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Menno Schilthuizen

@schilthuizen.bsky.social

1.5K followers 980 following 230 posts

New book "The Urban Naturalist" (MIT Press, 1 Apr. 2025) Author of 'Darwin Comes to Town' and 'Nature's Nether Regions' Rubber-stamped 'tweets' on ecology & evolution. TED speaker http://schilthuizen.com http://taxonexpeditions.com Leyden, Netherlands

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Menno Schilthuizen @schilthuizen.bsky.social · Nov 20

We have a cover!
Click here for preordering the book: mitpress.mit.edu/978026204909...

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Ainsley S @americanbeetles.bsky.social · 1d

Okay britpol is none of my business but this attitude fills me with incandescent rage

Rachel Reeves’ words about environmental delays to a housing development: “ She described the planning blockage as being due to "some snails on the site that are a protected species or something", adding:
"They are microscopic snails that you cannot even see, and they haven't been able to build there." The chancellor appeared to be referring to the little whirlpool ramshorn snail, which is 5mm in diameter, and one of the rarest creatures in Britain. It is an indicator of clean rivers and ponds…”

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Dan Killam @dantheclamman.blog · 2d

Phoresis is the name for when one organism attaches to another for the purpose of travel, and pea clams (Sphaeriidae) are masters of it. They attach to birds, fish, salamanders, and even aquatic insects like dragonflies or water boatmen to get a ride upstream. Ride on, little clams! (293)

Figure from Zelaya and Marinone 2012 showing a reservoir in Bolivia, where an unfortunate water boatman was found with two pea clams clamped onto its little claws. A pea clam is shown, 4 mm long or so. A close up of a claw, and a chip on the shell from where the boatman tried to kick off its hitchhiker, and also a piece of the leg stuck in the clammed-up bivalve gill

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Menno Schilthuizen @schilthuizen.bsky.social · 3d

Don’t buy Betamax

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Cephalopods Daily @cephalopodsdaily.bsky.social · 3d

The big-eye jellyhead (Inopinoteuthis magna) is thought to be largest species of cirrate octopus, with one specimen having a total length of 1.7 m, and mantle length of 33 cm.

I personally love it when they do their "person wearing a hoop skirt impression"

#OCTOtober

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EntomoNews @collemyria.bsky.social · 5d

L’exposition « Insectes de la Loire et architecture » est l'occasion de découvrir le travail de Sylvie Mommert, une artiste plasticienne qui fige sur la toile les insectes qu’elle se plaît à observer dans la nature. Elle expose une quinzaine de ses œuvres au musée de la Tour du Moulin.

Marcigny (Saône-et-Loire). Sylvie Mommert, une artiste peintre qui fige les insectes dans le temps

Du samedi 4 au dimanche 12 octobre, le musée de la Tour du Moulin accueille l’exposition « Insectes de la Loire et architecture ». L’occasion d Emmanuel Daligand Aujourd'hui à 18:15 | mis à jour aujourd'hui à 19:26 Image : Sylvie Mommert expose une quinzaine de ses œuvres au musée de la Tour du Moulin. Photo Emmanuel Daligand

sco.lt

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Cam Muskelly (Explorer of Deep Time ⏰ ⚒️) @cambriancam.bsky.social · 5d

Ray Troll sent me this Paleo themed shirt with his art. So of course I had to model it. #Paleonerds

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Peter Moonlight @petermoonlight.bsky.social · 7d

Calling botanical researchers, the School of Natural Science at Trinity College Dublin is hiring a tenure track Assistant Professor in Plant Biodiversity and Conservation.

I know this is someone's dream job, so let me know if that is you and you want to chat!

my.corehr.com/pls/trrecrui...

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Álvaro Luna @alvaroluna87.bsky.social · Nov 18

Studying birds in your own city can sometimes facilitate low-cost science. Over the course of a year, we conducted 307 🦶 transects (~4 km each, totaling 1,200 km) in Madrid, obtaining nearly 3,000 observations on the diet of the common wood pigeon.

royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

🦉 🌎

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Menno Schilthuizen @schilthuizen.bsky.social · 9d

Kees van Achterberg will be so happy!

Davide Dal Pos @ddpichenumonidae.bsky.social · 9d

New paper out! ✨

With my friend Alvaro Doria Dos Santos, we describe a new Masona from Brazil! 🇧🇷

Now we have Masona wow (2024) & Masona uau (2025)!
📄 doi.org/10.1007/s117...

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Writing & Editing @wrtrstat.bsky.social · 10d

Perseverance and continued writing really are the two superpowers for an author. The more you write, the greater the opportunity for your current and past work to shine. Your #writing grows into its voice. - Wrtr #AmWriting We learn the most from editing/rewriting our work. #Writer #Author #BookSky

A writer is working when staring out of the window. - Burton Rascoe ~ Background photo shows a window overlooking outside a green wooded area next to the house.

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Menno Schilthuizen @schilthuizen.bsky.social · 11d

It’s so annoying — and endearing simultaneously — how we think that when nouns are conjoined in Dutch, it’s okay to do so in English as well.

