"Bond’s work leaves behind an inconvenient lesson for an era of climate urgency: that speed is not a substitute for understanding, and that good intentions, applied without care, can erase ancient worlds as efficiently as neglect." A beautiful tribute to William Bond. Forever missed by many.

In late July 2025 I received word from a friend of his discovery of Field Eryngo Eryngium campestre on the edge of Winchester, Hampshire. Probably arrived via a car tyre with continental origins, but fab nonetheless. Formerly more widespread but now a true national rarity. @bsbibotany.bsky.social

Geneticist had the best response to an office pool about whether my kid would be a boy or girl: “Probably”.

When Brewdog admitted failure and sold off their rewilding project, there was at least hope that it had passed into competent hands. No such luck.

POV: You receive an email from a predatory journal inviting you to submit

Draft National Restoration Plans are required from all EU states by September 2026. There's a lot to do and not much time. www.wwf.eu?20421666/Nat...

For the love of mammoths, if you're not going to review a manuscript please decline right away. Don't just ignore the reminders and then let the system auto-decline after two weeks. Happy holidays to all who say "no" in a timely manner, and may those who suggest alternatives have a happy New Year.

If you're at #BES2025 and interested in conservation in socio-ecological systems then have a chat with Araya about his work in northern Ethiopia.

Io Saturnalia!

There's only 600 m2 of forest per person in the UK. That's less than a 25 x 25 m block. Stats from Chris Quine at #BES2025

Excited to launch the new improved Reproducible Code guide from @britishecologicalsociety.org @methodsinecoevol.bsky.social FREE online here! www.britishecologicalsociety.org//wp-content/... Amazing work by some very talented ECRs. We hope it’s useful!

Our society and economy need timber. @flyingquercus.bsky.social is here to remind ecologists of this central fact of forestry #BES2025

If you're at #BES2025 then come and say hi! I'm happy to talk about forests, LiDAR, the society's finances or where to find karaoke later.

Is this the first time @britishecologicalsociety.org have run a thematic session on forestry? I can't remember one. About time #BES2025

I warmly recommend this stunning book by @lesliebarnardbooth.bsky.social as a present to awake an interest in nature and trees in particular. Considering using it as textbook in #forestecology

Fantastic palaeoart in a traditional Chinese style, used as a figure in a Royal Society publication, describing a false sabre-tooth feline, Taotienimravus songi. I hope this buckles the trend again "stylised" art in publications and press releases. Art by Yuefeng Song 🐈

It makes me quite emotional to see Olivia's name everywhere at #BES25. She would have found it hilarious.

The legendary Sandra Diaz opens #BES25 by asking where are all the monsters, or rather, why do so many organisms converge on common syndromes?

As the atheist family whose children opt out of religious classes, I do wonder whether the village school is making a point by casting our daughter as Mary in the nativity play. Last time our son was Joseph. #Speirgorm

Dunno who needs to hear this, but before your start writing your reviewer comments, eat a cookie. Only you can prevent rude reviews.

University rankings are a lot like Santa. None of us believe in them, but we're forced to keep up the pretence because some people out there still do and it would be a shame to spoil the magic.

It's possible to get quality timber from oak in only a century. On the other hand, if you're facing a timber shortage in the next 30 years, planting oak isn't going to fix it. 🌲🌳 www.futuretrees.org/product/oak-...

Death and Taxus. As a fan of bad puns in paper titles, this one is a classic. 🌲🌳🧪🌏 link.springer.com/article/10.1...

One day in the lab, we accidentally discovered that the spines of a cactus 🌵 straighten when exposed to fog. I was intrigued and so were my collaborators. How does this work and what can be gained from it? Here are some of the answers in our new preprint: doi.org/10.1101/2025...

Nearly half of all countries have fewer than ten active plant taxonomists, and in 41% of countries they're all male. Global review by Simões et al. (2025). 🌏🧪🌐 www.cell.com/trends/plant...

