this is the last photo on my parents' video birdfeeder before it was mysteriously destroyed we may never know what happened

Animalia, Plantae, Fungi, Protista, Bacteria, Archea

You: please act normal you need these people to like you Me: ok! People: hi Me: Bats' digestive systems run so fast their bacteria don't have time to ferment stuff and so scientists think they don't fart. Their food speedruns in 12-34 minutes! ... Relax, your face mites really do have anuses.

This thread. And most depressing for me: Many people read books that are spat out by scammy AI, that are ACTIVELY poorly written and straight up crap and they...don't even notice. Or mind!

Thinking about this one today. For reasons. From the Archive: I wonder what happened to that lab? drugmonkey.wordpress.com/2013/04/29/i...

Thank you @maiasz.bsky.social for this: the Trump admin likes to tout its success reducing overdoses but is cutting money to PREVENT those overdoses taking place, replacing hard-won harm reduction policy with yet more stigma. www.nytimes.com/2026/05/14/o...

No Raccoon Left Behind.

Nutritionists debate how much protein we "need." Is it 0.6? 0.8? 1.5?! No matter what, though, they all agreed: A protein-packed toaster pastry or latte is NOT the way to get it. www.scientificamerican.com/article/prot...

counterpoint: bethany is a great podcast guest and this episode will tell you everything you need to know about the latest ~protein craze~ bonus: it also features me really luxuriating in the phrase "the singular taste of a Cool Ranch Dorito"

Got to talk to @feltman.bsky.social about protein! Every time I see a transcript I feel bad about how much I just....laugh as a reflex. www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/epis...

Today in a scientific term I didn't know was a term until now. SPARGING. In chemistry it's a way to degas something. You bubble a gas through a liquid and it takes other gases out with it. heheheh sparging

Another thing I think people often don't think about: This is about RDAs: recommended daily allowances. Basically the thing that makes sure you are not hurting for a specific nutrient. RDAs are NOT about optimizing. They're not for your best life!

There is another angle I want to add here because of the number of people saying "But WHAT ABOUT ME I want to build muscle the 0.8 is for maintenance." ...we need to talk about the protein scavenging theory. Because protein is an essential nutrient, your body makes sure it gets it.

For more on this, may I HIGHLY recommend the Gastropod podcast on RDAs. gastropod.com/protein-pyra...

There is another angle I want to add here because of the number of people saying "But WHAT ABOUT ME I want to build muscle the 0.8 is for maintenance." ...we need to talk about the protein scavenging theory. Because protein is an essential nutrient, your body makes sure it gets it.

I know we are all talking about these passengers and who is going to be quarantined where and etc. But those poor crew members. Just doing their dang jobs and now they're still stuck on the boat, no one freaking out on Tiktok about their welfare.

Find your safe space. @panic.gay this seems up your, um, alley.

I would also like to acknowledge the people who made this happen: The n=12 who participated in a blinded taste test of Regular vs Protein Packed PopTarts! Thank you for your service. Results below! www.scientificamerican.com/article/prot...

Thank you to @sciam.bsky.social for letting me dig into the protein enhancement fad. 1. If you are an elite athlete, OR elderly/frail, maybe you do need extra protein. 2. That's not you. You're not an elite athlete. 3. If it is you: consider yogurt. www.scientificamerican.com/article/prot...

I drank a protein enhanced latte with protein cold foam for this article. The sacrifice was real that thing was...slimy. Weirdly slimy. 🤢

I was wailing to my partner that I'm getting so decrepit. He said he thinks I'm very crepit. It made me realize...can one BE "crepit"? Crepitus is joint popping, which sounds more like DEcrepit than crepit.

I have many, many issues with this particular coverage of RFK Jr's latest crusade against antidepressants (wild how they only got comment from people who wanted to quit them). First, RFK's LANGUAGE www.nytimes.com/2026/05/04/s...

Friends, don't do this. Stating that Harry Truman did a thing is not an endorsement of Harry Truman. It is a statement that Harry Truman did a thing. Historians are allowed to discuss discrete historical facts on the internet without attaching a disclaimer paragraph every single fucking time.

This thread is about AI and it's awesome. Context changes everything. In the case of AI: what is the toilet brush here? The plagiarism. The invention of citations that don't exist. The telling you what you want to hear, and not what is true.

Inside me there are two wolves: The fully independent adult human being and the one counting back timezones on her fingers.

