Dan Baldassarre
@evornithology.bsky.social
Doctor of Birds at SUNY Oswego. Opinions = mine, not representative of NY state government. I run a banding station: @rcbobirds on IG.
When someone at the banding station tells me not to write “Yellow Warbler”
🎵 Hello catbird my old friend. I’ve come to band you once again. 🎵
To the reviewer and AE who were *adamant* that we should delete these watercolors: FYI im getting loads of compliments on them. Everyone says we need more art like that in peer-reviewed pubs.
Rafael Marcondes@rafamarcondes.bsky.social · last mo.Also check out these GORGEOUS watercolors by Rice biology/art student Caroline Pollan!
I am beyond excited to share that our paper, "Neurodivergent Perceptions, Experiences, and Perspectives in Academic Biological Sciences Spaces" has been published! A 🧵incoming because this paper is so special to me and the co-authors. doi.org/10.1093/icb/...
Neurodivergent Perceptions, Experiences, and Perspectives in Academic Biological Sciences Spaces
Abstract. Neurodiversity has received considerable attention recently from the general population and academic researchers, coinciding with an increase in
doi.org
Bury them under the jail www.fox13news.com/news/st-pete...
St. Pete Beach mothballs: Two men arrested in plot to disrupt nesting shorebirds
Two men face criminal charges after state wildlife investigators uncovered a plot to scatter over 1,000 toxic mothballs across St. Pete Beach to disrupt a vital shorebird nesting area.
fox13news.com
Is it weird that I’m still thinking about the Butterfinger rice krispy treat I got at the gas station two days ago?
Great piece here by @brendonstuff.bsky.social on the need for widespread use of bird-safe glass to prevent window collisions theconversation.com/bird-safe-gl...
Bird-safe glass must become the norm to prevent collisions with buildings
In Canada, tens of millions of birds are killed annually by crashing into glass on buildings.
theconversation.com
Everyone says AI will accelerate science. I don't think it will -- at least not in biology, and at least not soon. New post where I explain why, and how the productivity paradox can be resolved: blekhman.substack.com/p/why-ai-wil...
Why AI will not speed up science (yet)
You can see AI everywhere except in the productivity statistics
blekhman.substack.com
Cool cool cool link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Closure of the Strait of Hormuz may trigger a bioinvasion super-spreader event - Biological Invasions
The ongoing conflicts in the Middle East are causing substantial humanitarian, economic, and geopolitical impacts and disrupting global trade. While the human and economic effects remain the focus of ...
link.springer.com
Pack it up folks. We’ve got the greatest talk title of all time, courtesy of @kristencovino.bsky.social.
Blumstein has always been goated and this confirms
David Ho@davidho.bsky.social · 2w agoFacing federal science budget cuts, biologist Daniel Blumstein resorted to uploading marmot videos to OnlyFans to raise funds for his marmot research. However, when he uploaded his driver’s license for verification, OnlyFans informed him that his appearance didn’t match the marmots in the videos.
“Omg I looooooove your necklace!” -this Common Grackle, probably
Incredible work 👏
Andrew Iwaniuk@evoneuro.bsky.social · 2w agoNew paper out today led by @gallinaciega.bsky.social We show that seed-eating songbirds have enlarged a somatosensory nucleus, especially the part associated with the tongue, suggesting that seed-cracking is dependent on a fine sense of touch. #ornithology #neuroethology doi.org/10.1098/rspb...
![A multipanel figure showing a cartoon of a songbird head, a cartoon diagram of a songbird brain, and three black and white images showing the cellular structure of the brain region we focused on, PrV. The following is the legend that accompanies the figure. (a) Shows in different colours the areas of the innervation in the head, beak and tongue by the three branches of the trigeminal nerve (V1-V3) and the hypoglossal nerve (XII) in a songbird and the respective areas of innervation in the principal sensory nucleus of the trigeminal nerve (PrV; based on Faunes & Wild [26]). (b–d) Microphotographs of Nissl-stained coronal sections through the principal sensory in nucleus of the trigeminal nerve (PrV) in three species of songbirds: (b) the pine grosbeak (Pinicola enucleator, Fringillidae); (c) the field sparrow (Spizella pusilla, Passerellidae); (d) the Carolina chickadee (Poecile carolinensis, Parulidae).](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:gfvjxniv5ylppk263f44p3zs/bafkreighnpetcjup2wmdlgcpcxvdkjhk3hyamr3vukgl2zmq54jxohlfbu)
UC Davis will no longer pay the difference so that GRFP recipients earn the same as other students. So mid-PhD students will lose nearly 25% of salary & new students will make less than their peers. Apply for the GRFP, it’s a wonderful help to your career. Just don’t come here if you get one.
This is deeply offensive to me on a personal and professional level. I would rather die than teach an online class with a "Socratic tutorial chatbot".
Cranes!!!
Wilson Ornithological Society@wilsonornithsoc.bsky.social · 2w agoHere it is: the logo for our *2027* meeting, planned for March 17-19 in Kearney, Nebraska (to coincide with Sandhill Crane migration)! The logo was designed by Gracie Boe, an undergraduate at the University of Nebraska at Kearney. Will you be joining us? wos2027.org
Our new commentary rdcu.be/ftx6h in @natecoevo.nature.com written with folks from @inaturalist.bsky.social and @cornellbirds.bsky.social shows that use of AI to manipulate existing or create new wildlife images undermines the huge value of vast citizen science databases. 🌍🪰🪶 #Ornithology 🧵 1/10
Citizen science platforms must mitigate against the threat of generative AI
Nature Ecology & Evolution - Citizen science platforms must mitigate against the threat of generative AI
rdcu.be
Pair of Merlins flying around the lake at my kids’ swim lessons
1. We—@eduede.bsky.social, @mjcrockett.bsky.social, Kevin Gross, and I—have a new preprint on the arXiv today, based on ideas that emerged during an @sfiscience.bsky.social workshop in November 2024: The unintended consequences of large language models as a labor-augmenting technology in science.
The unintended consequences of large language models as a labor-augmenting technology in science
As a labor-augmenting technology, large language models (LLMs) have the potential to accelerate scientific activity across the research pipeline. But even if LLMs perform on par with human experts at ...
arxiv.org