Marie Hébert
@mariehebert.bsky.social
Research Fellow @University of St Andrews -Neuroethologist/behavioural neuroendocrinologist. Birds🦜🐥🦆, Brain 🧠,Hormones, Nest building 🪺, Courtship, and more! drmariehebert.wordpress.com
Birds on the € notes!? You can make it happen! 🐦✨ Vote now for your favourite design! www.ecb.europa.eu/euro/banknot... The European Central Bank is redesigning the euro banknotes and is asking the public for feedback. And one of the themes is birds and rivers...😈
New papers in Science provide evidence for the convergent development and evolution of neurons and their connections in the bird and mammalian pallia, highlighting the need for multiple perspectives in brain comparative studies. Learn more in a new #SciencePerspective: scim.ag/41xuqjl
Constrained roads to complex brains
Neural development and brain circuit evolution converged in birds and mammals
scim.ag
In the absence of ambient light–dark cycles, fruit flies use their behavior to create artificial cycles, restoring clock function in the brain and the normal organization of sleep and locomotor activity, according to new research. Learn more in a new #SciencePerspective: https://scim.ag/4flVxo7
Climate change is already impacting birds across the UK. Rising temperatures, changing rainfall patterns and more frequent extreme weather can shape where species live, how common they are and the timing of breeding and migration. Some of the UK’s most vulnerable birds are already declining.
It's official: #Behaviour2027 is happening in Vienna next summer!
Behaviour 2027@behaviour2027.bsky.social · 4w agoWe are excited to announce that #Behaviour2027 (XXXIX International Ethological Congress) will be taking place in Vienna, Austria! We are looking forward to having you all join us next year from August 23-27. Please follow and share!
Researchers diving 7 kilometres deep in a crewed submersible have discovered a vast collection of whale bones, including fossils up to 5 million years old and species new to science
Millions of fossil whale bones found in deep-ocean ‘necropolis’
Researchers diving 7 kilometres deep in a crewed submersible have discovered a vast collection of whale bones, including fossils up to 5 million years old and species new to science
newscientist.com
First and last authors more likely to be men in leading science journals www.nature.com/articles/d41...
First and last authors more likely to be men in leading science journals
Women’s participation in science has risen sharply, but a Nature Index analysis finds that gender gaps in first and last authorship — markers of key scientific achievements — have barely shifted over ...
nature.com
Five different groups of predatory dinosaurs independently evolved disproportionately small arms, and it seems they did so because their heads became so large and powerful
We may finally know why dinosaurs like T. rex evolved tiny arms
Five different groups of predatory dinosaurs independently evolved disproportionately small arms, and it seems they did so because their heads became so large and powerful
newscientist.com
Sir David Attenborough has a soft spot for #kakapo. We named a kākāpō after him (Attenborough the bird is now ten years old, living on Te Kākahu) and he kindly narrated a short video for us about them, which you can see here: youtu.be/5eZVjQowNvw?.... #attenborough #conservation
Postdoc Opportunity! 4-year @royalsociety.org funded post @uniexecec.bsky.social: “Understanding the role of individual cognitive variation in reintroduction biology”. Closes: 5 June 2026. More info & to apply: careers.exeter.ac.uk/vacancies/78... Wt: @paradiseparkhayle.bsky.social & Wildwood Trust
Screaming to the abyss: #ColossalBio did not resurrect the dire wolf and they're probably just going to make an antelope with methemoglobinemia to give it a bluish color. Their #DeExtinction #DisInformation campaign is just a pyramid scheme because #ExtinctionIsForever 🧪
Exciting new research published in @currentbiology.bsky.social by our guest scientist and former group leader @jmrko.bsky.social. The study highlights insights from connectomics research in songbirds. „Tunneling neurons“ open new perspectives on how adult neural circuits may regenerate.
Sarah Scott Scire@sarahscire.com · 4mo agoSongbirds reveal the dark side of making new brain cells as adults @krcallaway.bsky.social on new work from @bbscott.bsky.social's lab in @sciam.bsky.social www.scientificamerican.com/article/song...
Constructing a nest underwater is no easy task! But shell-dwelling cichlids are expert architects, instinctively transforming empty snail shells into protective nests. Take a deep dive into the new cichlid research from our Institute! 🔗 Press release: www.bi.mpg.de/news/2026-04...
This image of home just came down from the Artemis II crew. Taken after their translunar injection burn, there are aurorae at top right and lower left, and zodiacal light at lower right. Credit: NASA/Reid Wiseman
Trump to revoke protections for endangered species in Gulf of Mexico; convening so-called ‘God squad’ to override provisions of Endangered Species Act for ‘national security’ www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...
Trump to revoke protections for endangered species in Gulf of Mexico
President is convening so-called ‘God squad’ to override provisions of Endangered Species Act for ‘national security’
theguardian.com
This rarely-seen Glass Octopus was caught by an underwater robot during an expedition off the Phoenix Islands.
