Here is a hastily constructed animated gif from different NASA satellites showing the progression of the Hayli Gubbi eruption. Note the tall ash plume spreading NE (right) and a lower, light tan ash flow(?) moving NNW. #eruption #volcano

Kestrels are such handsome birds. Lots out and about today, their plumage even more striking than usual. This shot captures the colors and patterns well.

A pliosaur vertebra from the Etches Collection sporting a notochordal boss, an embryonic remnant. These are common in ankylosaur verts but not uncommon in #IsleofWight posterior dorsal and early caudal iguanodontian centra. Rarely reported elsewhere it seems. #FossilFriday

Are you local to the DC area and want to be a public engagement volunteer with us in the Hall of Human Origins? Apply now! naturalhistory.si.edu/join-us/volu...

Here is Vanderbilt's cast (minus the skull 😭), purchased around 1875 and recently rediscovered in a basement: www.vanderbilt.edu/evolution/re... Hoping we can restore and display someday -- museum conservationists, on anyone with a spare skull, DM me! #FossilFriday @evolutionvu.bsky.social

Hey everyone! I’m excited to share that one of my thesis projects was just published in @currentbiology.bsky.social and featured on phys.org! In this paper, we use an old statistical approach developed by the US Navy in WW2 to predict the aquatic habits of various dinosaurs and marine reptiles 🦖🐊

#fossilfriday Sarah stands in for scale against the surprisingly large skeleton of the Jurassic pliosaur Rhomaleosaurus cramptoni, on display in the "Mary Anning hall" at @nhm-london.bsky.social. This is a cast of the type, from the Whitby Mudstone of Yorkshire. @tetrameryx.bsky.social #2025SVP

Alas, this article on our reptile decomposition research does not come in a scratch-and-sniff format. However, if you'd like to see what my students, colleagues, and I have been up to with our decomposing lizards and crocodylians, here's your chance. 🧪

🕸️ Histoire naturelle des fourmis, . Paris, De l'impr. de Crapelet, 1802.. [Source]

Cloud Cuckoo Land

Rafflesia hasseltii: a plant seen more by tigers than people. Watching this flower open by night was the closest thing to magic:

🌱 Hortus gramineus Woburnensis: London: Printed by B. McMillan, 1816. [Source]

montana de oro state park, los osos, california, 1985

🦉 Die Raubvögel Deutschlands und des angrenzenden Mitteleuropas;. Cassel [Germany]Verlag von Theodor Fischer, 1876.. [Source]

Billion year old shallow water stromatolitic carbonates contact metamorphosed. Green layers with diopside and occasional grossular garnet. Sedimentary layers are preserved, including ripples! Franklin Mountains, El Paso, Texas.

𝐓𝐫𝐲𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐛𝐞 𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐨𝐧𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐞 I'm trying to be less terminally online Maybe it's easy in the sense that The constellation of bullshit Seems evermore beyond my grasp So, I'm like the doomed astronaut Drifting away from the discourse But then there's the terminal part

Always love a paper full of scrappy fossils!

Don’t miss our colleague Tomás Fornari at #2025SVP! He is presenting about tooth replacement patterns in marine reptiles🦷

Nice view of the deepwater laminated argillaceous limestone facies of the Hermitage Formation! See: tennesseefossils.com/Formations/M...

Our new temporary exhibition Feeding Without Jaws is open TODAY! Come and immerse yourself in the fascinating world of ancient fish. We are open 10am-4pm Mon-Fri, 12pm-5pm Sat-Sun and are free to visit 🐟 #LapworthRocks #FeedingWithoutJaws #NewExhibition #SVP2025 #Palaeontology #Paleontology

🦌 Animal guide, North American wild animals Worcester, Mass.: C. K. Reed, 1915. [Source]

The blue sisters sent me to another school.

🦖 A monograph of the fossil Reptilia of the Liassic formations London, Printed for the Palæontographical society, 1861-81. [Source]

I spotted this albino/leucistic alligator gar at @tnaquarium.bsky.social yesterday! Very auspicious omen for #garweek

Gerontocracy… good?

In honour of the 85th Meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Palaeontology 2025, we have assembled a collection of landmark vertebrate palaeontology papers published by JSP First up: A new phylogeny of ichthyosaurs by B.C. Moon buff.ly/0XLPtMf #2025SVP #Paleosky @moononthebones.bsky.social #NHM

Bro,

I realize this streaming service is toxic but for those who partake here’s an hour+ of Hybrid Moments covers: open.spotify.com/playlist/40D...

