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Reposted by Massimo Martini

Science Magazine @science.org · 3d

A new study in Science evaluating published data from 19 countries has pinpointed the minimum habitat levels needed to sustain pollinators in agricultural landscapes. https://scim.ag/3VIq4Cg

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · 2d

It's not only bees. Syrphid flies are also very important pollinators and are so gosh darn cute 😍

Episyrphus balteatus,☝️ for scale

Syrphid fly pointing face first towards camera, big red eyes, perched on my finger

Syrphid fly perched on my finger, lateral view shows abdomen with its orange and black stripes resembling a bee

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Reposted by Massimo Martini

Biodiversity Exploratories @bexplo.bsky.social · 9d

📢Check out our latest BE-publication on #invertebrate 🐞abundance in #grasslands 🌱 published in @basicapplecol.bsky.social.

Reducing land use (single late #mowing) increased #insects by +41% after 1 yr and +99% after 3 yrs.
Species diversity, however, remained unchanged.

🔗 doi.org/10.1016/j.ba...

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Reposted by Massimo Martini

Florian Schnabel @mixedforests.bsky.social · 10d

🗞️New study in @globalchangebio.bsky.social 🗞️

🌳Diversity in resource use strategies promotes productivity across a global network of tree #diversity experiments?🌲

Read our new study led by Joel Jensen together with #TreeDivNet here:

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Diversity in Resource Use Strategies Promotes Productivity in Young Planted Tree Species Mixtures

By analyzing data from over 83,000 trees in 21 experiments across five continents, we found that forests with more species were more productive and had more stable growth. Productivity was driven mai....

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Reposted by Massimo Martini

Will Allen @wlallen.bsky.social · 13d

📢🦋 Our paper ‘Global selection on insect antipredator coloration’ is out and featured on the cover of @science.org

We ran a huge experiment to find out how ecological context favours camouflage and warning colouration as antipredator strategies. 1/6

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

A white-fronted bee-eater (Merops bullockoides) decides whether to consume a warningly colored white-barred acraea butterfly (Telchinia encedon). Photo (c) Mike Rowe

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Reposted by Massimo Martini

Julian Schrader @julianschrader.bsky.social · Sep 7

Our paper on species and trait abundance distributions in @jappliedecology.bsky.social is now out in an issue:

besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Led by Werner Ulrich and many other great colleagues.

Species and trait abundance distributions as tools for understanding disturbance effects and community assembly in applied ecology

Further insight into the links between disturbance and species abundance may come from the recognition that the species abundance distribution (SAD) is a special case of a broader concept, the trait ...

besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · Sep 5

The german+austian+swiss conference of #ecology (gfö) just wrapped up, and I was stoked to present results from a long-term biodiversity study - a huge combined effort involving a decade of insect population monitoring.

I also managed to check out some entomological collections in Würzburg! 🐝

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Dave Goulson @davegoulson.bsky.social · Aug 19

New Europe-wide study finds that efforts to provide pollinator habitat in urban areas - such as sowing wildflower mixes - really do work, boosting numbers of bees and butterflies: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Pollinator‐Promoting Interventions in European Urban Habitats—A Synthesis

Syntheses of urban pollinator-friendly management are lacking, hindering policy implementation compared to farmland. Addressing this gap, our re-analytical data synthesis demonstrates the generally p...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · Aug 11

And that's #labwork also wrapped up! For the next year my PhD will exclusively exclusively involve writing manuscripts... I have mixed feelings about that 😅

This here is just a small part of the insects that we sampled. Some very cool bees and wasps, including potentially new species.

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Reposted by Massimo Martini

EnviXLab @envixlab.bsky.social · Jul 28

📢 ITV-net: the first Italian database on #PlantFunctionalTraits with #IntraspecificTraitVariability 🌱

ITV-net includes over 8,500 leaf trait records (LA/SLA) for 709 plant species across 8 Italian habitats, from coastal dunes to alpine grasslands.

#EnviXLab

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

ITV-net: a dataset of intraspecific leaf traits data across major Italian habitats

Over the last decades plant ecology has greatly benefited from open data on functional traits. Nowadays, several national and international trait databases are available, but trait data from Southe...

www.tandfonline.com

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · Jul 24

Here is a picture from above, showing the skull on the thorax and the gorgeous wing pattern

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · Jul 24

Ever seen a moth do some #pushups? 💪💪💪💪💪💪

This big guy came flying to our light trap! We handled him carefully and let him go shortly later. Here he's showing some defensive mechanism to scare us off.

Species: Greater death's head hawkmoth

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · Jul 20

Back in Jiangxi for one last PhD field trip. Couldn't help but immediately set up a light trap to see what's flying. Fingers crossed for some big beetles 🪲

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Reposted by Massimo Martini

Science Magazine @science.org · Jun 25

In what may be one of Earth’s craziest forms of mimicry, researchers in 2023 reported a species of rove beetle that grows a termite puppet on its back to fool real termites into feeding it.

Learn more during #InsectWeek: scim.ag/40mj1S8

Beetle grows ‘termite’ on back to steal food

Puppet helps insect trick real termites into feeding it

scim.ag

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Ed Hawkins @edhawkins.org · Jun 21

Every country is warming.

Every country is experiencing more extreme weather events because of climate change, mainly caused by burning fossil fuels. www.ShowYourStripes.info

Time to #ShowYourStripes and start climate conversations to prompt actions to reduce emissions, personally & collectively.

