I'm a data scientist @ourworldindata.org and I need help from a botanist or someone local to Kyoto, Japan! 🌸
We present one of the world’s longest climate records: 1,200 years of peak cherry blossom dates in Kyoto.
The researcher who maintained it, Prof. Yasuyuki Aono, sadly passed away last year.
1/25 New paper out in PNAS! We show that the fitness costs of reproductive specialization, where somatic cells give up reproduction, scale inversely with organism size. Larger organisms can afford far more soma, removing a key barrier to multicellular complexity.
Join me & @olliepadget.bsky.social at @livuninews.bsky.social! #postdoc #seabird movement & navigation in response to environmental cues @ukri.org. Developing new loggers w/ micro-engineers & computer scientists @yorkuniversity.bsky.social. Job tinyurl.com/2zuzktv5 Press release tinyurl.com/2zuzktv5
Migrated to Bluesky as I'm excited to share our new paper on collective route memories in homing pigeons: rdcu.be/e73Qk
We found flocks remembered old routes better than pigeons flying alone, likely because different birds remembered different parts of the route!
Does being in a collective buffer against individual forgetting, when it comes to navigation?
New paper by Joe Morford: we find that collectives of homing pigeons remember their routes better than individuals
@dorabiro.bsky.social @richardpmann.bsky.social
Thanks to @templetonworld.bsky.social !
Collective wisdom emerges in pigeons through forgetting randomly-different information over time doi.org/10.1038/s415...
So, groups of animals are better at remembering what they’ve learned than lone individuals because they forget independently, generating complementary memories of the task solution!
A figure showing homing efficiency index on the y axis and end of training or memory test on the x axis. The figure is split between data from the treatment which did not get extra training and those that did. In each case, the pairs have slightly higher homing efficiency at the end of training than solo birds. However, homing efficiency is lower in the memory test and there is no clear difference between pairs or solo birds. This suggests that collective intelligence has not resulted from the better memory of the baseline routes in pairs.
But despite this improvement in recapitulation of the learned route, we saw no improvement in homing efficiency for pairs during testing - collective memory did not translate into collective intelligence. We suspect that with a longer period of forgetting, this association might emerge.
This suggests that collective memory emerges not just through sampling but through complementary memories, like a many wrongs effect.
Figure showing paired and solo testing routes from one of the release sites, compared to their baseline routes. The paired test route appears much closer to the original baseline route than the solo route. To the right is a box and whisker plot with the average distance to the closest baseline route on the y axis. On the x axis are labels saying the end of training and memory test. Within each of these levels, the data are split into pair and solo treatments. At the end of training, there is no clear difference in distance from the baseline route for pairs or solo birds. However, during memory testing weeks later, the pairs are much closer to the closest baseline route than the lone birds, on average.
After this period of forgetting, we tested them either in pairs again, or solo. We found that pigeons released in pairs took routes much closer to their original training routes ✅ and this effect appeared larger than expected from the solo route of the best performing partner 🥇
Diagram of the experimental setup, with a 11 training releases for pairs of pigeons, followed by 3 paired and 3 solo releases to baseline their routes and performance before forgetting. Half the pairs then got another 8 training releases and a further baseline. This was followed by either 8 or 5 weeks of no training in each group. Afterwards, birds were tested in their pairs or alone, in randomised order.
Groups of homing pigeons 🐦🐦 learn idiosyncratic routes from release sites and faithfully recapitulate these, even when released alone 🐦 We trained pigeons in pairs until they formed consistent routes, then stopped releasing them at those sites for a few months to let them forget their route ❌🧠
Collective intelligence - better performance of larger groups ⬆️ - has been documented in various tasks in animals through various mechanisms. But whether similar effects emerge in memory of a task solution, rather than task performance, is unknown 🤔⁉️
You’ve probably heard of collective intelligence but what about collective memory? 🧠🐘
New paper in press, led by Joe Morford! We investigated whether collective decision making in pigeons can rescue long-term memory of learned homing routes 🧵
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Fantastic @egioxford.bsky.social seminar from @pauldufour80.bsky.social on the latest work on avian vagrancy
I heard my first in central Oxford in the first week of February this year, and another going at full blast a week later behind my garden. The first one really surprised me but perhaps I should be expecting it these days!
📑📊We have just uploaded a new pre-print where we decompose spatial, temporal and spatial-temporal variation in natural selection on reproductive traits for great tits and blue tits.
