Spiders wriggling their butt - What more could you ask for???

Great collaboration with @samjakeengland.bsky.social ♥️

Even more! When we look at the brains of the spiders, we find that they also haven't invested very much in the parts that process visual information 🧠👀 (Yes, spider central nervous systems look a bit like rubber ducks lol 🦆)... (5/8)

Typically, spiders that hunt with vision, like jumping spiders, have large eyes, that also vary a lot in size between different eyes of the same animal - probably adapted to different tasks. BUT! When we measure with microCT, the crab spiders don't! Their eyes are small and similar in size! (4/8)

Nice! This expands the list of spiders for which we know that vision is used in hunting, like the charismatic jumping spiders e.g. below 👀 Though crab spiders likely don't use it for complicated visual predatory tasks, it's still very useful behavioural info! But here's where it gets weird...(3/8)

So, we conducted a simple behavioural experiment; placing crab spiders in arenas with flies and seeing how successful the spiders were at catching their prey - we used spiders with normal vision, and others we had painted over the eyes - they got worse at hunting when they couldn't see 🕷️🪰 (2/8)

Out today in @royalsocietypublishing.org - we show that crab spiders (the ones you usually see ambushing pollinators on flowers 🕷️🌸) get worse at hunting if their eyes are covered!🫣 Sounds obvious? It's actually quite surprising, here's why... 👀 (1/8) royalsocietypublishing.org/rsos/article...

It was so lovely working on this with wonderful co-authors @lucillejmrose.bsky.social (her first paper! 🥳), @vanspidergirl.bsky.social 🧠, @mherberstein.bsky.social 🕷️, and @laurensr.bsky.social 👁️ @multipleye-lab.bsky.social @mfnberlin.bsky.social (7/8)

Excellent innovation this year. Made our own bingo cards for the party. Everybody had their own randomized version made from a larger pool of options. 16th year since @mherberstein.bsky.social introduced me to @eurovision.tv (as well as scones with clotted cream).

An insect that produces a nasty secretion to defend the local group against predators. Our commentary on some brilliant fieldwork by @caritalindstedt.bsky.social & Raphael www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... @asgriffin.bsky.social

Earth’s earliest history is written in tiny glass beads. Impact spherules from South Africa carry geochemical fingerprints of meteorite impacts over 3 billion years ago, offering clues to processes shaping the young Earth and Solar System. #LIBresearch © NASA Earth Observatory (public domain) 1/3

From online games to evolutionary theory: testing warning signals with human “predators” Understanding how signals are perceived is key to explaining biodiversity patterns and how species communicate risk.

Using an online game with human 'predators' we test if toxic butterflies are more conspicuous: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Understanding how climate affects immunity is key to predicting disease dynamics under ongoing environmental change. → doi.org/10.1007/s004... @mherberstein.bsky.social

Measuring predation in the wild is hard. @mherberstein.bsky.social We compared wing damage, artificial replicas, and bird surveys in Australian butterfly communities. Methods were complementary — together they better estimate predation risk. royalsocietypublishing.org/rsos/article...

New #PhD on #bees (BeeHd?)! Despite the ad saying "UK Students only", a limited number of scholarships are available for international candidates. So please apply!

Come to Hamburg and do a PhD on insect/spider traits with me!

I am looking for a PhD working on tracking trait changes in insects/spiders at the Leibniz Institute for the Analysis of Biodiversity change @leibnizlib.bsky.social and the University of Hamburg. Apply here: www.uni-hamburg.de/en/stellenan...

Far-reaching consequences of trait preferences for animal social network structure and function #Sociality #BiologicalModelling doi.org/10.1093/behe...

Great PhD opportunity at the #LIB

Congratulations Scott!!! So well deserved!!! An excellent choice for your specialisation - very very proud!!!!

A fantastic choice for #ECBB2026 plenary speaker: @mherberstein.bsky.social If you have ideas or topics you’d love to hear in a plenary, now is the time to share them — Mariella is taking suggestions!

New paper out today in @ecol-evol.bsky.social led by Hansani Daluwatta Galappaththige, with @mherberstein.bsky.social. We quantified wing attack marks in Australian butterflies and found lower attack rates in temperate biomes and in males compared to females: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Missed our #ECBB2026 Plenary Speaker reveals? Not to worry! Here is a quick recap of all the excellent speakers we'll be welcoming at September's meeting!

Meet our plenary speaker Renata Sousa-Lima! Professor at Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte (Brazil), Renata ‘s research focuses on bioacoustics of aquatic mammals and has pioneered the field of ecoacoustics and soundscape ecology in Brazil.

Meet our plenary speaker Eva Ringler! Professor at the University of Bern, Eva Ringler and her research group are interested in understanding variation in animal behaviour from an ecological and evolutionary perspective focusing on Neotropical poison frogs and glassfrogs.

