Received a notice that Akamai's long-in-the-tooth "Social Login" used by www.simplemappr.net will be retired Dec. 31, 2026. That means I have one year to either rewrite the integration (with considerable pain, tbh), hand it off to someone else to have a go, or shutdown SimpleMappr entirely. 🤔

The end of an era: the Tree of Life Web Project is going dark after 3 decades. Anyone interested in communicating phylogeny online should read David's account of goals, history, and future. @bembidion.bsky.social subulatepalpomere.com/2025/11/02/t...

(Re-)stumbled onto @rdmpage.bsky.social 13 YEAR OLD (!!) iPhylo post about the stability of @gbif.org occurrenceIDs, iphylo.blogspot.com/2012/07/dear.... Great improvements to stability have been made since then & there is new awareness. But, the source of the instability remains exactly the same.

BHL had a strong presence at #LivingData2025 + the #GBIF #GB32 Governing Board Meeting in Bogotá 🇨🇴. We shared our transition progress, rallied support & strengthened collaborations for linked open biodiversity data. 🧪 🌎 📚 🌱🔗 Read more: blog.biodiversitylibrary.org/2025/11/livi... #OpenScience

New paper in Ecology Letters using @gbif.org mediated data: Natural History Collections at the Crossroads: Shifting Priorities and Data‐Driven Opportunities 🇦🇺 #CiteTheDOI: ❌ https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.70188

Solo paddling adventure last weekend in Algonquin Provincial Park in -4C weather was...adventurous. I flipped butt-over-teakettle, ironically fetching water for a late night tea. Many colourful words zinged Clamshell Lake. I later read this spot is 210ft deep, being the base of an old waterfall. 😬

📣 Calling all biodiversity institutions! Meise Botanic Garden is supporting the continuation of BHL by auditing/cancelling non-Open Access journal subscriptions & diverting all saved funds to BHL. Patricia Mergen encourages other institutions to do the same 🧪 🌱🌎 #LivingData2025 #OpenAccess #ILoveBHL

We are proud and delighted to announce the signing of a renewed partnership between OBIS and @gbif.org at #LivingData2025 With this, we strengthen our shared commitment to make marine biodiversity data more interoperable, accessible, and actionable! ⤵️ Read more obis.org/2025/10/23/o...

Paddling solo in N. Algonquin Park starting tomorrow for three days. Marathon 8km of portaging (if I feel like it), a bit of rain, -4C at night, & unlikely to be any humans. Maybe moose and bears. A good fire will zap the chill. Bring it on!

@gbif.org Do you have any docs on how you process the subtypes of checklists published via an IPT? This is an excellent guide ipt.gbif.org/manual/en/ip... but am looking if subtypes are differentially treated/processed.

(1) 🥁 Announcing the 2025 Ebbe Nielsen Challenge winners! First place: 🥇 @rukayaj.bsky.social (@gbifnorway.bsky.social) for BDQEmail Sharing first place: 🥇 @daxkellie.bsky.social, Amanda Buyan, @shandiya.bsky.social and @rowdynerd.bsky.social (Atlas of Living Australia) for galaxias!

Have some pancakes with maple syrup at sunrise in Algonquin Provincial Park. I’m sorry, I ate half.

Preparing for a chilly Canadian Thanksgiving paddle with several 2km+ portages in Algonquin Provincial Park with a friend from my high school years. Might be the last one of the season. 🛶 💪 🦃 🥶

First time I've not fully unpacked from the previous paddling adventure that the next one is underway. And, the first one where ticks are a consideration. Kawartha Highlands here I come with my eldest son. www.canoedaddy.com/home/trip-re...

Very excited to have this opportunity!

Our article "Wikidata for botanists: benefits of collaborating and sharing Linked Open Data" is part of this new issue of @annbot.bsky.social See: doi.org/10.1093/aob/... Result of a great #collaboration @siobhanleachman.bsky.social @joaquimsantos1978.bsky.social Heidi Meudt! #Wikidata #LOD

RIP #JaneGoodall - one of the modern pioneers of profound interconnections between people, animals and ecosystems. Her life was lived through science, compassion and tireless advocacy for the multiple values of nature - leaving a legacy that will endure for people and planet.

Stunning and other-worldly solo canoe trip circumnavigating Philip Edward Island on the NE shore of Lake Huron in Ontario, Canada. Two nights and three days, not a cloud in the sky and what little wind there was, it was at my back.

Departing on another paddling adventure to somewhere near here, the greatest concentration of freshwater islands in the world.

Back from a 4-day solo canoe trip to N. Algonquin. Beaver dams, lift overs, lining, oh my! Been so luck with the weather on my adventures this summer.

A four-day solo paddle with multiple, lengthy portages starts tomorrow morning. It's been at least 20 years since the last time I was truly all alone, fending for myself. I am grateful for my family who understand that I have been quietly aching for this. #MyLittleRedCanoe

What to do with scraps of uneaten dehydrated food from the last canoe trip? Plan another one! Son and I couldn't complete this Algonquin trip in May; he had a rotten virus. Good on him to tap the mat. At that time we were deafened by spring peepers and an American Bittern youtu.be/bAxAEoAVmuc?...

