Thanks friend!

#Taxonomy friends, I'm searching for generic revisions that include treatments without a nomenclatural act - e.g. a species listed for completeness with only a diagnosis + remarks. Anyone have good examples? #bugsky

ugh, this is sick, terrible stuff

some of us only have ONE ring of keys?? You want us to CHOOSE between Anomalocaris and Opabinia???

as an evolutionary biologist: yes. exactly

AI needs solid botanical data more than ever An artificial-intelligence revolution in biotechnology won’t get far without human taxonomic expertise — and that’s under threat.

The disappearance of formal #taxonomy training for undergrads could hobble the development of medical and agricultural AI systems that rely on biological data.

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

To my non tech normies, PSA: when you share a link, everything after the ? is tracking. Those “query parameters” tell companies exactly how you arrived, what app you clicked, which ad or email sent you, sometimes a unique identifier tied to you. You can delete everything after the question mark.

Moths...? But something's a little off...?

#stickerwip #stickers #etsyartist #lunamoth #moths

New paper: Australian biosecurity invertebrate interceptions An exciting new paper by Charlotte Lassaline, Erinn Fagan-Jeffries, and collaborators has just been published, presenting the first nine-year overview of terrestrial invertebrate biosecurity interc…

#NewPaper alert! What factors affect incursions of non-native invertebrates across Australia's borders? 9 years of interception data show arrivals follow trade, travel, and seasonality... but species diversity still isn’t plateauing. #bugsky
invertebratelab.com/2026/04/13/n...

👀

All good questions. Likely navigated through scent/vibration as other eyeless cave insects do, but apart from that we have no idea! 😱

New from my colleagues in the @invertebratelab.bsky.social! Paper out today. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

All the heart eyes for these tiny wonders 😍⁠
⁠
Many animals that live in the dim waters of the ocean’s twilight zone have evolved powerful eyes to detect prey, mates, and predators in the dark. Hyperiid amphipods have developed remarkably diverse eyes, each with different functional capabilities.

A spindly cricket poses on the forest floor, somewhat caught in the headlights by the photographer's flash. Its long legs resemble a spider and its antennae are longer than its dark brown and ochreous body.

A walking trail in Sherbrooke Forest sodden with recent rain. Vibrant, lush ferns and towering mountain ash trees bracket the path on either side and the air is thick with mist.

Not all "cave" crickets live in caves - this new species is just as happy in tree hollows and wombat burrows. Living in Outer Melbourne's green wedges, it's threatened by urban sprawl. Paper coming soon. #bugsky

📸: Reiner Richter, David Illiff

a black and white typography edit that reads "the world will always need more transsexuals. there is room enough for everyone. that includes you!" the image is textured to look photocopied.

happy Trans Day of Visibility 🏳️‍⚧️

Some of my favorite Orthoptera portaits I've taken in recent years. Katydids along with mantids have to be some of the most photogenic of all the insects. #katydid #grasshopper #cricket #insect #macro #nature #wildlife #bugsky #photography

This rather fantastic Black-footed Gondwanan Katydid (Metholce nigritarsis) was a recent visitor to our Perth Hills moth light.

These amazing Katydids have been recorded in all states around Australia except the NT.

#ausinverts #wildoz #Orthoptera #Katydid #inaturalist #nature #bugsky

An historic illustration of two butterflies and a hairy caterpillar. There are green leaves and white flowers in the background.

The Biodiversity Heritage Library is turning 20! 🎉

We’re starting celebrations with a special anniversary blog series #BHLat20: Treasures from BHL, featuring remarkable works chosen by the people who know them best: blog.biodiversitylibrary.org/2026/03/cele... #ILoveBHL

is your bigcartel down? the homepage is showing the event banner but nothing else

Welcome new lab members A big, warm welcome to Dr Maura Haas-Renninger, Andrew Stempel, and Callum Bush – our group’s 3 newest members. We look forward to working and collaborating with you all. Keep reading t…

Our lab is growing! We have new lab members joining us to work on micro-wasps, eyeless spiders, and cave crickets. Read on below to hear about their research. #bugsky 🐝🕷️🦗 invertebratelab.com/2026/03/24/welcome-new-lab-members

A photo of the front of an orange ichneumonid wasp from the front. The wasp has long antennae which emerge from between its large black eyes which have a touch of blueish iridescence to them. Its legs are long and slender and its abdomen rises just out of focus behind it and has a thick club-like end.

An ichneumonid #wasp in genus Enicospilus.

#fujifilm X-S10, #Laowa 65mm #Macro

#MacroPhotography
#photography
#Nature
#NatureIsAmazing
#Invertebrates
#insects

Ranking the Pain of Stinging Insects, From ‘Spicy’ to ‘Shockingly Electric' Remembering one passionate entomologist who poetically described and classified more than 70 species' painful stings.

**TIL about Justin O. Schmitt, an entomologist, who developed a pain scale for the stings of Hymenoptera.

Wow, Justin, you were definitely doing gawd’s work. I’m sad that I never met you.

Check out the incredible graphic by @atlasobscura.com

Diastrophus emeiensis, gall on Rubus found in Sichuan, China

Diplolepis nezha, rose gall from Sichuan, China

Orthopelma aobing, parasitoid of D. nezha from Sichuan, China

On #TaxonomistAppreciationDay I want to highlight some of the recent new species that I've described along with colleagues, many are from the global south where much of this diversity is from (and still awaits discover). First up, two species of herb gall wasps and a parasitoid from Sichuan, China.

jagged rocky formations surrounded by what looks like blood red water. the tiniest bit of mist.

computer graphics (1996) www.mobygames.com/game/598/the...

Jackie Chan’s Official Home Page in 1995

Jackie Chan’s Official Home Page in 1995

things keep changing / we will, too 💫

Exactly! I'm just hoping that the recommendations from the ABRS review are taken to heart - I know a big increase in funding was one of them. That was a few years ago now though, and I don't think the report will ever be made public. :(

‘I love midges because I know what their hearts look like’: is the passion for taxonomy in danger of dying out? Insect taxonomist Art Borkent has described and named more than 300 species of midges but fears his field of science is dying out, despite millions of insects, fungi and other organisms waiting to be ...

Yes. Taxonomy is very much in danger of dying out. Simply because other scientists don't understand its importance and there is very little money for doing this work. 1/n

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

The lack of taxonomic funding/positions makes my heart so heavy. This is my dream job and I'd love to do it forever, but realistically that's unlikely to happen. 😔 I don't see a top-down solution happening any time soon either. What do we do?

Sign the Petition Save the Nullarbor

The caves of the Nullarbor Plain are fragile time capsules of biodiversity, supporting species found nowhere else on Earth. While it sounds good on paper, the proposed "green" energy hub will destroy this ancient ecosystem. Please consider signing. #SaveTheNullarbor

change.org/p/save-the-nullarbor

A bee without a gut microbiome My recent PhD study on an Australian native solitary bee, Megachile tosticauda, challenges a longheld assumption in insect biology: that all bees rely on a functional gut microbiome. Toda…

Our postdoc @dr-ewilliamson.bsky.social's recent PhD study on an Australian native solitary bee, Megachile tosticauda, challenged a longheld assumption in insect biology: that all bees rely on a functional gut #microbiome. So what happens if it's missing? #bugsky invertebratelab.com/2026/02/24/a...