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · Jun 16

A black-striped orchard spider (Leucage celebesiana) waiting on a leaf for insect to fly into its web. Notice the single strand of silk holding the leaf in tension! Like so she'll be able to detect any minute vibration.
📍Dexing, Jiangxi China
#macromonday 🕸

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Benjamin Wildermuth @bmwildermuth.bsky.social · Jun 8

Postdoc Job offer for Arthropod Ecologists 🪲🕷️

Michael Staab @leuphana.bsky.social offers a 3 year postdoc starting in October latest.
Arthropod diversity, interactions & functions in different research programs, e.g. @bexplo.bsky.social

Apply by June 19th

www.leuphana.de/en/universit...

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · May 26

Hopping into #macromonday with this Monkey grasshopper nymph! Wishing all a good week filled with scientific reading and perhaps writing 📚🖋

Eumastacidae sp.

Tiny grasshopper nymph, brown with some lighter coloured bands. Very tiny antennae a long face. Resting on a leaf, surrounded by blurred-out green

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Florian Altermatt @florianaltermatt.bsky.social · Mar 26

Our study ‘The #global #human impact on #biodiversity’ is out in @nature.com: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

🌍🌐🐟🌿🪲

Unprecedented synthesis of >2000 studies led by @francoiskeck.bsky.social shows humans are not only shrinking species numbers—but reshaping entire communities across the planet.
🧵1/5

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RestPoll @restpoll.bsky.social · May 23

💬 Would you buy bee-friendly food? Then help us with your opinion and take part in our survey (approx. 20 min).

👉Your answers will help to make our food system more sustainable and promote the protection of pollinators.

Available in 7 different languages!
agreconlab.limesurvey.net/328536?lang=en

Apple orchard with flowerstrip between rows of trees. Texts says "Would you by bee-friendly food?"

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · May 23

Great news today at Uni Freiburg! #FutureForests in coming to town 🌳🌳

Florian Schnabel @mixedforests.bsky.social · May 23

Unbelievable 🎉 - We have a New Cluster of Excellence -
🌳 #FutureForests🌲

Looking forward to working with the amazing interdisciplinary team of #FutureForests on analysing and developing transformation pathways for forest-based social-ecological systems!!!

Great 7 years ahead @uni-freiburg.de!!!

Universität Freiburg @uni-freiburg.de · May 22

🎉Ab 1. Januar 2026 fördert die @dfg.de (#DFG) zwei #Exzellenzcluster der #UniFreiburg. Der bisherige #Exzellenzcluster @cibss.bsky.social wird weitere sieben Jahre fortgesetzt. Zudem startet der neue Exzellenzcluster #FutureForests. ufr.link/exzellenzclu...

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Reposted by Massimo Martini

Jen Cross @jencross.bsky.social · May 21

Holy smokes! I've got the male too! I'm tearing up. Just heard from the scientist that described the new species and this handsome lad is the male. So awesome!
(Chrysometa chuchaqui)

A skinny spider with swirly light sockets for pedipalps, a tan cephalothorax, cone shaped abdomen with shiny plates. He is sitting on a leaf.

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Reposted by Massimo Martini

Ele Willoughby @minouette.bsky.social · May 20

May 20 is World Bee Day. There are ~20,000 different bee species in the world. 🧪🧵🐝 Here in Ontario we have at least 400 native bees (none of which are honeybees, which are from Europe). Bees are key to pollination. According to the UN nearly 90% of the world’s wild flowering plant species depend, 🧵

As described this 16” x 20” linocut print combines gold text in a central circle reading “OUR FATE” arching upwards, “IS TIED” horizontally across the middle, “TO THAT OF THE INSECTS” arching downwards in two lines with insects.
Clockwise from top: two leaf cutter bees (Megachile relativa and M. brevis), the Imperial moth (Eacles imperialis), the Virgin Tiger moth (Apantesis virgo), an Isabella’s Longwings butterfly (Nymphalidae Eueides isabella), a blue orchard mason bee (Osmia lignaria), a firefly (Photinus pyralis), the rusty patched bumblebee (Bombus affinis), a white underwing moth (Catocala relicta), an eastern carpenter bee (Xylocopa virginica), a sweat bee (Agapostemon sericeus), a hummingbird clearwing moth (Hermaris thysbe), the common eastern bumblebee (B. impatiens), a long-horned bee (Melissodes sp.), a monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) and centre: eastern snail-shell nesting bee (O. conjuncta).

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · May 20

Happy world #bee day!! Today we thank them for their hard work in supporting a key ecosystem function #pollination, and appreciate their beauty 🐝. Here, a Ceratina sp. on a flower in Jiangxi, China.

#macro

A tiny bee of the genus Ceratina. Black, mostly hairless, with yellow legs and yellow thin horizontal stripes on the abdomen. Perched on a yellow flower with white petals (similar to a daisy).

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Massimo Martini @entomassi.bsky.social · May 12

Spring time... to get busy! And these two Tetanocerini wasted no time. Named marsh flies, these insects live next to water bodies, and apparently the larvae are gastropod (slugs & snails) hunters/parasites?! More trophic interactions to study? @multitroph.bsky.social
#macromonday

Picture of two flies, approximately 5 mm long, copulating on a leaf

The male is standing on top of the female, their abdomens are connected in copulation

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