A vibrant cluster of bright purple mountain saxifrage (Saxifraga oppositifolia) flowers blooms on a rocky alpine slope. The dense cushion of small, four-petaled purple flowers forms a striking contrast against the gray limestone rocks and patches of moss. In the background, dramatic snow-capped mountain peaks rise under a bright blue sky with white clouds. The harsh, rocky terrain shows typical alpine conditions where this hardy Arctic and alpine plant thrives.

📝 What 17,000 Pressed Flowers Revealed About Arctic Climate Change 🧵
doi.org/pwnc

The brief Arctic summer is getting briefer. Research using herbaria shows that flowering times are shifting. Not all plants are responding the same way & that’s a problem

#Botany #PlantScience 🧪 #InBrief (1/10)

‘The place is bleached, a dead zone’: how the UK’s most beloved landscapes became biodiversity deserts National parks, famous for their rich natural heritage, should be at the heart of efforts to protect habitats and wildlife. Instead, experts say they are declining – fast

I did my PhD on protected areas - the 15% of the Earth's land set aside as parks and reserves for the conservation of nature

The UK's National Parks are NOT protected areas - they don't meet the definition

Only 3% of our land does, it's a disgrace

And they are poisonous

'I'm British but I can't live in my own country with my partner' MPs in Bristol and Stroud want the government to scrap a family visa policy that separates couples

bbc.com/news/article...
"I don't think people have any idea of how much harm the visa rules cause"

From despair to purpose: Six climate reporters on how to protect their mental health Journalists from Brazil, Burkina Faso, Denmark, Nigeria, Trinidad and Tobago and the UK reflect on how they cope with the anxieties of global warming.

Interesting work from @reutersinstitute.bsky.social on the mental health impacts of climate journalism. A solid psychiatric study and some nuanced, touching personal accounts. reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/news/despair...

Happy father's day to everyone celebrating. Apparently the paternity leave in the UK is one of the worst in the developed world 🤦https://bbc.com/news/articles/cy8d3l7858zo

70% of people said science benefit people like them
73% said medical research and innovation benefit people like them
71% said new technologies benefit people like them

To Erica, this is encouraging that the public opinion of science is NOT that different than before the election

Us cancer survival statistics

A reminder. The budget that just passed the House slashes US scientific research by half. Please call or email your senators and tell them you do not want the NIH and NSF cut. You can find your senators contact info here: www.senate.gov/senators/sen...

A rainbow made up of different Manitoba wildflowers. The red on the left end is a three-flowered avens (lantern-shaped flowers), orange - wood lily, yellow - goldenrod, green - green bog orchid, blue - lungwort (little blue bells), purple - iris.

Happy #Pride everyone. Nature is infinitely diverse.

From @thehill.com, “Trump orders agencies to ‘sunset’ environmental protections.”

thehill.com/policy/energ...

Yeah that is messy... My record is 75 synonyms for a bamboo grass. Which tools did you use to compile all the names?

When NW Scotland wants to trade places with the Mediterranean.

📷 1. Above Gairloch, and the view to the Quiraing, Skye.
📷 2. Above Opinan, and the view to the Old Man of Storr, Skye.

One of Ireland's wildlife success stories is the return of this bird Cranes were culturally significant in Ireland, kept as pets by nobility and may have been associated in folklore with death

This to me is astonishing. The site of Ireland's 1st breeding Cranes in centuries, could be 'developed' as a solar farm, instead of being protected for crane recovery.

"the bog with the nesting cranes is at the pre-planning stage for a solar farm"

🦉 🐦 🌎

www.irishtimes.com/science/2025...

Exclusive: documents reveal how NIH will axe climate studies US agency guidelines nix funding for studies on climate anxiety and more but allow it for those on extreme weather and health.

"It exists, it’s happening, and you can’t erase it by not studying it.

Physician Preeti Jaggi responds to news that research into climate anxiety, rapidly growing among young people, is among the climate chg projects to be axed by NIH."
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
H/T @floragraham.bsky.social

A mother opossum with five babies on her back, with each of their tails curled around hers.

Wishing all the mothers in the world a Happy Mother's Day! 💐

🎨 from "Die Säugthiere in Abbildungen nach der Natur, mit Beschreibungen" [1774]-1855. Digitized for #BHLib by the Ernst Mayr Library, Museum of Comparative Zoology @harvard.edu biodiversitylibrary.org/page/31064824 #MothersDay

Sir David Attenborough sitting at a table in an old library looking at a historic volume of a journal open to an illustration of a platypus. There is also a stuffed platypus and a platypus skeleton on the table.

Sir David Attenborough sitting at a table in an old library looking at a stuffed platypus.

An historic volume of a journal open to an illustration of platypus bills and feet.

