I'm an entomologist with Italian heritage. My brain IS full of spiders and I DO have garlic in my soul.

Mourning a box turtle that I found on a hike and took to a wildlife rehab center. He didn't respond to antibiotics treatment and passed away after a week in care. I am grateful to the professionals who do their best. They do not receive govt funding so please donate to a center near you.

I'm giving a lunchtime presentation at work on monarch fall migration and my six year old says "that sounds like a nice lil' treat.... For YOU"

You heard the squid emperor, everyone. Leave those leaves!

The community of Drosophila researchers is amazing, mutually supportive and collaborative. Right now a key resource for our community, @flybase.bsky.social , is threatened by the cancellation of its NIH grant and is seeking community help in raising short term funds 1/n 🧪 please share

Challenge: post your last photo taken in DC to show what a hellhole it is

Child- can you send that caterpillar picture to my mom so she can send it to Miss Alys and ask what it is? Me- ......I am Miss Alys.....

One thing to emphasize strongly is that funding to science is like oxygen to the brain. Temporarily restricting oxygen flow for ten minutes (while you figure your shit out) is going to have the same outcome as shutting oxygen off permanently. We are close to the ten minute mark.

Multiple ebony jewelwing sightings today 🎉

www.standupforscience.net/open-letter-....

It turns out I still don't really know any Japanese after a whole year

Elsevier sent me a survey asking "what parts of scientific inquiry should we offload onto AI?" This included deciding which scientific questions to pursue. I can't imagine a bleaker future than one where science is not driven by human curiosity but is simply humans executing the vision of computers

My garden is my small act of rebellion where I find a bit of hope these days

With war spreading through the world, Trump’s plan to use the US Army exclusively against American protesters is looking savvier by the day.

The new leadership of NIH is dismantling long standing biomedical science programs & putting in their place scientifically questionable ideas. A courageous group of current NIH employees pushed back, publishing “The Bethesda Declaration” 1/2 www.standupforscience.net/bethesda-dec...

Happy birthday to these little scamps who are eating all of my dill even though I have tons and tons of zizia

This lady comes for breakfast every morning and it's the best

The US scientific enterprise is about to collapse unless we do something about it.

So exciting!!! Snowberry clearwing caterpillars at my little lepidopteran b&b

Let the brain drain begin! erc.europa.eu/news-events/...

May 18 is the deadline for #PublicComment regarding weakening the #EndangeredSpeciesAct by redefining harm to #wildlife ( #animals & #plants) as NOT including destruction of habitat. Please comment at www.regulations.gov/commenton/FW... 🌿🦤 #EndangeredSpecies #extinction #NativePlants RS OK

What a treat to spend a work day behind the scenes learning plant propagation tricks at the national arboretum

Federal research cuts impact local economies, and stall progress. Publish an opinion piece in your hometown paper on June 16th to SPREAD THE WORD about how scientific research contributes to the everyday health and wealth of the general public. #McClintockLetters blogs.cornell.edu/asap/events-...

Today I was cautioned to not use the word 'asexual' to describe a hydra (cnidarian) in a public school classroom and wow this is all going to get so much worse before it gets better

The IUCN Red List has 47,187 living species that are currently threatened with extinction, but here is a genetically engineered big dumb wolf thing that serves absolutely no functional ecological purpose and isn't even close to being the thing that we pretend it is. 🧪🌏

Didn't know there was a trout-lily miner bee before today, but it was a thrill to discover it

Gonna end some garlic mustard with my new friend

every college, corporate, and nonprofit president right now

Field season is coming

Take it from people inside #NIH: If we don’t shut the government down now and instead accept this horrible Republican CR, NIH will be dead. Forget the budget, the study sections, the councils: Trump and Musk will just cancel your grants as they did to Columbia. 🧪

CDC plans to waste time and taxpayers’ money chasing windmills in the midst of one raging epidemic (and on the precipice of several others) that would not have existed except for people who claimed fraudulently there was such a link in the first place (which there isn’t) Bit longer headline but…

Worms in labs not in brains #standupforscience2025

"In an unprecedented move, the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) has begun mass terminations of research grants that fund active scientific projects because they no longer meet 'agency priorities'" www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Transgenic means that genes from 1 organism have been put into another. We make transgenic mice to understand how genes influence biological processes. We make transgenic plants to make them more nutrient rich. We make transgenic bacteria so they make medicine for us. It's wide-ranging & v. useful.

Clear cutting forests, raw sewage in the water, destroyed education department, defunded scientific research, forbidden communication between health authorities. These people hate America.

Join the nerds in fighting fascism this Friday!

For World Wildlife Day, I'll be speaking to a girl scout group about pollinator habitat and will get them planting VA native wildflowers

Many US students don’t know how to seek opportunities outside the US. With some help from our colleagues in EU and Canada, we could put together a consolidated website of PhD opportunities and scholarships outside the US, organized by field. There might still be time for this year in some places.

Oh can we please fill this horrible thing with loads of worthless garbage?

The People's Union USA, a grassroots group, is calling on Americans to join a national boycott by not shopping for 24 hours on Friday.

The first measles death in the US in a decade -- the tragic, preventable death of a child whose parents chose not to protect them with vaccination -- should spark an immediate nation-wide campaign to ensure all children are protected against preventable diseases. Anything less is unconscionable.

“Dr. Paul Offit of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia…confirmed the cancellation and warned that it could interfere with or delay production of flu vaccines.” “It’s a six-month production cycle,” Dr. Offit said. “So one can only assume that we’re not picking flu strains this year.”

Science (and science policy, and conservation) friends, I need your help! We are collecting *specific, clear* examples of harms caused by the Trump administration's attacks on science, to be included in an open letter. Can be links to news stories/social media posts. 🧪🦑🌎 #SciComm #SciPol

I super felt this Gentry Mullen piece at the Kansas City library today

Source tells me that in at least one state, universities that get INBRE (IDeA Networks of Biomedical Research Excellence) money have been told not to expect any of those funds to come in “for at least six months.” That will basically lock out poorer students from grad/med school. INBRE states:

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