🧪 💥 RESEARCH FINDINGS: 52 studies show a link between fracking and health harms, including rare cancers. Many of these problems are showing up in the Peace River area of British Columbia where >30,000 oil/gas wells have been drilled and fracked over the past 20 yrs. 1/3 www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...

If you don't live in Alberta, let me explain Alberta politics to you. 1. *long sigh* 2. *incoherent mumbling* 3. *muffled tears* 4. *long sigh* Thank you for listening.

U.S. legal scholars baffled as Prince Andrew arrested for Epstein ties, Korean president sentenced for insurrection

Living in Alberta is turning me into a racist. I'm really beginning to dislike whites.

A bit of serenity is needed for this week: a redpoll just taking it all in during a blizzard. #Alberta #Canada #birding #birds 🪶🇨🇦

Just reading through today’s news and if any Canadian university outside of Alberta is interested in hiring a middle aged guy with a decent cv, plenty of admin and teaching experience, and courses that put bums in seats, I am cheap and can start July 1 #academicsky #Canada

Every day there are new announcements from the Canadian federal government gutting science programs. I was just notified that the National Boreal Caribou Knowledge Consortium (NBCKC) is dead. Terrible shame to do this at time when boreal caribou are in real trouble.

So Basically the King is doing No Kings better than the Americans.

Winter came back strong this week! #Alberta #Canada

Strike over, but strife remains at Laurentian Faculty ratify new collective agreement, but say the deal still puts them behind other Ontario universities. universityaffairs.ca/news/strike-...

Danielle, warming up for her televised address because the upcoming austerity budget can’t possibly be her fault.

Grey Goshawk in my Merimbula backyard! #birds #WildOz #backyardbirds

2 of our highland Laughingthrushs - Chestnut-capped Laughingthrush (Pterorhinus mitratus) which is common & the uncommon Malayan Laughingthrush (Trochalopteron peninsulae). #BirdsSeenIn2026 #highlands #Pahang #Malaysia @birdsoftheworld.bsky.social @tonyrinaud.bsky.social

A female Green-barred Woodpecker #Birds #Argentina

Appreciate the sentiment of this article but some of us have been banging this drum for decades to no avail. Our work has been ridiculed at SFN and we constantly have to defend ourselves within our neuroscience dept. The field is unwilling to change. #neuroskyence

Today I heard Paul Scofield, Senior Curator of Natural History at Canterbury Museum, give a public talk on moa resurrection and the museumʻs partnership with Colossal Biosciences (the “dire wolf” people).

Did you ask for a bird fact? No, but you're getting one whether you like it or not. 🪶

Does my behind look big in this? A rather different view of a Black-necked Grebe at Clot Del Galvany. #birds #birdphotography #birdsseenin2026 #Alicante #canonphotography

The people who think LLMs can do this work mistake the output for the process. They think that to write a paper is to produce a document: if the document is produced then the research must have been done.

Such an extraordinarily beautiful youngster 🪶

A Steller's Jay in its element. #birds #birdphotography #albertabirds

The first #kakapo chick for four years hatched two days ago (on Valentine’s Day for those who like to anthropomorphise!). Here’s Tiwhiri-A1-2026 in Yasmine’s nest. 📸: Deidre Vercoe. www.doc.govt.nz/news/media-r... #kakapo2026 #conservation #parrots #birds

25 years ago I used to read books about UK public policy and think of London as a place where people thought Big Thoughts and did Big Things. Now UK public policy is a horror story I read about when I want to dispel thoughts like "Canada is Broken" because sweet jesus we're nothing like as bad.

Pygmy Cupwing (Pnoepyga pusilla). They were building a nest and flew to my feet to collect material. I just stood still & let them carry on. Then backed off to give these tiny wren-babblers some space. #BirdsSeenIn2026 #highlands #Pahang #Malaysia @birdsoftheworld.bsky.social @tonyrinaud.bsky.social

The Striated Caracara, locally called Johnny Rook in the #FalklandIslands were either viciously aggressive dive-bombing heads, or totally chilled very curious. This photo isn't cropped & you can see us in his eye 500mm f10 1/640 ISO800 #BirdOfTheDay #Portraits #Birds #Birdsseenin2026 #EastCoastKin

These are getting posted all over - Canadian curling being the raygun of these Winter Olympics. It’s pretty embarrassing guys.