Doing a 3.5 day solo canoe trip next weekend that’ll have a bit of rigour to get the heart pumping. Five portages over 800m! A fire ban is unfortunate but we need rain in Eastern Ontario, Canada.

🚀 Four weeks left to submit your entry to the 2025 Ebbe Nielsen Challenge! Who can enter the Challenge? 😎 individuals 💪teams 🏢 companies 🔍 governmental agencies from anywhere in the world! Submissions close 7 September 2025 🔗 gbif.link/ebbe-2025 Enter to win a share of €20,000! 💸

🕷️#Arachnews alert! 🦂 New Foelix (the definitive reference for general spider biology, a must-have for every arachnologist & arachnophile) just dropped. Now called Spider Biology, this is an completely rewritten & updated version of the Biology of Spiders (2011). link.springer.com/book/10.1007...

iDigBio is hosting a zoom webinar on Monday, August 18, 1pm - 2pm (it says ET in one place and CT in another place, I'm assuming it's ET??) to discuss how their new agentic LLM chatbot iChatBio is "transforming" biodiversity research. I'm sure it is. ufl.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

Kopka River Provincial Park portages are no joke! All hands on deck. #trailheadcanoes youtube.com/shorts/XDtXb...

Retrieving the dewy canoe while the boy sleeps. Photo by @cabbageleek.bsky.social

Drove 4,500+ km without leaving the province of Ontario, Canada these past few weeks (though a hop into Gatineau, Québec from Ottawa doesn’t really count). That’s like driving from Paris to Sicily and back.

Last week’s canoe portage in Wabakimi was brought to us by the ladder, eh?! 🤔

Wabakimi with @cabbageleek.bsky.social, James Macklin and my son, Thomas was next level. Trip report on 8 day adventure to come soon.

Excellent hike up to the gorge on the Sleeping Giant east of Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada today. Fires from Manitoba and Saskatchewan made for a challenging hike.

The Wawa goose! You can’t drive across the Province of Ontario without paying homage.

WABAKIMI PROVINCIAL PARK PHOTO DUMP. Much of the Kopka River ‘Seven Sisters’ of waterfalls. Very beautiful section, tough portaging.

One week to go before the LONG drive and then the paddle, paddle, paddle plus "OMG! We're going on THAT goat trail?!" A nervous time, but I feel like a teenager. Brief zoom today with @cabbageleek.bsky.social and paddlers to cross our eyes and dot our teas.

feedbackURL is finally a new term in the Darwin Core biodiversity data exchange standard after 8 years of deliberation github.com/tdwg/dwc/iss... rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/fe...

How many times are @boldsystems.bsky.social DNA barcoding datasets cited? Blog post on iPhylo iphylo.blogspot.com/2025/07/how-...

In the 3 week stretch now to an epic, once-in-a-lifetime, 8-day canoe trip in the Wabakimi, Ontario, Canada wilderness with @cabbageleek.bsky.social, my son and James Macklin. Fingers crossed we’re safe, strong, and healthy between now and then because we’ll all need it. 🛶

Happy Canada Day from Tom Thomson Lake this morning.

I just noticed today that www.simplemappr.net is going on 15 years, though it had its origins when my now 18 yr old son was in diapers. 😬

Youngest son graduates Gr 6 next week. He worked hard on a presentation about Tom Thomson a few months ago. To celebrate, he and I will spend four days and three nights fishing, canoeing, portaging, and sketching in Algonquin Provincial Park in two weeks’ time en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Tho...

Another excellent canoe trip in the books to Temagami’s Wolf Lake in Ontario, Canada.

That time of the year to renew the @bionomia.net domain. Better do that before heading out with my nephew on an epic 6-day canoe trip to Temagami, Ontario to see the last stand of old growth red pine IN THE WORLD! www.savewolflake.org

The legendary USGS Bee Lab is being shut down. The 2026 budget proposal defunds the Ecosystem Mission Area, which supported the lab. If their science helped your work, there’s still time to make your voice heard. Read below. (1/4) 🧪 #pollinators #Pollinators #USGS #Entomology #Hymenoptera 🪲🪳

Canoe trip #1 of the year in the books with my son. Northern Algonquin Park, Ontario, Canada a few weeks before the black flies and mosquitoes emerge. Felt really good to flex the portage & paddling muscles again.

The most meaningful work of my career has been the 17.5 years I have spent with the Biodiversity Heritage Library. Now BHL faces new challenges, and seeks funding and support. Please share this message, and reach out if you can help. #ILoveBHL

"A New Future for the Biodiversity Heritage Library" blog.biodiversitylibrary.org/2025/04/new-... Important changes for BHL @biodivlibrary.bsky.social which can no longer be hosted at #Smithsonian and needs a new home.

One step closer to paddling season. Thanks to Trailhead Paddle Shack in Ottawa for setting me up.

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This years TaxonWorks Together is solidifying. We're excited to announce a series of conversations (together.taxonworks.org#Schedule) with guests on #biodiversityinformatics topics that spark our thinking. Do reach out if you're interested in contributing, from lightning talk to demo, let's talk!