Álvaro Luna
@alvaroluna87.bsky.social
2.5K followers 920 following 560 posts
PhD in Biology 🐦🌍🦅 | Urban Ecology, Plastic Pollution & Wildlife Conservation | Head of the “Study and Conservation of Biodiversity” Research Group at the European University of Madrid
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Reposted by Álvaro Luna
mehr.nz
samuel mehr @mehr.nz · Dec 14
it's wild that R, the ubiquitous statistical computing language, was co-created by a Māori prof (Ross Ihaka) — and yet the vast majority of scientists who use R don't know

this is like inventing the toaster. possibly the largest impact of a single member of an indigenous community on modern science
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
chikichanka.bsky.social
Lo del nóctulo comiendo pajaritos te lo cuenta estupendamente Elena Tena
@ebdonana.bsky.social
youtube.com/shorts/eI1pU...
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
aberron.bsky.social
Durante el eclipse solar de 2024 en EEUU, miles de aves cambiaron su comportamiento al hacerse la oscuridad total durante casi 4 minutos. Muchas enmudecieron cuando se fue la luz y un número mayor se lanzó a cantar con la reaparición del sol como en el amanecer

www.eldiario.es/1_c143ca?utm...
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
thelabandfield.bsky.social
Well, it's official. After our paper last year (onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....), the Slender-billed Curlew is officially declared Extinct today.

Scientists dream of describing new species, not writing their obituary and epitaph, knowing that they are gone forever #ornithology
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
dskarp.bsky.social
Finally, larger, more attractive species were consistently more likely to be marketed.

This is despite prior work arguing that an emphasis on novel birds translates into dedicated birdwatchers preferring dull species.

Dedicated birdwatchers may value beauty in birds, just like everyone else.
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
dskarp.bsky.social
Second, we were surprised that regularly observed species were more likely to be mentioned in trip itineraries.

Maybe tour operators are balancing novelty with the risk of disappointing clients when they inevitably fail to encounter rare species?
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
dskarp.bsky.social
Ok, so what did we find?

First, tour operators recognized that birdwatchers value novelty above all else. Range-restricted species were ten times more likely to appear in trip itineraries than cosmopolitan species.
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
ecoinvasions.bsky.social
The reviewer crisis: data from the journal Biological Invasions:

"Reviewer acceptance rates dropped steadily over the past two decades. Early-career researchers had the highest acceptance rates, while senior scholars were least likely to accept review invitations."
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
ftmaestre.bsky.social
In #drylands, plants don’t grow randomly — they self-organize into disordered hyperuniform patterns that help them use water wisely & endure extreme aridity. A beautiful hidden logic of nature, revealed in a new @pnas.org study doi.org/10.1073/pnas... including #Maestrelab alumni
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
c0nc0rdance.bsky.social
The global whaling industry experienced a boom c. 1840-1950 as technology allowed whalers to hunt the Southern Ocean around Antarctica.

Under standard models, we would have expected krill populations to have *exploded*.

Instead, they DROPPED exponentially.