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Jim Jansen @jimjansen.bsky.social · 12d

Maak Franciska de Vries minister van stikstof zou ik zeggen:

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Micah @rincewind.run · 17d

we have gone from a world in which we were told not to cite wikipedia because it was unreliable to a world where wikipedia might be the only reliable source left on the internet and we all owe a lot to the pedantic nerds who got us there

Dr. Samantha Hancox-Li @sjshancoxli.liberalcurrents.com · 17d

for all people mock it wikipedia is genuinely one of the wonders of the modern world

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Menno Schilthuizen @schilthuizen.bsky.social · 12d

Een leuk item voor Expeditie 10 van Vroege Vogels over de expeditie van @taxonexpeditions.bsky.social op Hoeve Kazan twee weken geleden!

#burgerwetenschap #citizenscience #biodiversiteit #waterleven #waterbeestjes #insecten #expedities #natuur #BiologischeLandbouw

www.bnnvara.nl/expeditie10/...

Kinderen onderzoeken waterleven op slootjessafari - Expeditie 10 - BNNVARA

Waterroofkevers, karperluizen en waterwantsen. Een kleine greep uit de dieren die kinderen tegenkomen tijdens de slootjessafari bij Hoeve Kazan..

www.bnnvara.nl

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marc konijn @marckonijn.bsky.social · 17d

Op de Atlantische oceaan is het opvallend stil, maar in de pacific gaat het goed los.

Dit is pure verwoesting wat je ziet: categorie 5, 270 km/uur, en een druk van 911!!

De zwaarste storm in 🇳🇱 had een uurgemiddelde van 126 km/uur, de zwaarste windstoot was 162 km/uur.

🌀=🫣

Zoom Earth @zoom.earth · 17d

Category 5 strength Super Typhoon #Ragasa / #NandoPH is raging in the Philippine Sea with winds of 270 km/h (165 mph), pressure down to 911 hPa. What a monster storm! 👀

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Endless Screaming @infinitescream.bsky.social · 17d

AAAAAAAAAHHH

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David Cole @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social · 17d

On the cold-blooded execution of alleged drug smugglers.

www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

Getting Away with Murder | David Cole

During his first presidential campaign Donald Trump famously claimed that he could “stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody” and not lose

www.nybooks.com

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Lars Chittka @larschittka.bsky.social · 19d

When bees carry individual marks, you realise that they are not "attracted to flowers" like some silly reflex machines - in fact they know where they're going and the same individuals often return to the same flowers whose locations, appearance and rewards they have learned. Go Orange 24!

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Darren Naish @tetzoo.bsky.social · 19d

Every time you use 'raptor' for a dromaeosaurid a baby hawk, eagle or falcon dies

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Menno Schilthuizen @schilthuizen.bsky.social · 20d

It’s all in the book Wie Wat Bewaart by Freek Vonk and myself—only available in Dutch, I am afraid…

Menno Schilthuizen @schilthuizen.bsky.social · 20d

Yesterday was the 130th anniversary of the #ICZN, the International Commission for Zoological Nomenclature. It was founded during the zoology congress in Leiden, organized by the then director the Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie, Frederik Jentink.

black and white group photo of the international zoological congress, taken at the statue of Van der Werff, in the Van der Werff Park in Leiden in 1895.

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The Coleopterists Society @coleopsoc.bsky.social · 20d

#LiteratureNotice Khormizi et al. Distribution and habitat preferences of Hyperaspis species ( #Coleoptera: #Coccinellidae) in Iran doi.org/10.1007/s426... #Beetle #Beetles #LadyBeetles #NewRecords #CheckLists

Dorsal view on adults of Hyperaspis species represented in Iran: (a) Hyperaspis concolor, (b) Hyperaspis duvergeri, (c) Hyperaspis femorata, (d) Hyperaspis guttulata, (e) Hyperaspis histeroides, (f) Hyperaspis marmottani, (g) Hyperaspis persica female, (h) Hyperaspis polita, (i) Hyperaspis pseudopustulata, (j) Hyperaspis quadrimaculata, k) Hyperaspis reppensis, l) Hyperaspis syriaca, m) Hyperaspis transversoguttata, n) Hyperaspis vinciguerrae male, o) Hyperaspis vinciguerrae female

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Menno Schilthuizen @schilthuizen.bsky.social · 21d

Oh stop it

CNN @cnn.com · 21d

A plan to genetically engineer a version of the dodo, a giant flightless bird that disappeared 400 years ago and became the poster child for extinction, has made some headway, according to Texas-based biotechnology firm Colossal Biosciences. https://cnn.it/4nW9kUb

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Chentomology @chentomology.bsky.social · 21d

We love jumping spiders because they are smol, cute, active, friendly and always looking around curiously with their huge eyes. But do you know they’re also masters of mimicry? Check out the bugs they pretend to be (and some of those are really good)!💚💚

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Endless Screaming @infinitescream.bsky.social · 21d

AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH

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