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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Birch Aquarium @birchaquarium.bsky.social · Aug 31

Did someone say resting fish face?

The #LonghornCowfish is easy to spot with its bright yellow color and the signature horns jutting from its head. But those horns aren’t just for style — scientists think they evolved to make this little cowfish a mouthful most predators can’t swallow.

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Rosemary Mosco @rosemarymosco.com · Aug 11

It's that time again :>

A three panel comic. In panel 1, two people are facing each other. The first person asks "Hey, do you want to drive really far and spend hours staring at distant, rapidly moving gray-brown objects while trying to find subtle differences between them?" and the second says "No." In panel 2, the first person says "What if they're bird-shaped?" and the second person says "Then absolutely, yes." In panel 3, the two people are standing and looking through binoculars at distant shorebirds on a beach. The first person says "Yay shorebirds season!" and the second says "Woo!"

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Stacy Jupiter @stacyjupiter.bsky.social · Aug 5

New study from @wcs.org and partners document 85% decline in abundance of Nassau grouper at their spawning site at Glover's Reef over 20 years, moving the population to local extirpation. Read more from Coral Reefs: link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Photo (c) Connor Holland/Ocean Image Bank

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Nadine, Haunter of Rocks 👻 @nadwgab.bsky.social · Jan 1

1 of #365Minerals 🧪⚒️

Quetzalcoatlite:
- Named after Quetzalcoatl, an Aztec and Toltec god of the sea, due to its sea-blue colour
- Forms in the oxidised zone of tellurium-bearing hydrothermal deposits #minerals
- This below is a co-type specimen (one of the specimens used to define the species)

Tiny blue-green crystals (there's a green coloured arrow stuck on the specimen to point these out) with some leaf-green illite and blue azurite on a matrix. From Bambollita Mine, Moctezuma, Sonora, Mexico.

Specimen from the Natural History Museum, London's collections.

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

David Shiffman, Ph.D. 🦈 @whysharksmatter.bsky.social · Jul 23

New manta ray new manta ray NEW MANTA RAY!

John P. Friel, Ph.D. @friel.bsky.social · Jul 23

𝑀𝑜𝑏𝑢𝑙𝑎 𝑦𝑎𝑟𝑎, a new cryptic species of Manta Ray, is described from the Western Atlantic Ocean. The existence of an undescribed manta ray species has been suggested for over 15 years and is now formally described. 🐟🧪

link.springer.com/article/10.1...

An integrative taxonomy investigation unravels a cryptic species of Mobula Rafinesque, 1810 (Mobulidae, Myliobatiformes), from the Atlantic Ocean - Environmental Biology of Fishes

Manta and devil rays comprise a vulnerable animal group with a complex nomenclatural history and a somewhat unresolved taxonomy. The existence of a putative undescribed species of manta ray in the Atl...

link.springer.com

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jul 11

Phenomenal first PhD paper by the marvelous @lljeannot.bsky.social – check it out folks, it has birds, coral reefs, and tiny fish!

Laura-Li Jeannot @lljeannot.bsky.social · Jul 11

New paper out in Proceedings B! 🔊

Seabirds' impacts on reefs extends even to some of its tiniest inhabitants - cryptobenthic reef fishes 🐠
Near colonies, these fishes assimilate seabird nutrients (💩), grow larger 📈 & more at: royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

@royalsocietypublishing.org

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Aaron O'Dea @odealab.bsky.social · Jul 1

🐠🦈 Just out: In this paper we ask "How has reef trophic structure changed since humans started removing predatory fishes from Caribbean coral reefs?".

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Illustrations @cookedillustrations.com

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Texas Science @texasscience.bsky.social · Jun 10

New research challenges the long-held belief that coral reefs are “oases” in marine deserts. While among the world’s most productive ecosystems, their existence in nutrient-deprived oceans is the exception rather than the rule. @gobyone.bsky.social @utmsi.bsky.social
cns.utexas.edu/news/researc...

Idea of Coral Reefs as Oases in Marine Deserts May Be Mistaken

New research from Simon Brandl at The University of Texas at Austin challenges a long-held belief about coral reefs.

cns.utexas.edu

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jun 10

Yes, @joey-squishfish.bsky.social – this is fossilized marine lint! 😁

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Renato Morais @renatoamorais.bsky.social · Jun 7

Our new paper on the historical and scientific basis of Darwin’s ‘coral reef paradox’ is out @currentbiology.bsky.social! Summary below by @gobyone.bsky.social.

Also with @paulinenarvaez.bsky.social
@oclaripv.bsky.social
and Vale Parravicini!

