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apreece.bsky.social
California birder.
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Ok, this is fun! Maybe just beginners luck... birdie 🦢 #1016: 🟩⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ birdiegame.net

Happy First Day of Spring Migration (aka Birdcast Day) to those who celebrate birdcast.info 🪶📊

🪶Of COURSE everything is better with a bird on it! If you agree, check out Better With Birds: shop.betterwithbirds... ! They have cool gear for bird nerds & they're donating 20% of their March and April profits to IBP! Get fun stuff & help support science for effective conservation! It's a win-win!

New in the annals of animal intelligence via Max-Planck Inst: Fish were found to use visual differences between divers to recognize the person who rewarded them Everywhere we look, we find nature looking back:

Popular female impersonator Julian Eltinge as the title character of THE COUNTESS CHARMING (1917). He plays a thief who, in the guise of a foreign countess, steals valuables from rich snobs and donates the money to charity. It was originally marketed as "Mrs. Raffles."

Science (and science policy, and conservation) friends, I need your help! We are collecting *specific, clear* examples of harms caused by the Trump administration's attacks on science, to be included in an open letter. Can be links to news stories/social media posts. 🧪🦑🌎 #SciComm #SciPol

NO KINGS ONLY TRAINS yeeessss

I painted some sparrows for this article! 🐡🪶

When you hear the word "cardinal," you probably think of one of the most widely recognized birds in the U.S.– the Northern Cardinal. But did you know there are other cardinals in the Americas? Join this FREE webinar to learn about the colorful & diverse #bird family. act.abcbirds.org/a/cardinals-...

The origin and early evolution of feathers: implications, uncertainties and future prospects royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

Putting a face to what you read in the news. Until last Friday, I served our nation working as a Research Ecologist with the US Geological Survey (USGS). As a federal scientist, I provided robust, defensible information to support good decisions in natural resource management.

If I had a band or a label, I would do a punk cover of "No More Kings" from Schoolhouse Rock. And then I would gather a bunch of people to write a whole album of next-generation Schoolhouse Rock songs, with songs about Social Security and Medicaid and NOAA. I am not kidding in the least.

democrats-science.house.gov/sciencefirings 🧪

This 👇is a 🎯 all-in-one H5N1 tracking tool to bookmark & share: H5N1 US Tracker - Ginkgo Biosecurity www.ginkgobiosecurity.com/h5n1-us-trac... H/t @rhonda234567.bsky.social

In a powerful piece for @newyorker.com, ABC Board member Jonathan Franzen outlined how policies like trap-neuter-release often fall short of reducing feral cat populations, revealing the immense suffering feral cats endure while putting local wildlife, like #birds, at risk. bit.ly/4jwUYIa

In 2014 Dutch scientists left a hamster wheel outside, to see if wild animals would use it like their domesticated counterparts. The answer: hell yes! 734 visits from wild mice - plus rats, shrews, slugs ("running" being subjective here) & even frogs and snails. The apparent reason: fun. Just fun.

The world in which the kestrel moves, the world that it sees, is, & always will be, entirely beyond us. That there are such worlds all around us is an essential feature of our world. ~M. Midgley 📸 Today's #birding! 4 fresh ones w/ the aptly named 'Puff' the regular Kestrel! 🪶 #TalonTuesday #Raptors

How to turn off AI. 📌

We are reading this paper - again! - for lab meeting this week. It’s so good and essential that it requires periodic revisiting, esp. as new folks join my group. Generates great discussion and introspection. The authors also approach the topic with refreshing humility. doi.org/10.1002/ecy....

Oh, I love the poster for World Migratory Bird Day (May 10 in the US and Canada)! Look at that kitty watching the lovely urban wildlife from behind bird safe glass! Art is by Annamaria Savarino Drago. www.migratorybirdday.org

I wouldn't dare ruin it for anyone, and I wouldn't anyone to jump RIGHT to this moment, as you need the whole context, but there's a line that's spoken from 7:03 to 7:08 that makes me cackle every time and I can't get it out of my head and it's pure magic. David Lynch cooking quinoa. Treat yo'self.

