If you can, please donate to help with funeral costs and supporting her family. RIP Sheila Colla. www.gofundme.com/f/support-sh...

For the first time in over 100 years we have an up-to-date checklist of Canadian Diptera. Really proud to have been a part of this effort!

New book: A checklist to identify all known species of flies in Canada! doi.org/10.3897/ab.e... "This checklist is a fundamental piece of work that will guide the assessment of the conservation status of those species." @bioinfocus.bsky.social

A very warm welcome to ResNet's Interim Network Manager: Dr. Morgan Jackson (you can follow him @bioinfocus.bsky.social)! He will be responsible for overseeing ResNet’s daily operations while our permanent Network Manager Nicole Middlemiss is on leave.

Soldier on. #NaturalHistoryCollections #Macrophotography #FocusStacking #FlyDayFriday #FlyFriday #FlyDay

Last year, my fantastic co-author @bioinfocus.bsky.social and I published this note observing squirrels foraging insect galls in the Yukon: www.canadianfieldnaturalist.ca/index.php/cf... #SquirrelAppreciationDay

Do you have any favourite evolutionary biology resources that are not textbooks? E.g. podcast/youtube series or episodes, blogs, websites, news articles.. I am trying to diversify the resources I recommend to the students in the courses I teach 🤓

Coming out, transitioning, and being trans is HARD. Fortunately, there's a lot we can all do, whether cis or trans, to help our colleagues and strengthen our departments. In addition to all the actions we can take, we've also gathered a list of resources.

Collaborating with @rin-krichilsky.bsky.social and Kanako Shimizu, we put together what's basically a top-ten list of ways to help foster trans inclusivity and awareness within our scientific and academic communities and would love if you could help share the guide!

Want to know how to support trans and gender nonconforming colleagues things you can literally do right now to help? Check out the first link here for a new two-page handout to share widely! linktr.ee/trans_inclus...

What have I been working on for the last.... uh... 8 years? This 🧵 🐝🪲 entomologytoday.org/2025/01/15/l...

A tricky #SpotTheInsect!

Little globular springtail doodle in colored pencil and ink. Inspired by @the_forest_tin on IG, one of my fav macro photographers. 💚 #SciArt 🎨🕷️🐡🐞🌱

Horsefly boy in flight, very buzzy 🤎

Exciting #Arachnology news! It's been clear for some time that spiders have 'noses' on their legs but we didn't really understand how they smell airborne sex pheromones. Now we do! Gabriele Uhl & colleagues have identified the sensilla responsible: 🕷️🧪 www.uni-greifswald.de/en/universit...

Canadian Member of Parliament Richard Cannings found an unusual antlion in his backyard, posted it to iNaturalist, and just published it as being a new genus record for Canada in a regional society journal journal.entsocbc.ca/index.php/jo... Can't ask for much more in an elected representative TBH!

Do you teach field-based courses? Or hope to? Wrote a brief commentary for the new Plant Science Bulletin on why these course need to be offered/supported. TL;DR the kids need to get outside... where integrative biology lives. #SICB2025 #STEMeducation digitalcommons.bucknell.edu/fac_journ/21...

Ribbitcoin

What do we have here? This is a scar from historical resin extraction in a longleaf pine (Pinus palustris) tree. It helps to explain an important era of American history...and also the decline of one of my top two favorite tree species. A thread.

We’re now offering two permanent positions at the Bavarian State Collection for Zoology in Munich, those as curators for Diptera and Hymenoptera: snsb.de/kurator-ento... snsb.de/kurator-ento... Both announcements are in German, but German skills are not required at the time of application.

Ronald McWeevil isn’t real, he can’t hurt y-

Great story, great art, great resource at the end. Also reposting as part of Canadian Team P-AOWOO-P

For this amazing December 2024 edition of #InverteFest I contributed a "checkerboard of flies" for your invertebrate viewing pleasure 🪰🦟 Because the variety of flies always blows my mind

Happy #Invertefest! I love to draw creatures with fantastical elements and one of my favorites to draw is beetles! #SciArt #Beetles #Art

The latest BSC newsletter is now available at biologicalsurvey.ca/publications...

