Around 440 billion shrimp are farmed and slaughtered each year. Do certification schemes protect their welfare? On May 19, Urja Thakrar (Royal Veterinary College) will present the first farm-level shrimp welfare study and reflect on how certification could be strengthened.
Join us:
How you handle black soldier fly prepupae—and what you give them to pupate in—has real consequences for welfare in farmed settings. New research finds daily handling delays eclosion and cuts survival significantly. Substrate choice matters too.
Learn more: www.meghan-barrett.com/latest-news/...
"Philosophy of Animal Welfare," a workshop at Duke University, is now accepting abstracts.
Topics include which animals should count as welfare subjects, how animal welfare should be measured, managing uncertainty, and more.
A new review in Animal Behaviour finds that of 89 mirror self-recognition studies, only a small handful involved invertebrates. The paper also calls for species-appropriate test designs beyond the visual mirror paradigm.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
New research in Animal Behaviour tested hermit crabs on a conditional escape task to assess levels of awareness. Results suggest P. bernhardus shows perceptual awareness—but the study showed no evidence of forward planning.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Missed our seminar last week? @viveknityananda.bsky.social tackled some of the most pressing epistemological and ethical questions around insect sentience, and you can catch it on our YouTube:
"Pain and Suffering in Farmed Animals" provides an accessible introduction welfare issues across a wide range of farmed species—including invertebrates like cephalopods, crustaceans, and insects. It also points to next steps for research and better management.
Read it here: bit.ly/40ZJ2qh
Join us next week (March 11) as @viveknityananda.bsky.social examines frameworks for investigating insect welfare, including key debates around insect emotions and pain.
The session will be followed by a Q&A—a great opportunity to bring your questions on insect sentience!
bit.ly/4bFAITn
Fruit flies can estimate, remember, and reproduce time intervals of several seconds — using a "population clock" in their mushroom bodies.
Learn more in this new study published in @currentbiology.bsky.social:
The @asab.org animal behavior ethics guidelines now reference our work on humane husbandry and ethical study design for insects and decapods! See the full guidelines:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
⏰ Only 2 weeks left to apply! This is a rare funding opportunity specifically for amateur entomologists and biological recorders — up to $2,000 to support your work refining recording methods with 3Rs approaches. Deadline: February 28! 🦋
bit.ly/4pluUC8
This open access paper in Biological Reviews offers an up-to-date synthesis of the scientific evidence on cephalopod sentience 🐙🦑
It considers 120+ studies using an 8-criterion framework:
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...
@zoophilosophy.bsky.social @birchlse.bsky.social
The NYU Center for Mind, Ethics, and Policy and the NYU Center for Environmental and Animal Protection are both hiring full-time researchers!
If you have strong research skills and an interest in animal and AI welfare (for CMEP) or food and wildlife science and policy (for CEAP), please apply!
Apply to be a researcher and project manager at the NYU Center for Mind, Ethics, and Policy: apply.interfolio.com/181285
In this episode of the "Get the Bug" podcast, @beebytes.bsky.social discusses a wide range of insect welfare topics, from insects in poultry feed to emerging data on public perceptions of insect welfare.
What does the evidence actually tell us about insect sentience?
Join us on March 11 as @viveknityananda.bsky.social examines frameworks for investigating insect welfare, including key debates around insect emotions and pain.
bit.ly/4bFAITn
So excited to see this recommendation coming from the Animal Sentience Committee, really hoping it leads to some real change in decapod protection
www.gov.uk/government/p...
This new review in J Agric & Environ Ethics argues that black soldier fly farming's ethical framework hasn't kept pace with its commercial scale. Read to learn about practical welfare concerns, from handling to environmental stressors, and gaps for future research:
Great opportunity for anyone interested in a PhD at the intersection of philosophy, animal welfare, public policy, and sentience research 🐛
The IWRS is hiring! Help us build the infrastructure for invertebrate welfare research—from husbandry databases to educational resources. 🐛📖
Remote Research Scientist position, $55-60K. We will begin reviewing applications on March 15.
Learn more and apply here:
This important review proposes 2-step euthanasia methods in invertebrates, examining procedures across taxa. Drawing on lessons from vertebrate welfare history, the authors also argue that current research gaps about pain should prompt precautionary standards, not justify lower ones: bit.ly/4sPoJIO
Don't miss our seminar tomorrow! Prof. Edward Waddell will discuss a key issue for farmed insect welfare: dietary preferences in adult black soldier flies.
A new paper by @marcinurbaniak.bsky.social provides a useful synthesis of neurological and behavioral evidence for pain perception in crabs, crayfish, and prawns.
Full paper available here:
Need funding for your arthropod welfare research? Check out this opportunity—only one week left to apply! 🦐🐜🐛
Join us Jan 20 as Prof. Edward Waddell explores dietary preferences in black soldier flies. His research shows adults live an average of 4-6 days longer and mate more frequently when given their preferred diet—revealing practical pathways to improve welfare for trillions farmed annually.
Register:
Happy New Year! Our first newsletter of 2026 celebrates jumping spider cognition, UK legislation banning the live boiling of lobsters, and a new paper on research directions in insect welfare.
Want to know the latest in the field? Make sure to join our listserv!
www.insectwelfare.com/join
In a new paper, @jeffsebo.bsky.social and Toni Sims argue that insect research needs ethical oversight. Their article covers moral reasoning behind their argument and initial steps forward—including developing policies and methods for assessing welfare risks.
Full paper here:
This fascinating video from @scishow.bsky.social explores how jumping spiders in the genus Portia can plan ahead, learn through trial and error, and even lie!
Explore the latest on spider cognition here: youtu.be/lwPryksCmIo
