Its WORLD WASP DAY!

WTF @royentsoc.bsky.social, the new Dolichopodidae handbook is £125!!! So much for Entomology being accessible. Will any of our societies @dipteristsforum.bsky.social @britentsoc.bsky.social @amentsoc.bsky.social be stepping up and challenging the RES over this? #diptera #entomology

Conference organizers: If you want people who work outside of academia (or financially secure company), to give a talk at your conference bc you value their expertise, it's unreasonable to make them pay for registration. Artists/Nonprofit folks do not have the funding to pay you to share expertise.

That’s what they call a landslide!

‼️Zack Polanski elected leader of The Greens

This 👇

It’s here! Starfinder 2E in the wild! Cannot wait to play this… #RPG #Starfinder

The next game for the Portsmouth Pathfinder Society is up, for Sunday 27th July at Dice Portsmouth. New players always very welcome and no previous experience of a RPG or Pathfinder is needed. warhorn.net/events/pompe... #Pathfinder #PathfinderSociety #RPG

You need to take a look at this bug I saw in the park last night. Look at it! What a weirdo! I’m obsessed! It’s called a Long-Necked Ground Beetle and I can’t believe we’re neighbors.

New paper out on an important issue — monitoring insects requires preserving the specimens. We explored this issue using data from the Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab, which has systematically destroyed most of their specimens for decades. A 🧵(1/10) doi.org/10.1093/aesa...

I think this deserves to be the nature photo of the year!

Have you recorded wildlife? An MSc student at Leeds Uni is interested in understanding how biological recording and biological recorders contribute to conservation - survey link here: forms.cloud.microsoft/e/taGxQK7Adg

Due to some technical issues, the plug broke, this is a bit delayed, but our first Light Trap at Portsmouth Natural History Musuem is away! #Entomology #Lepidoptera #Moths

I've wanted to write this article for years. About my and other's struggles to even survive sometime in #academia. Thank you to the amazing editors at @plosbiology.org that gave me the forum to write this piece. #science

So I'm doing a thing, and GM'ing my first game of @paizo.com's Pathfinder Society at the excellent Dice in Portsmouth. And even better, it involves Wasps! What else could you possibly want! Come play Pathfinder with us, newbies very welcome. #Pathfinder #Wasps warhorn.net/events/pompe...

Wooop! Finally, several years after planting, the Rose has lured in the absolutely awesome looking larvae of an Arge sp. sawfly. Will be collecting to rear through and see if we can get any Ctenopelmatinae wasps out of them! #Entomology #Wasps #Hymenoptera

Still a bit of work to do but my Pseudoscorpion guide is coming along. Maps are just about done (these show pre (yellow) and post (red) 2000 records) but I will need to revisit museum specimens to re-photograph or make detailed drawings.

We are expanding our online presence and have set up a LinkedIn page: uk.linkedin.com/company/appl... Please come give us a follow there for videos and updates on our research activities related to applied entomology, especially integrated pest and pollinator management!

Very excited to say that we are seeking an Assistant Curator to join our entomology team! 😁🪲 For full details on this 2 year fixed-term post, head to our website: ➡️ careers.nms.ac.uk/job/727783 #Entomology #InsectCollection #EntoJobs #MuseumJobs

So this is a delightful little moment of disobedience……..

🌟 Exciting Discovery Alert! 🌟 Back in January we teased some big news…and here it is! 🐌 Semilimax pyrenaicus (Pyrenean Semi-slug) has been recorded in Britain for the first time, found at a colliery spoil site in Cwmaman, S. Wales. Read more: doi.org/10.61733/jco... #SemiSlug #WildlifeDiscovery

While @dipteristsforum.bsky.social field meeting is in theory to collect flies, it’s proved to be a great trip for @carrionbeetlesuk.bsky.social! Along with Phosphuga atrata and Oiceoptoma thoracicum managed to find our first, hopefully, Nicrophorus vespilloides #entomology #diptera #coleoptera

The journey to the @dipteristsforum.bsky.social Summer Field Meeting continues, a beautiful, if wet morning in Glasgow before heading to Inverness and then onwards to Tomich!

And we’re off! On the Caledonia sleeper heading off to the @dipteristsforum.bsky.social Summer Field Meeting! To the, hopefully for a least sometimes, dryish highlands!

