Author | Lightnews

Dr Tom Montgomery

@drtomontgomery.bsky.social

590 followers 47 following 49 posts

Marine biologist. USA based; work mainly in Americas & Arctic regions. I specialize in marine mammals, predominantly cetaceans, in a team of 16 international marine scientists. I write about rare & endangered species, science and nature.

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Nov 9

#ClimateCrisis

As the Arctic warms, many polar bears have been found with bleeding ulcerative lesions on feet & loss of epidermal & dermal layers unlikely to heal without prolonged rest.
Pain was so severe that gentle palpation elicited responses even under sedation.

🧵1/2

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Jun 10

#Ocean

Does anyone think our commercial fishing practices are sustainable?

Fundamental change is inevitable, and like the cop says, we can do it the easy or hard way.

It can start now, phased in sensibly, or a bit later, by catastrophic collapse.

Our stark choice.

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · May 31

Source: www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...

‘Nothing left’: Irish whale-watching company closes amid ‘overfishing’

Sprat fishing has disrupted the food chain and diverted humpback, minke and fin whales as well as dolphins

www.theguardian.com

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · May 31

#Ocean

What have we done?

A whale-watching company in Ireland has closed down permanently because huge trawlers have left nothing but "an empty, lifeless sea."

All the dolphins and humpback, minke & fin whales have disappeared, leaving nothing left to watch.

Source in 🧵

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · May 17

#Tigers

Twenty years of unimaginable hell.

Mental & physical torture in her concrete prison on a tiger farm in Thailand.

Abused as a breeding machine to provide cubs for tiger tourism & illegal trade in tiger body parts.

This is where those tiger cubs tourists delight in petting come from.

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · May 4

There is only one organization in the world dedicated to the Binturong.
They do important work, inc teaching locals why it's against their interests to kill them for their skins, to eat, for TCM, or to trap as pets.

They are desperate for urgent support if you can help:
abconservation.org/en/

4/4

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · May 4

We are utter fools to wipe out species which disperse seeds which restore the forests we destroy.

They have never been more important for the planet and mankind.

Source: Binturong ecology and conservation in pristine, fragmented and degraded tropical forests
cambridge.org/core/journal...
🧵3/4

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · May 4

Few animals suffer in more ways at the hands of humans than the binturong (Arctictis binturong).

Facing national extinctions, not only from massive deforestation in SE Asia, but throughout their range they're eaten, skinned for fur, killed for TCM, trapped for zoos & trafficked as pets.

🧵2/4

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · May 4

#Asia

This is a tragic image from Facebook advertising this binturong for sale as a 'pet'

They are long-lived wild animals, completely unsuitable as pets, as our homes are not a forest, nor are we nocturnal, & imprisonment, deprivation of mate & family is cruel & decimating numbers in wild.

🧵1/4

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Apr 30

Source:
Chinese pangolins facilitate ecological restoration in burned forest sites.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Apr 30

#Pangolins

Chinese pangolins facilitate ecological restoration in burned forest sites.

They are ecosystem engineers: a year after forest fire, birds, animals & plants had all benefited significantly from pangolin activity.

We're wiping out those who can help save us.

Research paper in 🧵

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Apr 26

#Antarctica

Gentoo penguin chicks getting by with help from their friends.
Whilst the parents go out to sea to catch food, they survive by huddling together for warmth and protection from predators.

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Apr 23

Thank you, Pam.

Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Apr 23

#Vietnam

Delacour's langur: gentle leaf and flower eaters, who regenerate forests by spreading seeds.
Critically endangered, only~200 left in the wild.

Hunted to brink of extinction for traditional medicine and their habitat destroyed by deforestation and limestone quarrying for cement.

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Mar 28

What American tourists don't see on safari - the unimaginable squalor of bushmeat & risk of zoonotic disease.

So much talk of national security, but global disease threatens us all - and this U.S. administration is putting everyone in danger.

This excellent thread explains why:🧵

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Feb 20

Thank you, Sherry. Friendship, integrity and trust are fundamentally important to me.

Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Feb 11

#Climate

An albatross chick lies dying in wet mud on Bird Island.

The tall nest was specially constructed to protect them, but we’ve warmed the world.

Winds are now stronger, so the chicks are blown out of their nests.

A bird who lives on the wind is now dying by the wind.

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Jan 28

#Birds

I'm seeing terrible advice all over sm about giving dryer lint to wild birds as nesting material.

DON'T do this.

It spreads microplastics into the environment, and is harmful to birds.

Here's advice from Audubon: Please tell your friends.
www.audubon.org/news/what-ne...

What Nesting Materials Are Safe for Birds?

Follow these dos and don'ts if you want to help your feathered neighbors build their homes this spring.

www.audubon.org

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Jan 24

No. Quite a few ppl do it, a good friend on X complained to a big account, someone one would never have believed would stoop so low, that he'd lifted his work & passed it off as his own, asked him to delete it, but no reply.
That account (highly-respected wildlife activist) then did the same to me.

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Jan 24

#StormÉowyn

We can take refuge from extreme weather in our homes, but most wildlife suffers the full force.

Seabirds are particularly vulnerable; puffins die in their thousands in powerful storms.

A warming world is littered with their battered bodies.

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Jan 24

Unfortunately not. I wish it could have been, I thought we were friends.

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Jan 19

Source:
Con McCarthy, of Rathcoole, Co Dublin, had his conviction for offences under the Wildlife Act dropped on appeal.

A subsequent donation offered instead was rejected because the Wildlife Trust viewed it as "buying himself out of a conviction".

www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2024...

Irish Wildlife Trust rejects donation from developer who ‘entombed’ badgers

Con McCarthy (61), of Greenogue Business Park, Rathcoole, Co Dublin, was spared a criminal conviction on appeal

www.irishtimes.com

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Jan 19

the project. When Brian Keeley (who conducted the wildlife survey) returned to the site and saw what had been done he said
"I’ve been enforcing the law for twenty years and this is the most willfully cruel act I’ve seen”.

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Jan 19

In court, an ecologist, Brian Keeley, testified that he had conducted a badger survey prior to the works. He found two badgers bringing bedding into their sett & presumed they were breeding.
He made the developer aware of the badger sett but was told to step down from 🧵

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Jan 19

#Wildlilfe

A property developer near Dublin, Ireland buried alive a family of badgers in their sett.

Many tons of clay and large tree trunks were piled on top of their home, leaving them no chance of escape.

He appealed his conviction and walked free. 🧵1/

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Dr Tom Montgomery @drtomontgomery.bsky.social · Dec 14

#Brazil

A Giant armadillo showing her superb excavating tools.
>150 burrows dug each year provide homes & refuge for an astonishing 80 recorded species.

Hunted for meat & claws, with shrinking habitat, they are increasingly rare.

Their loss to the ecosystem and biodiversity would be incalculable.

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