Not only people killed and harmed: 5m tonnes of CO2 emitted in just 14 days of US war on Iran, analysis finds www.theguardian.com/world/2026/m...
5m tonnes of CO2 emitted in just 14 days of US war on Iran, analysis finds
Exclusive: War in the Middle East is draining the global carbon budget faster than 84 countries combined
theguardian.com
✨ Happy International Women’s Day. ✨ Today, we celebrate the power, courage, and impact of women around the world. Let’s continue to create space where women feel seen, valued, and unstoppable. May we continue to challenge stereotypes, support one another, and inspire the next generation.
New paper out on the decision strategies of bumblebees. When using visual cues to make flower choices, they switch strategy with sensory context, learning as much as necessary, but as little as possible. Based on their training time, we propose a mechanism for this switch. tinyurl.com/2r9d4jrs 🌸🐝🧠
Bees flexibly adjust decision strategies to information content in a foraging task
Bumblebees flexibly adjust their learning strategies to the sensory challenge, balancing costs and benefits of multicue learning.
tinyurl.com
Universität Konstanz@uni-konstanz.de · 5mo agoDuring their search for food, most insects head specifically for the flowers that promise the highest reward. Researchers from the #UniKonstanz and the @uni-wuerzburg.de have now studied how bumblebees process information about their food sources. Full story: t1p.de/mndcd
⚠️ We've had reports of seabirds washing up. Please report ALL species of dead birds ⬇️ 📍 In England, Wales & Scotland: www.gov.uk/guidance/... 📍 In Northern Ireland: www.daera-ni.gov.uk/... 📍 In Republic of Ireland: aviancheck.apps.serv... #UKBirding #BirdingWales #BirdingScotland
Hot off the press 🐣 Do birds have any idea of what their eggs look like? Contrary to our expectations, we show that barn swallows don't, nor do they learn it over time. Yet that doesn't stop them from successfully ejecting foreign eggs! 🔗 Read more here: doi.org/10.1098/rsbl... #OpenAccess
Recent breeding experience improves egg ejection behaviour
Abstract. Recognizing one’s own eggs is crucial for birds, especially for hosts of brood parasites that must identify and reject different-looking parasiti
doi.org
Periodic reminder that moa de-extinction could lead to net biodiversity loss due to conservation deprioritisation of extant species. The (re)introduction process of any resultant genetically-modified Emus will very expensive www.nature.com/articles/s41... #Ornithology
Spending limited resources on de-extinction could lead to net biodiversity loss - Nature Ecology & Evolution
Use of public funding for conservation of resurrected species would lead to fewer extant species that could be conserved, and consequent net biodiversity loss.
nature.com
Mike Dickison@adzebill.bsky.social · 6mo agoApparently faux-moa will be browsing generalists and help restore NZ's impenetrable bush back to what it was 800 years ago. (Paul admitted moa were not actually deer though.) But they'll also be in captivity, so go figure.
The RSPB is looking for surveyors to census the UK’s largest Storm Petrel colony on Mousa, Shetland. We need 2-4 volunteers who are comfortable working and camping in a remote location with limited facilities, to help complete playback surveys during mid-July 2026. 🪺🏝️🏕️
⚠️ Please report sightings of dead birds for possible testing for Avian Influenza. ⬇️ 📌 In England, Wales & Scotland: www.gov.uk/guidance/... 📌 In Northern Ireland: www.daera-ni.gov.uk/... 📌 In Republic of Ireland: aviancheck.apps.serv... #UKBirding #BirdingWales #BirdingScotland
🚨🚨👇👇👇👇 🚨🚨
Simone Meddle@simonemeddle.bsky.social · 7mo ago4 yr PhD studentship at the U. Edinburgh (Roslin Institute & The Roslin Foundation) to investigate the mechanism by which light exposure during artificial incubation of eggs exerts positive effects on post-hatch chicks Deadline 13/02/2026 @roslininstitute.bsky.social www.findaphd.com/phds/project...
A hybrid grolar bear saga is unfolding in the Arctic, and the tale of this strange family has much to tell us about nature on our changing planet
What the family drama of interbreeding polar and grizzly bears reveals
A hybrid grolar bear saga is unfolding in the Arctic, and the tale of this strange family has much to tell us about nature on our changing planet
newscientist.com
You are ABSOLUTELY NOT going to regret listening to this bird:
c0nc0rdance@c0nc0rdance.bsky.social · 8mo agoA male rock ptarmigan (Lagopus muta) in winter plumage. Ptarmigan is from Gaelic 'tarmachan' meaning "croaker". The p- was added when people mistakenly assumed it was a Greek word. A bird forever warning people: "A werewolf!" (just in case of werewolves).