Reading the latest Culture Study and hit this: "Fiction is (sorta) selling — but nonfiction? My friends' agents are all telling them to keep it for their newsletters. It'll generate more income that way. Memoir, maybe."

YUP. Also it's wild if you get to hold one. When the bears are super young they can't control their body temp and need to be kept warm in your jacket while the wildlife guys work on the mother (oh darn, my life is HARD). And so you're holding what feels like a 25 lb toddler, with GIANT CLAWS.

HAPPY BOOK BIRTHDAY @inkfish.bsky.social !!! So excited for this.

This thread emphasizes just HOW MUCH "nature" kills. And if it doesn't kill, it often has consequences! Congenital rubella causes cataracts, measles hearing loss and a wiped out immune system, smallpox left people scarred for life, polio can leave paralysis in its wake.

This is just the most infuriating and heartbreaking thing to me. People are so determined to do everything "naturally" and that "nature is best" that they forget...nature is also deadly.

Icon behavior.

The pollen is so bad that I was literally choking while running, and then I realized I was literally suffocating under the weight of plant sperm.

I can offer my own anecdote that every cat I've had dislikes my singing voice. My old cat Delilah once climbed fully up my jeans and stared into my face like "tell me where it hurts" when I was doing Candide. Telling her that other humans pay money for this did not convince her.

It was, of course, Our Majesty Beyonce who brought ANATOMY!!! Look at those glittering iliac crests.

This made me realize that strangler fig trees are the like, truck stops of the forest. They've got holes for cheap 'lil hotels, food, and TOILETS www.sciencenews.org/article/clou...

THIS PLEASE. A lot of us don't just wake up and face the world with our bare-ass face, and also if you don't tell me I will definitely be wearing a sports bra. And probably something with stains.

Honestly, it’s sort of comical that anyone would think that cerulean doesn’t have an interesting chemical history… when, in fact… blues are incredibly rare in nature.

Did you know that bowhead whales are as long as a 4.5 story building is tall. And also they are 1/3 mouth (we really don't talk about that enough) and ALSO that some populations recovered form whaling because the HID behind sea ice! www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/arti...

“That sweater is not just blue, it's not turquoise, it's not lapis, it's actually cerulean.” Thank you @wwrfd.bsky.social for letting me nerd out on the best movie monologue ever. www.nationalgeographic.com/science/arti...

I've a whale of a tale to tell you lads. A whale of a tale or two. About the bowhead whales that moved behind thick areas of sea ice whaling vessels couldn't penetrate and which scientists learned about by studying logbooks from 700 whaling voyages. www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/arti...

Stupid Canadian Wolf Bird. IYKYK

Timeline cleanse with this most glorious NOT-snek. This yes-rope.

Excited to read this one!

This thread for more on this. We're REALLY ADAPTABLE, our bodies can get incredible nutrition out of a lot of things. You don't have to fat maxx carb maxx protein maxx meat maxx. Fiber maxxing might be good for many of y'all though. 👀

As a historian I always get a bit offended by both medical establishment and health crazes: no alcohol! no salt! no sugar! no carbs! Like, mates mates, this can all be (partly) true AND ALSO we're doing SO MUCH BETTER on so many nutritional metrics than much of history.

This. Modern nutritionists get in fights about whether we'd all be even better than we are at 1.1 or 1.2 g/kg protein per day, or whether even one drink is a danger to a fetus. Meanwhile our ancestors were chugging down alcohol as their main form of water and potatoes were complete nutrition.

Growing a garden makes you realize when you eat a vegetable, you're eating TIME. You're eating 80 days in the sun, 80 days of water and soil and growth. And you just wolfed that down as a salad in 30 min. brookshire-team-trash.beehiiv.com/p/on-eating-...

Sometimes I walk around downtown and look up, and see a 5 story building and realize...that building's only like 10 feet taller than a bowhead whale is long.

When you eat a plant, have you ever thought how much TIME you're eating? How much time a carrot took to grow, and you just munch it down in 30 minutes? It's wild, how fast we eat time. brookshire-team-trash.beehiiv.com/p/on-eating-...

It's a wild thing to be raised to pursue a job that you love, that you also hope will make a huge difference in the world, to get a stack of degrees and work to make things to educate people online, and then just have randos hop in to make sure you know the Most Important Thing: You're UGLY.