Fly pollinators are even more vulnerable to rising global temperatures than bees. 🌍🐝🐞 Protecting all pollinators is essential for our ecosystems and food security." www.psu.edu/news/researc...

It's my last day at Hakai. Does that mean it's time to run through my favourite news stories from the past decade?

Possibly my favorite #microCT scan I've done all year - A mosquito pupa (Culex pipiens)! 🥰

Illinois Natural History Survey is hiring a new Director (my boss!) illinois.csod.com/ux/ats/caree... Come lead an amazing organization that has a really powerful applied mission, and some excellent scientists :)

Aurora part 2.

New comic: aurora part 1. Based on a comment by @nepeteaa.bsky.social a couple months back.

I finally found a Japanese house centipede (Thereuonema tuberculata)! I've been hoping to find one in my home for years, what a rush. A gorgeous little critter. This one is from Richmond, Virginia.

Wolf + spider gives you a lycosid:

Well that’s disappointing, they haven’t enabled any of the insects except for the bee, plus the spider and the scorpion. The spider is really quite fun…

3/n qwheeler.substack.com/p/much-ado-a...

“… of systematic biology. Molecular data has great value when synthesized with evidence from morphology, fossils and ontogeny; but pursued alone, as exemplified by DNA barcodes and minimalist taxonomy, molecular systematics is much ado about very little.” - Quentin Wheeler 2/n

“Molecular-based taxonomy is almost purely utilitarian, a non-taxonomist’s idea of taxonomy. But the ability to identify species about which almost nothing is known is a hollow, unambitious goal unworthy of the intellectual traditions, scientific accomplishments, and fantastic potential… 1/n

You guys are gonna poop your pants with jealousy when you see the stickers I got this week of the Lee County Cave Isopod. A federally endangered species endemic to a few caves in southwest Virginia, this isopod makes for a real Fabergé egg of a sticker!

This striking, fuzzy fly (Eudasys ophrys Whittington [Platystomatidae]) caught my attention when sorting a box of (largely unidentified) Diptera from Nigeria—never know what you'll in a collection! #PERCBugs #FlyFriday

Meet the Valley Grasshopper (Oedaleonotus enigma) a species restricted in Canada to the southern Okanagan Valley in British Columbia. Last week it was listed as Endangered by COSEWIC due to significant habitat loss from human housing developments. Photo by James Miskelly (CC-BY-NC) via iNaturalist.

restocked some tiny bug pins just in time for the holidays! 🔗 below ⬇️ 🐛

Are you aware of our collection of #Drosophila #history articles? Feel free to suggest more!!!!!!!! droso4public.wordpress.com/history/

I just love the ways bugs try not to be found. Here's a Phytocoris lichen-mimic plant bug from Texas, if you can see it. #Miridae

Lovely hubby has just arrived home. I've explained why I've yet to get up and get dressed. Yes dear reader, it's because I've been geeking out on African blood-sucking flies. I'm having a fabulous start to Sunday. commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Categor... #BiodiversityHeritageLibrary #SDC

The creep of New World Screwworm continues through Central America, now detected in cattle in southern Mexico. Massive containment problem that has been growing for months now; don’t be surprised if the flies start knocking on the US border before long! www.reuters.com/business/hea...

Check out this sick Tachinid fly I saw today. Provisionally, it looks like the genus Belvosia. A nice, stout fly!

Chrysobothris monticola with a split male/female face. possibly a mosaic gynandromorph rather than bilateral since the rest of the body is female style

A Trachys jewel beetle, part of a commissioned series a Government of Canada publication by @bioinfocus.bsky.social et al. Painted in ArtRage, with early Instagram filters. Very proud of this series. 🐡🧪🐞 #OldWorkWednesday

Oops, I dropped my guide to making a cheap and useful Berlese funnel at home, oh noooooo www.derekhennen.com/blog/2021/10...