With Yimen Araya-Ajoy, @ellafcole.bsky.social and @sheldonbirds.bsky.social
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
📄New paper out in Behaviour doi.org/10.1163/1568539X-bja10356
🐦 Ambush behaviour is rarely reported among #seabirds. We observed that #MediterraneanShag might employ this strategy to seize fish schools. Our knowledge on seabird #foragingbehaviour is still lacking!
#ornithology
four panel figure with a bee on a forget-me-not flower upper left, ants finding their way upper right, migratory bird on the lower right and the logo of the special intestest group on animal navigation of the royal institute of navigation on the lower left. in the middle it is written "royal institute of navigation (RIN) - animal navigation group with the RIN logo"
12th RIN Conference on Animal Navigation - one of my favourites 🧭🦉🐟🦇🐝🐜 - this time we tried a new format, inviting topical sessions to make sure we represent the wonderfully broad range of research in #animal #orientation and #navigation and are super excited about the lineup s.gwdg.de/EBROf7
@joewynnbirds.bsky.social did an excellent job on keeping all ducks in a row for the programme juggling and will surely live up to full potential in the legendary pub quiz and other evening highlights - stay tuned!
Decline in body mass in adult (left) and nestling great tits. In the nestling plot, the purple line represents all nestling and the green line those that recruited to the population as breeders. Their different slope suggest an increase in the strength of selection on nestling mass something confirmed in the MS by analysing the temporal trends in selection differentials (see link for further information)
We have published a new pre-print showing a decline in great tit adult and nestling mass of around 1 gram in 47 y. [rate of approx. -0.040 Hadanes] With @ellafcole.bsky.social, @devisatarkar.bsky.social, Sam. Crofts, @mcmahok.bsky.social & @sheldonbirds.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
I wrote an article for The Conversation about birds' often overlooked sense of smell. From vultures that detect gas leaks to citrus-scented seabirds - read more below:
Jacket design for Darwin and the Queer Origins of Life: A History of Sex and Science by Ross Brooks. It features a historic, drawn image of a gynandromorph gypsy moth, with distinctive female patterning on its left side and male on its right. Against a black background, the image and text (title and author's name) are brightly rendered in a spectrum of colours resonant of the Progress Pride Flag.
My first book, Darwin and the Queer Origins of Life, will be published by Yale University Press on 11 August (UK) and 8 September (US). Please help spread the word! 🙏
UK: yalebooks.co.uk/book/9780300... @yalebooks.bsky.social 🏳️🌈📚🐵
US: yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300... @yalepress.bsky.social 🏳️⚧️ 🗃️🦋
In theory, nature markets allow governments to attract more private investment and diversify funds that help restore nature. The reality is much more complicated.
New from Sophus zu Ermgassen @iccs.bsky.social in @uk.theconversation.com 👇
theconversation.com/how-to-make-...
Super honoured to have contributed to this paper, led by the brilliant Sophus zu Ermgassen! We use our experience evaluating nature markets from around the world and derive 5 'golden' rules for the design and implementation of markets that deliver scientifically-credible outcomes. 🌱
rdcu.be/eYFx8
🚨 PhD offer (please share)
Fascinated by bird migration and movement ecology? 🦜🌍 Join us at @vogelwarte.bsky.social to study annual cycle energetics with multi-sensor loggers in multiple species
Deadline: 20 Feb 2026
Starting: June 2026
Supervision: Martins Briedis & me
Info: tinyurl.com/2dbv9nzh
Had a fab time this week at Pop Group @popgroup2026.bsky.social and stoked to have won a prize for my poster on hybridisation in island birds! 🧬🐦⬛🏝️ #pgg59
Happy to share our new paper published in @cp-iscience.bsky.social We deployed 300+ multi-sensor loggers across 17 species to investigate how different species adapt their flight strategies when crossing deserts and marine areas during migration. tinyurl.com/2c8y8xvf #ornithology #birds
Last years field assistant holding a Manx Shearwater on the isle of Rum (under a towel), retrieving a GPS device after a bird has returned from a foraging trip!
We are looking to hire a Seabird Field Assistant for 2026 for our Manx Shearwater research project.
Please share this to anyone who'd like to get out in the field this summer and learn about biotelemetry, bird handling and research into animal behaviour.
drive.google.com/file/d/1SGZt...
I had a very enjoyable time at #ASABWinter2025 and was delighted to present a poster on my work on bird visual fields! Thanks to the organisers @asab-meetings.bsky.social for a sociable and useful few days.
PhD student @ghtrabin.bsky.social with his great poster at ASAB, all about avian visual fields! Along with @smthmpsn.bsky.social and @gayatrikumar.bsky.social, a great group of first year postgrads doing research in bird flight and vision. Give them a follow!