The largest social media networks failing us at a time when organizing is more important than ever. I started a Chicago-based Discord server for the birders, the bird-curious, and the bird-inspired to build community and collaborate. Hope you'll join us! 🪶 discord.com/invite/zA3H8...

Did you know "More Than 1.5 Million Farmed Animals Died in Barn Fires in 2024 in the US" (figures Animal Welfare Institute}

Did you know that there's a statue of a sofa-sized tardigrade outside the building where the Bohart Insect Museum is at the University of California, Davis? Well now you do. #invertebrates

Wildlife’s contributions to people www.nature.com/articles/s44...

A new vision for how evolution works is long overdue 🧪 www.nature.com/articles/d41... The idea that evolution is driven by an organism’s development — not just the natural selection of its genes — challenges a dearly held orthodoxy among evolutionary biologists.

Ecology/animal sciences folks should listen to @weouthere.bsky.social. I'm listening to the one with Hassan Bayyan and the inequality of volunteer/low paying jobs in science fields really shines in this episode. Short 🧵 creators.spotify.com/pod/show/weo...

Domestic #cats take an unfathomable toll on #birds, killing ~2.4 billion annually in the USA alone. This year, help birds by taking the pledge to keep your cat indoors! 🏠 Keeping cats indoors protects birds while also leading to a longer, healthier life for your beloved pet. 😻 bit.ly/4afVhTD

Birding, data viz + creative coding, together at last! I've just opened registration for new cohorts of my Binoculars to Binomials course. 2 weekly spring cohorts will run in the evenings starting Mar 25th. A more leisurely monthly cohort will run from March - July. 🪶📊 www.jerthorp.me/learning

Cardinals as tool-users? In case you missed it, our latest guest blog post is about a Northern Cardinal using a small rock to strike at its own reflection in a car mirror. #ornithology https://wilsonsociety.org/2025/01/08/guest-post-angry-bird-northern-cardinal-uses-rocks-to-attack-its-reflection/

In 2023 at least 960 #birds died in one day due to window collisions at McCormick Place in #Chicago. After applying bird-friendly window treatments, there were just 18 deaths all last fall. Further proof these simple changes work, and work well! It's time communities start making this a requirement.

As we continue to plan our June meeting in Los Angeles, our hearts go out to everyone affected by the ongoing fires there. If you're looking for ways to help, here's the LA Times list of suggested organizations to donate to. www.latimes.com/california/s...

Previously I mentioned a couple of ways I could harden my house against wildfire (fiber cement siding, metal roof). Here's an article describing how that all works. www.kqed.org/science/1941...

How ignoring detection probability hurts biodiversity conservation https://buff.ly/4h5Vjjk #conservation #Birds #wildlife

As I read the histories of local birds, it's so nice to get a break from "this species was harmed by human colonization" with "these benefit from humans!" In the east Purple Martins nest exclusively in human-provided boxes and have since before settler colonization! daily.jstor.org/the-disappea...

Super helpful app recommendation for Watchduty App to track wildfires. They even have large and small animal shelter locations called out on the maps of fire locations, which scores points in my book.

With the Eaton and Palisades Fires destroying likely hundreds of homes, a reminder that SoCal's worst firestorms involve multiple fires stretching resources thin. If you live anywhere near these fires (or any new ones), DO NOT WAIT for someone to knock/tell you to leave. Be Prepared and Go Early!

If you are in North America, please consider *not* offering corn (or cheap grains) to birds. There are other alternatives. www.allaboutbirds.org/news/types-o.... Corn is a favorite of House Sparrows and Starlings and is the offering most likely to be contaminated.

Until around fifty years ago there weren’t really professional wildlife rehabbers. Any injured or orphaned animals that got help had enthusiastic amateurs to thank. I had a great time looking at the first generation of rehabbers and their backyard bird hospitals. 🦉🧵

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! After years - DECADES - of Rocketship X-M not being officially available... ... ***IT'S ON*** :D www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdZM...