At long last, @paleolorax.bsky.social gives us her Plant-Based History of the Earth!

Episode 225 – Forests Listen to Episode 225 on Podbean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts! Put together a whole lot of trees, a certain amount of heat and precipitation, and a variety of…

Featuring @paleolorax.bsky.social and a deep dive into one of the most fascinating biomes on Earth, past and present.

CT-scan image of a pinecone, showing the internal structure and positions of seeds within.

CT-scan image of a pinecone, showing the internal structure and positions of seeds within.

CT-scan image of a pinecone, showing the external structure.

Episode 3 - What's Inside a Pinecone?

Out now!

Featuring an animated discussion about these CT-scan images from the Regents of the University of Michigan.

I’m glad you enjoyed it!

Episode 1 - Sex-Changing Plants!

Nora brings along some surprising news about trees that spontaneously changed sex, and Aly explains how plant sex works and what makes a tree suddenly swap from male to female.
leafittouspod.podbean.com/e/episode-1-...

A close up of a houseplant on a desk whose leaves have a bunch of little holes in them that are roughly the size and shape of cat teeth. Text says "I wonder how these holes got here?"

Episode 2 - Houseplants vs Housepets

Why are so many of our favorite houseplants so dangerous to our pets? Nora and Aly investigate the antagonism between plants and animals and share some of their favorite stories of plants vs pets.

leafittouspod.podbean.com/e/episode-2-...

🚨 New Podcast Alert! 🚨

If you - like Nora and Aly - feel that we don't talk enough about plants, we've got great news!

Hello! Leaf it to Us is a podcast about the science of plants and their importance to us humans!

Leaf it to Us is a descendant of @commondescentpod.bsky.social. They don't talk enough about plants, so we have BRANCHED off and said "Leaf it to Us!"

I'll be giving a free public lecture tonight at 6:30 p.m. for the Botanical Club of Wisconsin. The lecture is online and open to anyone; join us at the zoom link below if you're interested in learning more about oaks!

16 Apr 2025, 6:30 PM Central Time (US / Canada)

uwmadison.zoom.us/j/91623580182

We’re proud to announce a new podcast, Leaf it to Us, hosted by Nora Spurling and Aly Baumgartner!

As a special preview, the pilot episode and its accompanying bonus episode are both now out on the Common Descent podcast feed! Take a listen and let us know what you think!

The Fish Doorbell — The Fish Doorbell Did you spot a fish? Press the Fish Doorbell! This alerts our lock operator to let the fish through. The Fish Doorbell is in Utrecht, NL.

The Fish Doorbell is live!
THE FISH DOORBELL IS LIVE 🐟 🐠
visdeurbel.nl/en/

I just had a similar conversation. The good thing about having a regular guest appearance on a podcast is that it means I’ve kept up with friends for years

A photograph of Eurypterus, a pretty good eurypterid known from many fossils. This fossil preserves the head, upper body, and some of the legs, including a spiny leg on the left and the broad paddles at the back. The fossil is a dark grey on a light grey rock, and is speckled with dark patches of cuticle and yellow patched of pyrite.

A closeup of the head of a fossil of Eurypterus, preserved as a red-brown. The median eyes can be seen as little round dots, with the bean-shaped lateral eyes either side. The outline of the ventral plates, which open up to allow the animal to molt, can be seen underlying the carapace.

A closeup of the view of a paddle of Eurypterids, preserved as a red-brown cuticle on a cream-coloured rock. The intricate joints of the appendage are shown, along with some darker lines of scales.

In celebration of my monograph being accepted for publication, here's some images of everyone's favourite New York state fossil, Eurypterus, for #FossilFriday! Even among these standard compression fossils, the detail on the cuticle is exceptional. ⚒️🧪

This is a pro honey locust account

Composite image showing herbarium specimen segmentation and heatmaps indicating key regions influencing plant trait identification. The segmented image (bottom left) improves model focus, leading to more accurate classification results (bottom right). Image credit: Hanane Ariouat and Youcef Sklab.

Enhancing plant morphological trait identification in #herbarium collections through deep learning–based segmentation

New #AppsPlantSci research by Ariouat, Sklab, Prifti, Zucker & Chenin

bsapubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.... @ird-fr.bsky.social #botany #DeepLearning

The first mistake the girl makes is to be herself. The second is to cower.

5 kilogram nuts come crashing down at Australia’s largest botanic garden | Botanic Gardens of Sydney Summer heralds the sounds of loud thuds at the Australian Botanic Garden Mount Annan, as the Bunya Pine begin to drop their cones.

top four deranged Australian plants, a thread:
1. the tree that kills you instantly by dropping a 5kg/11lb cone on your head (Araucaria bidwelli) www.botanicgardens.org.au/discover-and...

OK it actually seems pretty isolated, re NSF panel cancellation. Currently, only four panels in the next few months are listed as cancelled. new.nsf.gov/events/propo...

BIG NEWS: Violet Lichen and Apex Book Company are launching a new annual anthology! 🥂📚🍄

ECO: The Year’s Best Speculative Eco-fiction, will showcase a collection of standout ecofiction published within the previous year. Story nominations open January 27th!

Check the attached post for details!

The map's form: leaves – small
It shows: comparative
Its purpose: to speculate

Yes, we are open today. Yes, we have the new Rebecca Yarros. Yes, we are a good place to go if you want to decentralize your shopping because you’re tired of billionaires determining our society. Yes, bookstores are the original Book Tok. Yes, books can make us feel better.

ArcGIS is the only program I’ve used where you can do something RIGHT and sometimes it just doesn’t work for whatever reason!

Finally get to squeeze some squirting cucumbers (Ecballium elaterium) IRL 🤩 The name derives from phenomenon that the ripe fruits squirting a stream of mucilaginous liquid containing its seeds as a dispersal mechanism. This vid here is a slow-mo! #iamabotanist #plantjoy #plantsciences 🧪🌾🌱🥒