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rowankuminski.bsky.social
They/them // PhD student - seabird population dynamics // LGBTQIA+ representation in STEM and ornithology 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈 Creator of @Animalesenespanol.bsky.social Currently on a year-long pause from my PhD @uniofaberdeen.bsky.social due to transphobia/EDI concerns
94 posts 1,571 followers 1,395 following
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Spotted near NOAA 💙 (source www.reddit.com/r/NOAA/s/qfW...)

"We present MacaqueNet, a global community of researchers who developed the first database on affiliative and agonistic behaviour. This database facilitates comparative research into the eco-evolutionary drivers of animal behaviour" @DeMoorDelphine🌏

Reminder: If you want to read a fun book about science and birds that has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with current events (okay, there is one BRIEF mention of the war in Ukraine), my book comes out in paperback on March 18! 🪶

In a time that seems so anti-science I encourage anyone that wants to do #scicomm to join in and try different ways that vibe with you! Whether it's videos, blogs, zines, or more! We need more! Don't let gatekeeping stop you. Keep doing you, online and/or offline! #science #outreach

In Spanish the word for the iris flower is spelled the same as in English, but the "i" is pronounced like the English sound "ee". We may also see various spellings of the world "arcoíris", for example "arcoiris" and "arco iris"!

Ending the week with a little motivation from our office mural. 💙 We hope you all have a great weekend. 🦈

I told my dad I hit 700 extractions for my evidence synthesis, and he has absolutely no idea what that means but he made celebratory chocolate martinis for the occasion 🥰

I don't think I've officially shared it, but remember back in Dec I said I'd gotten my first grant? well, thrilled to share it's for a new project on the evolution of Beringian birds! we'll be working with the Aleut Community of St. Paul Island to investigate the evolution of 4 songbird species!

Hey scientists, if anyone out there wants to do this but is unsure about writing for a newspaper/the public, I'm a professional science writer and would be happy to work with you on your piece.

If you have the capacity to donate to this, please consider doing so!! Likewise if there are any other people who also do art/crafts and want to come together to do a fundraiser for this, let's talk! 🪶

Join us! Science Homecoming helps scientists reconnect with communities by writing about the importance of science funding in their hometown newspapers. We’ve mapped every small newspaper in the U.S. and provide resources to get you started. Help science get back home 🧪🔬🧬 🏠 sciencehomecoming.com

A proposal: Academic researchers and folks in similar positions, consider writing an op-Ed, or at least a letter to the editor, in your local paper about what these horrific decisions will do to jobs and services *in your local community*. I train scientists to write op-Ed’s and I can help.

Does anyone have access to Journal of Zoology and wouldn't mind downloading/sending me a few papers? I would really appreciate it, I'm doing an evidence synthesis and there are several papers I need but my institution doesn't give access. Thanks in advance!

A students’-eye view of the educational and cultural disaster currently unfolding at Cardiff University. open.substack.com/pub/wydandie...

I'm reviewing applications for our Science IRL grant. The application pool is stupendous with a lot of fantastic & frankly weird ideas for how to connect people w/critical science info. I want to be able to fund more than we currently can. Wanna throw a few bucks at the pool? givebutter.com/29Ow9Y

What a week to see a musical about the blatant evils of capitalism and corporate greed, huh

🥳 We're finally on #Bluesky 💙 Hi everyone, we are a team of ethologists from the Czech Republic 🇨🇿 who study all sorts of bird behaviour 🪶mainly in the field 🗺️ Such as predator-prey interactions 🦅 brood parasitism🥚bioacoustics ♪ foraging 🌰 or competition ⚔️ #Ornithology #AnimalBehaviour #Birds

As I'm going through journal guidelines for a paper, I keep seeing suggestions that non-native English speakers pay $$$ for editing services, and thought it was a good time to remind anyone that needs it that @AnimalesEnEspanol.bsky.social will do this for free, just send us a message!

Got some artistic skills? Enter our Seabird Pride t-shirt competition! 🕊️🏳️‍🌈🎽 Details below ⬇️ #SeabirdPride2025

It’s never been more important to celebrate the International Day of Women and Girls in Science 👩‍🔬 Here’s a collection of posts from last year about some of the remarkable historical #WomenInSTEM in the animal field:

happy International Day of [banned] and [banned] in Science [under review] from the US

I wish there was a way to quantify the collective amount of work lost due to stress and despair over the last few weeks, independent of barriers to funding.