Our attempts to make quizzes accommodating and more accessible have been a failure. >10% of the class (230 students total) is clearly using ChatGPT because the answers make no sense and were not discussed in lectures or slides. @effinbirds.com as always has the right response to this

Today’s #BirdOfTheDay theme is #Birds&Bugs, any bird and bug in one capture. Here's a male #YellowHeadedBlackbird with a beakful of bugs to feed the kids. #PaternalCare #Birds🪶

Do subterranean mammals have hyper-elastic skin thanks to super-sized hyaluronan (HA) polymers? We challenge this popular idea in a new preprint, presenting the first skin elasticity measurements of burrowing rodents & HA size profiles for Ansell’s mole-rat (1/8) 🧪 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

🧵In this new op-ed in the Edmonton Journal, @pinglamjoeip.bsky.social and I debunk the myth that EDI hiring and “reverse discrimination” happened at University of Alberta. In actuality, the U of A has not made any advancement in EDI hiring.

There are suddenly people around us that have Alberta flags flying. These houses never had flags up before. This is not a good sign #abpoli #yql

Once again, for the hundredth time: Alberta could solve this with a simple PST. You'd be able to balance the budget *and* save non-renewable resource royalties for the future. But, of course, the self-appointed "fiscal conservatives" won't entertain the idea. #abpoli www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...

Noisy Friarbirds are large, active, loud and pugnacious honeyeaters of eastern Australia that often chase other birds from flowering trees. Virtually their entire heads are black naked skin set off by striking white bib. Voice is extraordinary loud cackling. #birds #birdwatching #WildOz #honeyeater

Happy birthday to Charles Darwin, patron saint of tired scientists, grumpy fieldworkers, and hating your own manuscript.

If you want to send support to those most impacted by the recent events in Tumbler Ridge, here's a link to donate to the Red Cross specifically for this purpose (and recommended by the BC government): give.redcross.ca/page/26TRTA?...

Carney’s budget cuts leads to workers losing their jobs at the human rights museum in Winnipeg. www.ctvnews.ca/winnipeg/art...

Check out my new post exploring #Lethbridge's ongoing government overhaul & the emergence of a mayor’s majority that will steer City Council decision-making for the next 3+ years. dryalebelanger.substack.com/p/mama-wants...

🇧🇷Gaviãozinho 🌎Gampsonyx swainsonii Conservação: Pouco Preocupante O gaviãozinho é um accipitriforme da família Accipitridae 📷 Valdir Hobus

People in Lethbridge are literally the reason that Lethbridge can’t have nice things

The two females were just next to a path at our hotel! They are massive birds so it was quite a surprise the first time one popped out of the bushes while we were walking to dinner 😂

Winter is a time when many of us are huddled near fires and computers, but some are luckier... Recently, CAM leader Chris Guglielmo spent time in Chile with Juan Navedo (U Austral Chile) recapturing multi-sensor loggers from Whimbrels. Can't spill the science story yet, but it is *very* cool!

My Cartoon for Thursday's Toronto Star

A great write up of our recent paper funded by NSERC and the Smithsonian Institution that concluded that the extinct Apteribis of Hawaii might have been nocturnal. #birds 🪶🧠🧪 done in collaboration with @weisbeckerbblab.bsky.social

Check out the brief summary of our newest paper on Phys org phys.org/news/2026-02...! 🐦‍⬛🌴 @evoneuro.bsky.social @aub-birdy.bsky.social

Today’s #BirdOfTheDay theme is #OddCouples. I often see red-winged blackbirds on sandhill cranes, but I don't often see the red-winged blackbird socializing with the green herons. A couple shots of each. #birds

Xhuwaji – Haida Grizzly Bear Bill Reid 1990

A win for the people! Movie Mill in #Lethbridge had booked a separation opportunity with Corey (Nazi) Morgan and Tamara (scrubber) Lich in a few weeks. Threatening their business with the Bloods and Piikani helped them rethink their booking. Thanks to everyone who contacted them. #Alberta

A ruffed grouse paused mid-step and trying to decide if I am actually a threat or not. #Alberta #birding #birds #grouse 🪶🇨🇦

The IOC has barred Ukrainian Olympian Vladyslav Heraskevych from wearing a helmet featuring portraits of Ukrainian athletes killed by Russia at the 2026 Games. He plans to formally appeal the decision.