk?)

🚨🪲🧬🦠 We have a new preprint out! Link: doi.org/10.64898/202... Insects and microbes are more connected than we realize. Some insects owe part of their ability to feed on plants to genes acquired from bacteria millions of years ago 🤯 See what we found about glycoside hydrolases in leafhoppers.

It never isn’t Weevil Wednesday

Birds at Sunset Kenojuak Ashevak ~ Inuk 1987

the litter sifter instructions alone are worth their weight in gold, but I'm also a big fan of the DIY aspirators

Wildfire interacts with land cover to influence mercury concentrations in juvenile Steelhead in coastal California watersheds https://ow.ly/Wxhx50ZfYr2 📊: Abbott et al., Fig. 2 | cjfas-2025-0357

In Canada it's Toronto weather that tends to get all the attention because, Toronto, but has anyone checked to make sure Edmonton is still there?? They're truly having a summer for the ages. www.instagram.com/reel/DbTKyEF...

The Weather Network on Instagram: "Dramatic footage captures the moment a powerful storm with intense wind and rain suddenly hits a fair in Edmonton, Alberta, sending people running for shelter. [ Se...

3,448 likes, 159 comments - weathernetwork on July 27, 2026: "Dramatic footage captures the moment a powerful storm with intense wind and rain suddenly hits a fair in Edmonton, Alberta, sending people...

instagram.com