"That's what ChatGPT told me to do." If you outsource your thinking to a machine, and turns out to be wrong, then the mistake is yours. You own it.

Manuscript submitted.

Today is the last day to apply to our open PhD position working on plant-associated above-belowground fungal microbiomes across the Galapagos! Based at the amazing @niooknaw.bsky.social 🌱🍄

Reminder that we currently have an open fully-funded 4-year PhD scholarship in Forest Structural Assessment @ucc.ie. Join us!

Two jobs for graduate ecologists @hometreecharity.bsky.social, a brilliant NGO for nature restoration in the west of Ireland. 🌏🌲🌳

I wrote about this trend years years ago. When we commodify education we encourage students to view it as a transaction rather than a process that is valuable in itself.

After three long hot days of LiDAR scanning in Wicklow, I'm now nursing some very sore muscles. Lots of lovely new data to play with though. #YesWeScan

Now this is what genetic engineering is for: creating super-psychedelic plants. How much do you think this research group are getting high on their own supply? 🧪

I've just discovered Chaos: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Nonlinear Science. My research is definitely chaotic and non-linear so this should be a perfect fit.

I'm proud to work at a university that delivers on sustainability. I couldn't care less about arbitrary league table positions. This is change that actually matters @ucc.ie

Farewell to the Major Oak. There's lots to say about the reasons for its decline, some of which were the result of well-meaning interventions 🌳🌲

Well done to @ucc.ie PhD student Johan Reyes Chavez for co-authoring Kew's State of the World’s Plants and Fungi report. Not bad for a side-project!

PhD studentship on forest biodiversity & carbon at UCD with the C-BioStock project. Deadline 26 June. Details here: www.linkedin.com/feed/update/...

PhD studentship in forest structural assessment, suitable for candidates with backgrounds in ecology, forestry or remote sensing 🌳🌲🌏. Fully-funded 4-year programme. Deadline 5 July. Application details here:

Academic good news sounds weird to anyone else.

happy friday, ADHD havers

Today marks 40 years since Ferris Bueller's Day Off went on general release. Where did the years go?

A sad task, well done—Brian McGill pens a tribute to Bob Ricklefs. One measure of Ricklefs’ influence: Ecology students from the 70s on were trained on “Ricklefs”: an imposing tome weaving graphs and equations together with fine, dense prose. Thanks Bob. dynamicecology.wordpress.com/2026/06/11/r...

Bob Ricklefs RIP. One of the giants of ecology. His textbooks were the gateway to the field for many students. His papers were invariably thoughtful, well-argued and provocative, even those I disagreed with. 🌏🧪🌐

Today marks 40 years since Ferris Bueller's Day Off went on general release. Where did the years go?

'Average person eats six times more chicken than in 1961, UN report finds' 🤯 🐔 A trend that's fuelling ecological destruction from the Amazon (rainforests cut down to grow soy feed for chickens) to the River Wye (full of chicken shit): www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Coming up with some memes for a talk on interdisciplinary collaboration and I'm having way too much fun.

Only one week left to apply for the full professorship in Experimental Biodiversity Research at our institute @unituebingen.bsky.social ! Please re-post.

eavesdropping on a couple of english lit academics in st. john, i overheard confirmation of what is surely going to be the biggest literary news story of the year

Proposal: all AI bots should be compelled to use the voice of Kaa from the Jungle Book

Does this make me a double professor or a professor squared?

Emma got a card from her friend Sue. Sue is on holidays in London and Paris. Sue isn’t doing a PhD so she can have holidays. Emma is spending her holidays trying to write her discussion chapter. In a minute she will throw Sue’s card in the bin.

Solidarity with my former colleagues and friends who are facing a crippling wave of redundancies @uniofnottingham.bsky.social. Join and support @ucu.org.uk.

Fellow academics: if you have no criticisms then say something nice instead. And even if you do, say something nice as well. Spotting problems can be helpful but don't let it be your only contribution.

People say you shouldn't check e-mail on holiday but then how am I supposed to feel smug about all the work I'm not doing?

Every academic during marking season

Many years ago I proposed launching Benthos, the journal of bottom-dwelling research. It looks like our time has come.

My wife is trying out motivational art and I think she's really hit on something here.

d4, d6, d8, d10, d12, and d20

The marking is finished. It is done. But at what cost.

Ooh, I've discovered a new species of academic spam email! I shall name it Spammius honorarium. This one is very good. It claims to be from a real foundation, granting me an award. And I think they've even set up a fake website which looks like the real Foundation's site.

Professorship Plant Ecology. Bremen, Germany. #plantscijob #plantscijobs www.academics.de/jobs/profess...

Malaria kills over 600,000 people every year, most of them children. A statue to celebrate a malarial death is tasteless, however we feel about the victim. Please stop this @oliver.ie @cllrhonorekamegni.bsky.social

Just finished up focus group 1 for our new trans-inclusive fieldwork project. I'm excited for where this project could go. Our previous LGBTQ+ inclusive fieldwork resources are already available here: inclusivefieldwork.leeds.ac.uk/pride/

But... new building? What about the shiny new building? It won an award you know.

In every academic book there is a secret second book hiding in the footnotes. Sometimes it is the first draft that had migrated there to escape the revisions. Sometimes it is the author's tortured secret rebuttal of their own claims, and sometimes it is the incipient form of the their next book.

Woah. Just came across this article written by a doctoral student... in 2008 👀

The entire Cal State system has been severed from Instructure completely as of 5/7. Chancellor's Office now dealing system wide. That's 500,000 students who were about to walk into finals week starting on Monday after mandates 2 yrs ago that every class is required to use Canvas 💁🏻

I greatly enjoyed this morning's e-mail saying "Nobody panic but you all need to download and back up your course material RIGHT NOW ok bye."

Best film adaptation of The Odyssey, wrong answers only

Anyone else feel like we should arrange another meeting?

Bingo! Do I win a prize now?

One of the fascinating details in this bizarre story is that Chomsky travelled to Paris to collect a prize from an organisation he can't possibly have heard of, because it didn't exist. The senior-academic energy is very, very strong here. www.theguardian.com/world/2026/m...

Fake it until you make it. Obviously this looks like misconduct but I'm also impressed by the sheer audacity.

Help me I have a problem