New study with @maureenpage.bsky.social @jsfrancis.bsky.social et al finds that honeybee competition reduces the nutritional quality of wild bee pollen diets 🐝 But, including high-protein plant species in wildflower plantings can partially mitigate these negative effects 🧪🌍 doi.org/10.1111/1365...

Did you know social bees eat pollen directly at flowers while foraging? New pub in Apidologie - we investigate function of pollen eating on flowers, and potentially link it to quality assessment! Work w/ students & @annieleonard.bsky.social @jsfrancis.bsky.social link.springer.com/article/10.1...

What gives us #PlantJoy? Giving you a few more days to get those abstracts in! The Botany 2024 early-registration discount and abstract submission deadlines have BEEN EXTENDED to APRIL 5th! www.botanyconference.org

Boosting because we are still searching, abstracts are due Monday! 🪴🌾🌎🌼

We are looking for early-career chemical ecology folks who want to participate in a symposium at botany. Hoping to have a vibrant and diverse representation of grad students, post-docs, and pre-tenure faculty. Is this you, or someone you know? Have them reach out to me! #botany #plant-sciences

My next blog posts on pollination ecology techniques is up. It covers some tips for pollen collection I learned during my dissertation, as well as some discussion of quantifying pollen rewards. I'd love to hear about others' experiences. jacobsfrancis.com/pollen-colle... 🌾🪴🌎🌼 #pollination #botany

We are looking for early-career chemical ecology folks who want to participate in a symposium at botany. Hoping to have a vibrant and diverse representation of grad students, post-docs, and pre-tenure faculty. Is this you, or someone you know? Have them reach out to me! #botany #plant-sciences

I am hiring a post-bac lab coordinator - this person will be the first official member of the lab besides me and will have the opportunity to be a part of many upcoming research projects from their inception! Job Ad here: fau.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/FAU/jo...

I recently got a question about sampling nectar, and was reminded of this quick blog post I did this summer about tips and tricks for new pollination ecologists. I will be working on more of these once 2 pressing MS are off my plate! jacobsfrancis.com/tips-on-samp... 🌾🌎🪴🌼 #botany #pollination

📜 Leaf abaxial and adaxial surfaces differentially affect plant-fungal pathogen interactions 🧑‍🔬 Celine Caseys, @spicybotrytis.bsky.social, et al. 📔 @biorxiv-plants.bsky.social 🔗 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... #️⃣ (Feeds) #PlantScience #PlantImmunity #PlantMetabolites #Botrytis

Thanks to the Duke Student newspaper for an informative piece about the announcement that Duke is abandoning support for its Herbarium, one of the most important in the nation www.dukechronicle.com/article/2024...

Hey science friends! Ever wonder what the phage community of bumble bees look like? Or how to best sample host-associated phage communities? Check out our new preprint! Turns out that the bumble bees we sampled hosted extraordinarily low diversity phage communities, relative to honey bees. 🐝🦠🧪

Couldn't handle having COVID and needing a haircut so went straight to the 1/16th buzz. We will see how my 17 moth old handles it as I have had hair since she was born!

Have you ever dreamed of running a field station, working with scientists, students, and artists? Check out our search for Reserve Director at the UC Berkeley Sagehen Creek Field Station, in the beautiful Tahoe/Truckee area of the Sierra Nevada! Closing date: 3/2/24. tinyurl.com/SagehenCreek

Botany 2024 is gonna be a blast!

The Botany 2024–Resilience in a Changing World - Regional Botany Special Lecturer will be Kaya DeerInWater. Kaya is a member of the Citizen Band of Potawatomi, and is pursuing his Master's degree in Biocultural Restoration at SUNY-ESF in Syracuse, New York. botanyconference.org/speaker-bios...

Back in California finishing up some lab work. The good news is you don't immediately forget how to do wet-lab work when you start as a PI. But, I feel like I should start doing DNA extractions once a month and track the decline in my ability to move small colorless liquids as time goes by.

The story of my very rough first year as a postdoc was just published! elifesciences.org/articles/96286

Been Quiet for a couple of months because in deep on starting the new lab! The room is completely cleaned out finally, and it is time to start amassing the things we need to do some science!

The best way to see a new ecosystem in my mind. Faster than walking so you can cover some ground and get a sense of beta diversity, but slow enough to actually see things.

My friend and fellow conservation scientist Sheila has been diagnosed with a rare form of cancer, and her partner is quitting his job to take care of her. If you can spare any funds to help their family, I and they would appreciate it. @savewildbees.bsky.social

If you are out here sending 3.5 page long letters of recommendation for a small travel grant for a trainee... please don't.