🎈 Happy 99th Birthday to Sir David Attenborough! 🎈
Our favourite #DavidAttenborough moment is when he featured George Shaw's 1799 description of the Platypus in his "How the Platypus made us rethink evolution" video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBRV...
📖 doi.org/10.5962/p.30... 🧪 #ILoveBHL #BHLib

About the Biodiversity Heritage Library The Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) is the world’s largest open access digital library for biodiversity literature and archives. BHL is revolutionizing global research by providing free, worldwide access to knowledge about life on Earth. To document Earth’s species and understand the complexities of swiftly-changing ecosystems in the midst of a major extinction crisis and widespread climate change, researchers need something that no single library can provide — access to the world’s collective knowledge about biodiversity. While natural history books and archives contain information that is critical to studying biodiversity, much of this material is available in only a handful of libraries globally. Scientists have long considered this lack of access to biodiversity literature as a major impediment to the efficiency of scientific research.

The most vital of tools, the Biodiversity Heritage Library @biodivlibrary.bsky.social , is apparently homed at the Smithsonian. For obv reasons, the Smithsonian cannot retain it

For free, you can access biodiversity-related texts going back to the 1400s!
#ILOVEBHL

www.biodiversitylibrary.org

🤬

Clematis montana Freda scrambling over an ornate blue metal garden chair

Chairs aren't just for sitting! Apologies for the poor cropping - this was just a quick snap. Clematis montana Freda I believe but happy to be corrected 🙏☺️

How is Arctic flora changing on a warming planet?

Climate change is altering plant diversity in the Arctic, with some species thriving in certain areas and declining in others

👉 news bit.ly/4cVpPLR
👉 nature paper bit.ly/44mXlsd

@serradiaz.bsky.social @csicdivulga.bsky.social @museuciencies.cat

A New Future for the Biodiversity Heritage Library The Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) is the world’s largest open access digital library for biodiversity literature and archives. A global consortium of over 660 contributors, BHL has made more …

If you use the Biodivisity Heritage Library (I use it almost daily), you'll be saddened (and maybe angered😡) to learn that DOGE+Musk+Trump have eliminated its funding. BHL is looking for a new home. #ILoveBHL

So much f***ing winning.🤬

blog.biodiversitylibrary.org/2025/04/new-...

A quote in white text "The cultivation of natural science cannot be efficiently carried out without reference to an extensive library." on a blue background, next to an historic image of sea creatures.

In an 1847 report to the British Museum, Darwin and his peers declared that "The cultivation of natural science cannot be efficiently carried out without reference to an extensive library." Still so true today... #ILoveBHL 63 million #OpenAccess pages & counting! www.biodiversitylibrary.org

A striking Oystercatcher strolls along wet, rocky mudflats, its vivid orange bill tipped with a tiny morsel of food. The bird’s black and white plumage glows in the low sunlight, and a small silver leg ring is visible, marking it as part of a long-term study.

Big news from the mudflats!

The UK’s oldest known Oystercatchers - aged 41 and 43 - have been discovered on The Wash.

That’s three times their species’ average lifespan!

Legends wade amongst us... 😎

A reminder of why the East Coast Wetlands are so special: buff.ly/rgnjIeg

Published yesterday
The UK is not heading in the right direction either.
#humanrights

Okay, I'm probably preaching to the choir here, but BHL is an absolutely VITAL resource for ecologists and evolutionary biologists. There's no other database I'm aware of that provides digital access to species descriptions dating all the way back to the 1800s and beyond.

Me too, BHL is an invaluable resource for anyone doing any kind of natural history research!

About the Biodiversity Heritage Library The Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) is the world’s largest open access digital library for biodiversity literature and archives. BHL is revolutionizing global research by providing free, worldwide access to knowledge about life on Earth. To document Earth’s species and understand the complexities of swiftly-changing ecosystems in the midst of a major extinction crisis and widespread climate change, researchers need something that no single library can provide — access to the world’s collective knowledge about biodiversity. While natural history books and archives contain information that is critical to studying biodiversity, much of this material is available in only a handful of libraries globally. Scientists have long considered this lack of access to biodiversity literature as a major impediment to the efficiency of scientific research.

In addition to EVERY-FUCKING-THING ELSE

The most vital of tools, the Biodiversity Heritage Library, is apparently homed at the Smithsonian. For obv reasons, the Smithsonian cannot retain it

For free, you can access biodiversity-related texts going back to the 1400s!

www.biodiversitylibrary.org

"The top ~2% largest trees account for 75% of the live tree carbon storage in the western US. This result suggests the importance of maintaining large-diameter trees in order to mitigate climate change." But Trump's recent EO plans to send them to sawmills. 🌏 www.pnas.org/doi/epub/10....

Banned DDT discovered in Canadian trout 70 years after use, research finds Potential danger to humans and wildlife from harmful pesticide discovered in fish at 10 times safety limit

Banned DDT discovered in Canadian trout 70 years after use, research finds

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

UCU stands with trans people, today and every day.

The Supreme Court ruling is not just wrong, it’s dangerous.

We will never stop fighting for trans rights and equality.

#TransRightsAreHumanRights #Solidarity