Garden of Earthly Delights

🦕 Flora fossilis formationis oolithicae =. Padova: Tip. del Seminario, 1856/1868-1873/1885.. [Source]

A spooky fossil for Halloween! The Carboniferous swamps of the north of England were full of creepy crawlies... This is one of them, a spider-like creature called Mesotarbus. 📍 Westhoughton 🏛️ Manchester Museum 📷 GB3D Fossils #FossilFriday

🐌 I guess National Snail Day is a good time to share the overwhelming diversity of •pelagic gastropods• we saw in the Gulf of California, Mexico, last month. We used scuba and trawls on the R/V Sally Ride, supported by NSF grants and expertise of Brad Seibel and Amy Maas. 🦑🧪

Delighted to see this new paper out on the Cretaceous turtle Rhinochelys from the Lebanese Lagerstätten in Nammoura (approx 100 mya). This is the oldest direct evidence of sea turtle soft tissues, and shows that sea turtles lost their scales 4 independent times doi.org/10.1016/j.is...

Bazzi, M., Siversson, M., Wintner, S. et al. Early gigantic lamniform marks the onset of mega-body size in modern shark evolution. Commun Biol 8, 1499 (2025). doi.org/10.1038/s420...

Danz Video Oconto, WI

"Vanderbilt is failing in its moral responsibility to push back against rising authoritarianism and political coercion." My effort to convince Vanderbilt (and all universities) to take a stand for the rule of law, the Constitution, and our democracy. www.tennessean.com/story/opinio...

If you're in #Nashville this weekend, come see us at Fossils at the Fort this Saturday at Fort Negley from 10am - 1pm! #Evolution

🦄 Arcana, or, The museum of natural history: . London: Printed by George Smeeton for James Stratford, 1811.. [Source]

This Mesohippus memento mori seems seasonally appropriate #FossilFriday

I’ve never seen the biggest freshwater crayfish in the world, but here’s me holding the second biggest (Euastacus armatus)!

Just in time for #FossilFriday! Our paper is out today in Palaeontology @thepalass.bsky.social Ten simple rules to follow when cleaning occurrence data in palaeobiology 🧹🦕 onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... Another great @palaeoverse.bsky.social team effort to offer a community resource!

#toothtuesday Fur seals and sea lions evolved from ancestors with double-rooted teeth - but evolved single rooted teeth over the past five million years. Shown here is the 'anagenetic' evolution of the northern fur seal, Callorhinus ursinus. Read more here: coastalpaleo.blogspot.com/2025/10/the-...

There's something so bleak about the phishing scam test sent out by the university being an appreciation gift from the university. You're the sucker who fails the test if you think the university would ever be so generous.

Happy #InternationalSlothDay! To celebrate w/ a paleontology twist, here's a fossilized skull and lower jaw of the extinct Pleistocene (Ice Age) ground sloth Paramylodon harlani, discovered in 2018 during excavation for the LA subway's La Cienega Station. 🧪🦥 #WorldSlothDay #MylodontMonday

🕸️ The animal kingdom London: Printed for G.B. Whittaker, 1827-1835. [Source]

🦝 The quadrupeds of North America, . New York, V.G. Audubon, 1851-54.. [Source]

The application window for GeoSPACE 2026 is now open! Join us online or in-person in Arizona for a two-week planetary geology field camp through @ufgeology.bsky.social. Open to geo-gators as well as visitors from other schools. If you are looking for an accessible field camp, check us out! ⚒️

🚨We're hiring! The Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History is seeking a tenure-track split position as Assistant Curator of Ichthyology and Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences. Please retweet & share with colleagues! 🐟🐠🧪 Apply here: apply.interfolio.com/174674

🚨Research alert! A recent study, led by Museum Macaulay Curator Roger Benson, details a new species of Jurassic reptile that has links to the origins of lizards and snakes: amnh.link/46MCY71

Seals' whiskers are incredibly sensitive to fish wakes & other water movements & now it turns out that seals can probably tell in which direction a fish is escaping by sensing the vortices sent spinning off by the fleeing fish with their whiskers journals.biologists.com/jeb/article/...