Free-access link:
authors.elsevier.com/a/1lDFm3QW8S...

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jun 10

Cool description of seven miniature fish species from the Triassic that may be similar to modern day cryptobenthics. Apparently they were all over the Tethys Sea 240 million years ago, measuring in at a whopping 4cm adult body size 🥹 Scale bar in 📷 is 5mm!

linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii...

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jun 8

☺️

a cartoon of alice from alice in wonderland says why thank you !

ALT: a cartoon of alice from alice in wonderland says why thank you !

media.tenor.com

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Global Change Biology @globalchangebio.bsky.social · Jun 8

Global Patterns and Drivers of Freshwater Fish Extinctions: Can We Learn From Our Losses?

🔗 buff.ly/1ljgy5X

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jun 6

A detailed summary of our paper's results is provided below. This work was funded by a Branco Weiss Fellowship and the US National Science Foundation.

Photos by @jordancasey.bsky.social

www.eurekalert.org/news-release...

New research challenges long-held belief of coral reefs as oases in marine deserts

www.eurekalert.org

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jun 6

Scientific semantics aside, why does this matter? It matters because reefs clearly depend much more on their surrounding oceans than commonly assumed. As we alter not just reefs themselves, but also broader dynamics like nutrients, currents, and plankton blooms, reefs will have to cope with both.

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jun 6

Not really, because the oceans around reefs aren't deserts. Most reefs do not occur in conditions we would define as nutrient-poor. They thrive instead across a vast spectrum of oceanographic regimes, and 80% of reefs are surrounded by waters we would generally classify as meso- or eutrophic.

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jun 6

Does that mean it's all wrong? Not quite, because coral reefs are indeed ridiculously productive. We compared net primary production across Earth's ecosystems and found that reefs outpace almost all other systems in their ability to produce biomass. They're absolute powerhouses. Dare I say, oases?

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jun 6

First, Darwin never said nothing about reef productivity & nutrients. In fact, old Chucky D didn't have the basic oceanographic knowledge to arrive at the paradox conclusion. Instead, it arose after the first coral reef ecosystem metabolism studies in the 1950s and was misattributed in the 80s/90s

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jun 6

Our new paper in @currentbiology.bsky.social, led by @renatoamorais.bsky.social, examined the history and veracity of the alleged paradox and its patron Charles Darwin.

www.cell.com/current-biol...

@oclaripv.bsky.social
@paulinenarvaez.bsky.social
@utaustin.bsky.social
@psl-univ.bsky.social

Rethinking Darwin’s coral reef paradox and the ubiquity of “marine oases”

Morais et al. evaluate the history of Darwin’s paradox and the prevalence of oligotrophic conditions among coral reefs. They find no link between Darwin and the marine oasis concept. Most coral reefs ...

www.cell.com

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Jun 6

Heard of "Darwin's paradox"? It refers to Charles Darwin's observation that coral reefs are wildly productive despite occurring in nutrient-poor tropical oceans. Reefs are, so the story goes, oases in marine deserts 🏝️...

Turns out that 2/3 of these assertions are very wrong...

🌐
🦑🧪

🧵⬇️

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Antonio Vecoli (@tonyveco on X) @tonyveco.bsky.social · May 3

☀️🌏🇮🇹High pressure conditions have cleaned the sky almost everywhere over a wonderfully green #Italy and its islands, reaching 30°C in multiple regions for the first time in 2025. In the meanwhile a heavy saharahn dust event is about to touch the SW coast of Sardegna.⬇️View of Sentinel3 on May 2.

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Apr 18

In good tradition, here are a few tiny fishes with bunny ears 🐰

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Dr. Elizabeth Santos @lizmillermacroevo.bsky.social · Apr 14

I am pleased to announce The Macroevolution Lab at Ohio State opens this August! We will be housed in the Museum of Biological Diversity 🐟🐠🐡

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Reposted by Simon J. Brandl

Isabelle Ng @iseabelle.bsky.social · Apr 14

When thinking of the 'model' planktivore on reefs, fusiliers come to mind - their fusiform bodies, forked caudal fins, and large eyes appear built for the job. But are these traits common among most plankton-feeding reef fishes? 🐟

🔗 The story is more nuanced than we thought: doi.org/10.1007/s111...

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Simon J. Brandl @gobyone.bsky.social · Apr 11

What do dolphins, toadfishes, and snapping shrimp have in common? They all go quiet when disaster strikes. We show that historic rainfalls in South Texas silenced an otherwise noisy estuary for several months, suggesting a sustained loss of ecosystem functioning.

👉 link.springer.com/article/10.1...

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