Meet our plenary speaker Kulbhushansingh Suryawanshi Director of the India Program for the Snow Leopard Trust working on snow leopards and human-wildlife coexistence in the high Himalaya. His work focuses on the interactions between large carnivores, their wild prey, and farming communities.

Meet our plenary speaker Felicity Muth! Assistant professor at the University of California Davis, her lab group are broadly interested in cognition, especially aspects of learning and memory that have a clear function in the natural world, focusing on captive and wild bumblebees.

Meet our Plenary Speaker Daniela Rößler Fueled by curiosity and a deep love of natural history Daniela discovered a REM-like sleep state in spiders and uses integrative field, lab and comparative approaches to investigate the function, ecology, and evolution of sleep across the spider tree of life.

We are happy to announce that registration for ISBE2026 is now open! We encourage you to register as soon as possible to take advantage of reduced fees and to plan your trip and accommodation in advance. Please read the information on www.isbe2026.com before proceeding with your registration.

Abstract (and travel award) submission deadline has been extended to the 7th of January 2026. Don’t miss the chance to submit your contribution and be part of the scientific program of ISBE2026!

Thank you so much for the invitation!!! I am taking requests! What would you like to hear in a plenary????

Ready to meet our third plenary speaker? We are delighted to announce it's.... 🥁 🥁 🥁 The extraordinary @mherberstein.bsky.social

✨ It’s published! ✨ 🕷️ Social spiders have bigger brains… but only in the right places! Our new study shows that in social huntsman spiders, regions for memory & vision processing are proportionally larger, supporting group living. Read more: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Complex signals, complex defences: there’s more to defences than meets the eye. New from @amatageorgeii.bsky.social & @liisahamalainen.bsky.social @kateumbers.bsky.social @mherberstein.bsky.social @jmappes.bsky.social @mpic.de royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/... #aposematism #chemecol

Check out what these toxic moths are up to! Shout out to ‪@amatageorgeii.bsky.social‬

Ever wondered whether prey always outcompete predators (aka life-dinner principle?). Turns out when prey are numerous, predators edge ahead in the evolutionary arms race - download paper here: royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10....

Sperm transfer in spiders is complex and sometimes dangerous. Our latest paper is trying to figure out what behavioural and morphological traits affect sperm transfer doi.org/10.1111/1749...

Playing with propagation-based phase contrast in #microCT scans to visualize soft tissue without contrast staining in jumping #spiders 🕷️🕷️🕷️ Sure no great image quality achieved, but good enough to measure internal structures of the eyes with @jadethurlow.bsky.social & @mherberstein.bsky.social

#NewPaper 🐍 Our scientists have described two new species of African house snakes that occur in East and Northeast #Africa. It all started with an 20 year old specimen and resulted in a recent study in #Zootaxa. Read more: www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-... Original study: doi.org/10.11646/zoo...

🚨Watch out postdocs and early career researchers: the #BORA_network invites you to the Postdoc Day 03 April 2025: Orientation, #Networking, #Career Opportunities 🌍🎓 . Explore the international science scape of #Bonn. 👉 www.uni-bonn.de/de/forschung... #PostdocDay2025 @leibnizlib.bsky.social

Crabs smell with their legs too!

New species of Sydney Funnelweb discovered! bmcecolevol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....

We are hiring a new entomological curator in Hamburg at the Leibniz institute for the analysis of biodiversity change… Please share and apply!!! 8101202752.karriereportal.cloud/job/2024-20-...

Friends, plz repost and share! We are hiring a lab technician with exp in mol biology and general lab management. BS or MS degree and good org skills are required. Deadline Feb 1, 2025. We are a welcoming and equitable lab community. Details at link below. 🐸🐢🐍🦎 zamudiolab.org/2024/12/18/k...

It took me way too long to do this one, but it's finally finished. If you're the kind of person who wants to watch a 40-minute video about Argiope aurantia, then I got you. youtu.be/RJBIcgYZMdM

Lovely blog post about our recent paper in Ornithology (@amornith.bsky.social)! We applied agent-based models and machine learning to 36 yrs of mourning warbler song, and found evidence that males have a learning bias for more complex syllables: americanornithology.org/cultural-evo...

Call for workshops is open: behaviourindia2025.in/Call-for-Wor... If you would like to propose a workshop at #Behaviour2025, check this! @asabeducation.bsky.social @animalopps.bsky.social @animalbehaviour.live @ethology.bsky.social @nationalgeographic.bsky.social @natureportfolio.bsky.social

Celebrating the move to Bluesky? Well, not really. Grant writing day with @mattdhall.bsky.social in the city. Treating ourselves to a nice lunch as reward.