Caupolicana floridana; a pretty Florida endemic bee, sighted doing serious bee things near Lake Placid last fall 🧡🌿

Our preprint on the very cool, very weird (ant-like??) microbiome of the solitary bee Anthophora bomboides is up on bioRxiv !! Its overwhelmingly dominated by Actinobacteria and one fungus (Moniliella spathulata)-- but only in the brood cell... www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

My whirlwind two week visit to the US has ended, happy to see my mentors, collaborators, and colleagues at #EntSoc23. But my fav thing about the conference is by far the memes of Corteva Man.

Climate Change Ecologist position in the biology department at Florida Atlantic University: fau.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/FAU/de... We have been in S. Florida for almost 2 months, and have loved the outdoor opportunities. The department has a bunch of new hires, and everyone is super friendly!

I definitely clicked on this paper thinking it would be about making fake flowers for bee behavioral experiments... I cant be the only one right? @draverbee.bsky.social @larschittka.bsky.social?

Every study ever: Fewer cars, reliable transit, and safe active transportation options are good things. Cities: Hmm I don't know, can we really trust every study ever done?

White folks love to say “he’s a product of his time” but refuse to acknowledge how our racist society is a product of that same time period

V. excited to be within biking distance of the Amtrak Silver Meteor line. Its going to take a little longer to get to Entomology this year, but I will 1) have a bike in DC, and 2) burn a little less carbon! Just sad it doesn't look like this anymore. Photo Credit:Leonard W. Rice.

I've been neglecting 3 projects for too long - with many collaborators waiting on me. But - I have the feeling that any progress needs to be perfect (I've had forever to work on it after all). It makes it much harder to make progress. How do folks lighten the weight of these sorts of tasks?

@ethanfreedman.bsky.social could I please be added to the what is ecology feed?

Come study pollination ecology in S. Florida! Recruiting graduate students (as well as a postdoc). 🌎🌾

The short answer is, relatively high heterozygosity and dependence on a few suspected gene loci for palatability. 🌾🧪 The long answer is… Well, here: www.nature.com/articles/nat...

If the departmental culture I anything like my interactions with Erol have been then this would be a wonderful place to be! Philly doesn't stink either.

#PlantScience folks Have you ever wished there was a review paper on a given topic that was appropriate for beginning learners? For use in teaching or when learning about a new topic? Here's your chance to publish a Primer on that topic. 👇🏼 DO IT!

Getting out into some natural areas of North Broward County with FAU undergraduates and botanist extraordinaire John Pipoly. So much botanical diversity in S. Florida - and at least 5 species of bee.

As more people come over here, I'll keep reposting this hoping that we can hold each other to higher standards this time and stop tolerating all kinds of assholery in this space & irl alike, regardless of someone's status in the prestige hierarchy. Remember: Bullies bullying is not genius at work.

Introduce yourself with some jobs you have done: Horticultural labor (greenhouse weeding) Graveyard landscaper (gravestone weeding) Environmental educator (nature center weeding) Invasive species tech (forest weeding) Freelance landscaper (rich-folks yard weeding) Bicycle Mech. Grad student Postdoc

I hear from so many that work from home is more efficient for them, and I guess the data show that. But it never has (and I don’t think ever will be) for me. I can’t seem to switch my brain from work mode to home mode without some travel, and getting stuck in either is not an option.

This sounds like a great program! One of the reasons I love the botanical society is how much training they organize (e.g. GRFP programs, this and others)

I have lots of family in West Virginia, and a special connection to the biomes of the Allegheny Front. Because of this WVU was was a place I dreamed of working. This reminds me of stories I heard from alumni about herbarium specimens being literally burned decades ago (never fact checked)

Something I gently and supportively correct every time I hear it: when we are doing around-the-circle introductions, so many times I hear “and I’m just the undergraduate student on the project.“ Hell no, scratch the just, you’re probably the one making it all happen! 🌎

@ethanfreedman.bsky.social Could you please add me to the What is Ecology feed?

I have been here a minute, but had nothing to say. But now: We have a new paper out in New Phytologist where we found evidence that dispersal overwhelms host selection in nectar microbiome assembly. I'd love to hear folks thoughts on the work! drive.google.com/file/d/1MNP3...

Post-doc opportunity for a quantitative ecologist at Colorado State University & USFS Rocky Mountain Research Station in Fort Collins, CO! Focus is on integrating big wildlife data at broad scales to understand trends & global change drivers of wildlife decline. w/ @johnmola.bsky.social & me 🧪