🔥 A lottery-first system 🎲 makes research grants allocation cheaper, faster, and boosts funding for women, while "traditional" (patriarcal?) peer review drags everyone down. 🤔 Maybe randomness is fairer than the experts. 🔄 Time to rethink the whole game! 💣 www.nature.com/articles/s41... 🧪

More diverse forests have greater productivity, but do they use more water? A new meta-analysis by Shovon et al. in @journalofecology.bsky.social suggests not. 🌐🌏🧪 besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Tried on some shoes but when I went to stand up my knee gave way. Immediately surrounded by kind shop assistants who offered me a chair for a sit down. I'm only 47 FFS.

So love wobbegongs. Everything is good about the wobbegong. Its name. Its flattened Oscar the Grouch face. Its frondy bits. Its lazy life as a hungry rug. And it’s a shark. Outstanding animal 10/10

Want to publish in @britishecologicalsociety.org journals but worried about the cost? First check your options and don't be afraid to ask for a waiver if you need one.

Last night I mentioned that William Bond had died, and a family member asked me what he had done. My response was that the two things I learnt from him were (a) sometimes the grasses win and (b) many ecosystems are meant to burn. I hope he wouldn't object to that summary. 🌏🌐

I'm very sad to say William Bond, of the University of Cape Town & Fellow of the Royal Society (@royalsociety.org ), has passed away. It is a great loss. He was an enthusiastic ecologist and a critical thinker. I learned a lot, and I still had a lot to learn from him. RIP. 😢 🧪🌎🔥🌿🌳🪴🌐 #PlantScience

Are you a graduate ecologist in the UK and looking for a job? You are in demand: www.britishecologicalsociety.org/content/sust...

It's only 10 days to the @britishecologicalsociety.org Annual Meeting and best of all THE KARAOKE ROOM IS BACK.

Some cool digital heritage research here, using community-sourced images from phones to build 3D reconstructions of temples in Bali. It only works for equivalent viewing angles. 🧪 ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/112...

✨ Don't forget to nominate an entomologist or educator for RES Awards and Recognition 🐝 ⏰ Deadline: 31 December Some open awards include: 🦋 Insect Conservation Award 🐝 Eleanor Ormerod Award 🪲 Higher Education Teaching Award Nominate or apply now 🔽

My university @ucc.ie has just been ranked second in the world for sustainability. I don't often care about rankings but this is one we can rightly be proud of. greenmetric.ui.ac.id

One of the things I admire about @georgemonbiot.bsky.social is his willingness to make connections and find answers rather than just lamenting about the scale of the problem. This is an intriguing initiative and I hope it delivers on the promise.

I'm remotely attending a workshop in China with live AI translation. We just had a talk about the 'white goat touching rabbit' model which turns out be a form of SDM.

Please, everyone, a moment's silence for the Porsche drivers of Russia. I'm wiping a tear from my eye right now.

I've not seen this one before. Ouch.

1. The European Parliament’s attempt to ban plant-based foods from being sold as “sausages”, “burgers” etc is a direct response to livestock industry lobbying. This is a short thread on how utterly bleeding ridiculous it is. 🧵1/6

My recent thread on literature searches is dredging up a lot of buried memories. Bonus Gen X points to anyone who can remember using this device.

Remember Internet cafes? Like the dinosaurs, they ruled the world and then were wiped out.

Recently I've read a number of books and articles expressing net-nostalgia, about how better everything was online in the 90s. For those who missed it, let me explain how literature searches worked back then. Thread 👇

Recently I've read a number of books and articles expressing net-nostalgia, about how better everything was online in the 90s. For those who missed it, let me explain how literature searches worked back then. Thread 👇

Got the traditional Jehovah's Witness advent calendar again: when you try to open a little cardboard door a voice tells you to sod off.

Interesting move. There is broad agreement that metrics have distorted research, and concern over public money being paid to the companies that generate them. Is this the first major national science body to pull out entirely?