Apps are due FRIDAY for the Science IRL grant We're funding projects that tackle humanity's big science-centric problems, while reaching people who are NOT engaging with science. Bring me your creative, unique projects that put science where there currently is none. docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Queer Animals of the World! 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️ For LGBTQ+ History Month, our PhD Society, Zoo&Roots, wanted to highlight how nature is filled with queer animals. For sources & reading material, go to linktr.ee/gayanimals Remember, spread your wings and F • L • Y! #gayanimals #lgbt #citypop

I've started doing a lot more outreach with school students lately about my work on #fulmars, and while I've worked on some charismatic species in my career, I can't overstate the immediate engagement power of telling a room full of kids that your bird projectile vomits stomach oil at predators 😂

Come volunteer with us! 🌈 I co-chair the British Ecological Society EDGE (Equity and Diversity for all Genders in Ecology) Network, and we're looking for a Communications Rep! No experience required, make sure to apply by 9am, Monday 10 February! www.britishecologicalsociety.org/content/edge...

Did my first @skypeascientist.bsky.social talk this morning! Got to speak to a class about fulmars, seabird population dynamics, and why seabirds are such useful species to study environmental changes! 🐧🪶

For a while I've contemplated making additional pages like @animalesenespanol.bsky.social; although there's so many I'd like to do, for now I've chosen to focus on a language I'm not as proficient in but am also learning. So I'm excited to announce the start of @animaliinitaliano.bsky.social 😊

In Spanish, the word for spider is "araña", and many spider names are direct translations from English (such as jumping spider/araña saltarina). However, some spiders (such as tarantulas/tarántulas) don't include the word "araña" in their names

Resources for scientists who are being threatened or targeted below from the @nationalacademies.org www.nationalacademies.org/chr/resource...

This. When I started at Aberdeen, so many students told me on my first day that they were allies, had trans friends, etc. then proceeded to be the worst perpetrators, and told me I needed to "set a better example as a trans person" if I wanted allies to respect me

🐦 Are you a bird enthusiast AND an art lover? This might be the perfect webinar for you! 🧑‍🎨 Join American Bird Conservancy for a Free Webinar about the Critically Endangered Araripe Manakin! act.abcbirds.org/a/draw-manak...

Been rewatching quite a bit of Star Trek lately; for those who aren’t familiar, a core concept of the franchise is IDIC, which stands for Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations. It’s the philosophy that celebrating diversity, rather than fearing it, is the only way a civilization can thrive

Want a helpful tool for learning Spanish? Check out Language Reactor, which generates bilingual subtitles for videos on Youtube/Netflix, and provides definitions for new words. They also now have a chat feature that lets you practice speaking Spanish, and can be used for anything, not just ecology!

Nature is not a blocker to growth. The UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves has claimed that 'The balance has gone too far in the direction of always protecting every bat and every newt.' But how can this statement be true when the UK is one of the most nature depleted countries in the world?🌍

Creating a temporary exhibition. Just letting you know, Mary Anning's Temnodontosaurus is back in Lyme Regis, after being over 180 years away in Cambridge. New exhibition on Mary Anning's homecoming is opening soon 👀

🌊🐣 Excited to share the Seabird Monitoring Programme! Join us in conserving our UK breeding seabird populations through data collection and research. 🪶💚 Explore getting involved inland or at the coast at www.bto.org/smp. Together, we can make a difference! #Seabirds #Conservation #Ornithology

This isn't mine at all, but the Magic School Bus TV cartoon, which inspired untold millennials including myself, originated as an NSF grant 🧪 www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/...

Some different types of external body characteristics for a few types of animals: un exoesqueleto (exoskeleton), plumas (feathers), escamas (scales), and pelaje (fur)!

We CT scanned thousands of vertebrates from US natural history collections and made them freely available. Countless people have used the data for research (>200 pubs) and to learn anatomy/morphology. www.morphosource.org/projects/000...

As expected, the Trump team is already deleting climate info from government websites. In anticipation, our team at Urban Ocean Lab created a permanent archive of 100+ key resources and published a permanent archive: www.urbanoceanlab.org/resource-hub 👩🏽‍💻

If anyone has fulmar pics/videos they'd like to share with a very stressed/overwhelmed American seabird scientist, it would be very welcome right now (as it'll be several months until I can see my lovely study species in person again)

If you don't already, you should give my friend Sebastian a follow (and for my fellow bird nerds - he posts some lovely bird content) 😊

Burtt Undergraduate Mentoring Grant applications are due February 1! These grants provide up to $3,000 in funding for #ornithology research projects carried out by mentor-undergrad collaborations. https://wilsonsociety.org/awards/jed-burtt-mentoring-grants/