Let's talk about the KRILL PARADOX.
Change in distribution and abundance of southern right whales. (A) Shows historical and contemporary wintering distributions (Figure 1 from Carroll et al., 2018), and (B) shows decline in abundance and subsequent recovery (solid line is the mean, dashed line shows upper and lower 95% CI). Modified Figure 1 from Jackson et al. (2008). Contemporary sightings are divided into regions where large aggregations are seen during winter: Argentina (ARG), Brazil (BZL), South Africa (SAF), southwest Australia (SWA), south central Australia (SCA), and New Zealand sub-Antarctic (NZSA) and regions where sightings are typically of small numbers of individuals per year. The large aggregations are IWC management units and correspond to historical whaling grounds, although another 5 whaling grounds show little sign of recovery. Summer feeding areas are poorly described and so not shown.
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
mascarell.bsky.social
🧪🪶🌍🕊 25 Critically Endangered Birds
All of these species are on the brink of extinction.
A poster to raise awareness and inspire action. Every effort counts. ✨
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
pedrofresco.bsky.social
Fijáos si es falso, que estos eventos se han producido con 6 nucleares a máxima potencia (de las 7, una está en recarga) y una veintena de centrales de gas en restricciones técnicas cobrando millones de euros.
Pero los bulos nucleares no conocen límites.
filezboy.bsky.social
#Energía Esto es falso, falso. No necesitamos más "potencia firme" ni más nucleares, ni más gas, ni más inercia. Necesitamos que se apruebe marco técnico para permitir a las renovables hacer (control de tensión) lo que ya hacen desde hace años en otros países. No tenemos que inventar nada.
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
gbif.es
Los #carnívoros del Neotrópico tienen ahora un dataset único: 21 años de registros de presencia y ausencia listos para investigación y conservación. Un recurso abierto en @gbif.org que ayuda a entender su futuro:
▶️ natureconservation.pensoft.net/article/1406... #CiteTheDOI @flograttarola.bsky.social
Los registros de presencia de carnívoros del Neotrópico muestran dónde vemos a estas especies, pero también dónde no aparecen: una clave para entender su futuro.
Foto: Herpailurus yagouaroundi. Autor: Olvan Gonzalez (https://spain.inaturalist.org/people/olvan_gonzalez). Licencia: CC BY-NC 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) El área neotropical, de México a Argentina, revela vacíos de información que aún debemos llenar con más datos y colaboración.
Figura: Distribución de a) los registros de ocurrencia de solo presencia (PO) (n = 60.179) y b) los muestreos de presencia-ausencia (PA) (n = 271) de especies de carnívoros del Neotrópico. El valor está en combinar fuentes: ciencia  ciudadana, colecciones, monitoreos y literatura científica en un mismo recurso
Foto: Tremarctos ornatus. Autor: osoandino (https://spain.inaturalist.org/people/osoandino). Licencia: CC BY-NC 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) Con estas bases, podemos modelar distribuciones, evaluar riesgos y orientar decisiones de conservación en escenarios de cambio.
Figura: Número de registros (a) y especies (b) para los datos de solo presencia (PO), y número de registros (c) y especies (d) para los datos de presencia-ausencia (PA) en nuestro conjunto de datos. En escala de grises se muestran las familias de carnívoros.
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
unnombrealazar.bsky.social
En estos días de premios Nobel, es bueno recordar que conseguirlo habla más de tu red de contactos que de tu mérito científico y que para mi país prefiero muchos investigadores buenos bien apoyados que uno con premio.
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
ecoinvasions.bsky.social
Non-native omnivorous mammals (pigs & rats) have often replaced native frugivorous birds, bats & tortoises. These replacements have different physical traits that affect the size of seeds they can carry. Consequently, the long-term survival of native plants is threatened.
phys.org/news/2025-10...
Introduced animals change how island plants spread, global study finds
On islands, many plants rely on animals such as birds, bats and reptiles to disperse their seeds and help them grow in new places. When native animals go extinct, this naturally reduces seed dispersal...
phys.org
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
eegcam.bsky.social
#newpreprint: "Climate Shaped the Global Population Structure of Leopards and their Extinction in Europe": www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...! Leopards are charming big cats but there are many mysteries around them. Thread 🧵
Reposted by Álvaro Luna
alvaroluna87.bsky.social
Today is World Swift Day

In a recent study, we found that swifts across Europe are incorporating plastic debris into their nests. We surveyed 500 nests across 7 European countries, and found plastic in many of them.

doi.org/10.1016/j.sc...

#UrbanEcology #PlasticPollution #Birds
alvaroluna87.bsky.social
Argentinian colleagues have just reported a novel nesting substrate used by the burrowing parrot.

nuestrasaves.avesargentinas.org.ar/home/article...

This finding can be added to the novelties we published not long ago , highlighting how parrots keep surprising us with their nesting innovations.