Here you go: an absolute beast of a starter pack, with many of the UK's most prominent humanists on it. Includes scientists, historians, philosophers, public figures, the New Humanist editorial team and Humanists UK staff. A network for reason and decency. go.bsky.app/PTC4j2d

It's National Biscuit Day, which means you're obliged to eat biscuits - and nothing but biscuits - for 24 hours. Anyone caught breaking the rules will be immediately arrested by a police officer dressed as a giant Hobnob. #NationalBiscuitDay

Leucospis chalcid wasp, a parasitoid of the egg cases of another favorite of mine, resin bees. Weird chonky thing. 🖤

Todays find, several sawfly larvae, I think possibility of Ash Sawfly, Tomostethus nigritus, on Narrow Leaved Ash, Tomostethus nigritus, feeding merrily along despite the pouring rain. #Entomology #Hymenoptera #Sawflies

Another highlight from today, these beautiful little pearl like eggs, no idea what might emerge, but possible Lepidopteran or Hemipteran, can just wait and see what hatches! #Entomolgy #Lepidoptera #Hemiptera

Gruesome, fascinating and charming all at once. No idea what these might be, can the cocoon suggest anything @gavinbroad.bsky.social @jasboparai.bsky.social? Found several of these possible wasp cocoons wearing their aphid victims as hats today on roses. #Entomology #Wasps #Hymenoptera

Two Meadowsweet-associated sawflies on Hogweed on banks of the R. Derwent in E. Yorkshire last week...Phylloecus xanthostoma (Meadowsweet Stem-sawfly) and Arge ciliaris (Meadowsweet Fusehorn). A good time to get out and find these beauties! #symphyta #yorkshiresawflies @yorkswildlife.bsky.social

Labour promised to restore nature. ❌ Instead, their Planning Bill contains a licence to destroy it. We offered solutions. We’re done waiting. Part 3 of the Bill would gut the laws protecting our most precious habitats & species. Without significant change, it must be scrapped.

So @britentsoc.bsky.social wheres the members survey on the website? Cannot find it as promised in the Members Area.

OF ALL THE PHOTOS TO GET MOTION BLUR! 😭 Cleaned it up best I could - because this is a Genus Pamphilius Sawfly bitches! (Zero Oregon sightings on BugGuide & iNat - "whopping" 66 US sightings on iNat) LOOK AT THIS TRANSFORMER! Right up there with Conura Chalcids! #inverts #becurious

Closer:

This is so cool to see this in such fine detail!

Celebrating a major milestone this week. 🎉 My first issue as editor of the British Mycological Society’s Field Mycology publication is now online and available #OpenAccess for all to read. ➡️ fieldmycology.org Please read and share!

Diphyus latebricola www.researchgate.net/publication/... #Ichneumonidae #parasitoid #newtobritain

An open letter calling for pride events to ban anti trans parties that we have signed.

You can read the full letter on my website: carladenyer.co.uk/my-letter-to...

Today I've written to Bridget Phillipson to ask for clarity on how the government will ensure trans people's rights in the wake of the recent Supreme Court ruling and EHRC guidance. At a moment of extreme worry and distress for the trans community, govt must step up and give assurances.

Okay, you win this round Gelis, but this isn’t over…. A simultaneously fascinating and frustrating group, determined to remain unidentified by any means…. Thanks to the brilliant @gavinbroad.bsky.social for arranging accesses today at the @nhm-london.bsky.social #Wasps #Ichneumons #Entomology

"why not use [language model] for this" well you see I take some amount of pride in having stuff to say that can't be predicted by a statistical estimate

Wasps! Can you ever really have too many (well obviously not), but these chaps emerged today from a suspected spider egg sac. They have a braconid look to them, but will get a better look under the microscope when I have subdued a specimen or two….. #Hymenoptera #Entomology #Wasps

A rather brightly coloured Mottled Umber Erannis defoliaria, I think, caterpillar found while out and about today. Among Hawthorne flowers. Potted in the hopes it’s been parasitised by something interesting. #Lepidoptera #Entomology #Hymenoptera

So what do we recon to these, I think likely Lepidoptera eggs, found on Lime Tilia sp. last night while out caterpillar hunting. I've no idea, bur cannot wait to find out! #Entomology #Lepidoptera #Egg

Reading the, oh so very clumsy and smug decision of the Supreme Court for the third time. It’s very much a reminder of what a loss Lady Hale’s retirement was to court, we may never see her like again.

I know there are many trans and non-binary people who will be feeling deeply worried today, caught in the midst of a media storm as they try to simply live their lives. Please know that I stand with you - today, tomorrow and always. My statement in response to the Supreme Court ruling today:

On this #BugBanterPodcast, @flygirlnhm.bsky.social is our guide to the incredible world of flies! With their many shapes, colors, & weird superpowers, flies do it all, from pest control to pollination! Video w/ captions🔗 www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbjT... Audio & transcript⤵️ xerces.org/bug-banter/f...

Still early, they need more of a chance for the wasps to get at them! Will be checking in with these, I think Malacosoma neustria or Lackey, caterpillars until more mature, then take home to see what emerges! #Ichneumons #Hymenoptera #Lepidoptera