UK grant-giving charities are increasingly being bullied into withdrawing finance for research & #conservation projects in Venezuela under spurious legal claims of money laundering or breaching sanctions. Please do not collaborate—Venezuelan conservationists have never needed your support more.

This is precisely why IUCN Red List not ESA designations are the best gauge of conservation status and extinction risk. www.sierraclub.org/sierra/prote...

Unfortunately I'm still waiting for my binoculars to be repaired under warranty at Swarovski Austria, after they got lost for a while in the Brexit Triangle. Might have to buy a British pair next time 🤣.

An important read for anyone who cares about nature in the UK!

Epic recovery report just received! ⚠️ A Turnstone I trapped using a homemade walk-in trap has been recaptured in the 🌍 world’s 🌎 northernmost continuously inhabited settlement. Ringed on 12 February 2024 in Southend-on-Sea, Essex 🇬🇧, it was re-trapped on 08 June 2025 in Alert, Nunavut… 🇨🇦 (🧵 1/2)

We're not running out of new species to describe and have a long way to go to even catalogue Earth's biodiversity. And the rate at which new species are discovered, far from trailing off, is increasing. doi.org/10.1126/scia...

Our NBC Conservation Fund has supported 160 priority bird conservation projects in 14 countries to the tune of $350,000. Encouraged to help? Find out more, donate or join NBC (to receive our journal and magazine) at the new website: neotropicalbirdingandconservation.org/conservation/ #ornithology

New Neotropical Birding and Conservation website is up and running. If you want to help conserve the birds of the American tropics please consider joining, donating—or just spreading the word! @neobirdconserve.bsky.social neotropicalbirdingandconservation.org #ornithology

"More than 252 Venezuelans deported to El Salvador under the Trump regime’s mass deportation policy suffered systematic and prolonged torture and abuse, including sexual assault, during their detention." www.hrw.org/report/2025/...

Last week I had a couple of days in São Paulo before heading to Belem for COP30 and managed to donate old issues of @neobirdconserve.bsky.social magazines to Instituto Anchieta Grajaú and Ornitomulheres, the Brazilian Female Ornithologists Network. Glad these will not end up in the recycling bin!

As reports tally up the 2025 fires, here's a long view back. I've updated and abridged Vestal Fire - now 40% as long, with half the new text completely rewritten, reorganized, and reconceptualized. The narrative still includes Russia. Should be published in spring, 2026.

Literally every assertion—I count eight—in Trump's latest anti-Venezuela rant is a lie. How concerned should we be that the leader of the most powerful country on Earth deals solely in disinformation and demagoguery? www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJ-e...

This video of Chicagoans intervening to save a man from being abducted off the streets by ICE is making the rounds on Instagram. Community action works. Source: www.instagram.com/reel/DPZL2AL...

But, disregarding his political rants, Musk *has* materially eroded "freedom to carry out research without fear of discrimination, censorship, or other restrictions that would hinder their work". Surely @royalsociety.org is not unaware of this?

Venezuela is famous for having the largest proven oil reserves in the world, being home to the world's tallest waterfall and the ice-cream shop with most flavours, but this? I had no idea about the 'Worst in the World Insane Asylum'. The pretext for war seems to have shifted yet again.

Some validation for my recent efforts in uploading some old images of unidentified species to @inaturalist.bsky.social – turns out I photographed an undescribed poison-dart frog in the Western Amazon 18 years ago 🌎 🧪🐸🪶 #ornithology #herpetology 🧵1/21

Colossal Biosciences have succeeded, "through radical new technologies" in replicating the phenotype of Golden-crowned Manakin Lepidothrix vilasboasi even before it is extinct! doi.org/10.2173/bow....

Venezuela, from 1970s to 2000s the birders' gateway country to South America, with its pioneering modern field guide and excellent national infrastructure, is now an outlier, with huge avitourism potential, very few visitors and no growth. doi.org/10.1002/pan3... #ornithology

It really shouldn't require "a backlash" to remind people that a neo-Nazi music festival is not a good idea, even in Yarmouth.

RFK parroting environmental disinformation prepared by Hugo Chávez's 'communicational hegemony' propagandist, Michael 'Shill' Shellenberger, who now works for the Trump regime... www.youtube.com/watch?v=hanK...

Handy summary of the original paper analysing one of the factors in the ongoing collapse: "the historical intensification of heat extremes has caused a 25–38% reduction in the level of abundance of tropical birds, which has accumulated from 1950 to 2020." theconversation.com/70-years-of-...

Anyone still not able to join the dots...?

Norfolk is set to warm back up to Caracas temperatures again next week. The Chinese can cook up some pretty convincing hoaxes.

These binoculars have been wonderful companions on many a field trip and tour, but although I've really pampered them the time has come to test that famous Swarovski warranty.

An excellent up-to-date review of the profound impacts of illegal government-promoted gold mining in the Venezuelan Guayana, one of the world's most severe and least acknowledged environmental crises. www.crisisgroup.org/latin-americ...

🪶🌎🧪 Bird Banding Lab threatened by budget cuts: The lab falls under the U. S. Geological Survey’s Ecosystem Mission Area, the agency’s major ecology program, which under President Trump’s 2026 proposed budget would see funding cut to $29 million, from $293 million. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/08/s...

A prophetic piece published before the 4 July Edwards Plateau flash floods. www.texasobserver.org/trump-texas-...

If true, the direct impacts of defunding NOAA's National Weather Service are being felt sooner than expected. @nws.noaa.gov www.nytimes.com/2025/07/05/u...

🧵 THREAD: Why the Cato Institute’s new paper on “misinformation panic” is dangerously wrong, and why it completely misunderstands the real crisis we face. www.cato.org/policy-analy...

Look who's going to be at our AGM to be held at @globalbirdfair.bsky.social on the 12th of July. @themarshtit.bsky.social will talk about conservation in Bolivia after the formal part of the meeting. All welcome. Have you got something better to do?

I use @biodivlibrary.bsky.social all the time, an invaluable resource that, for example, archives past issues of Bull BOC back to 1893. Hard to see cash-strapped researchers adequately offsetting the termination of Smithsonian Institite's long-term hosting role, but donate here... #ornithology

"Te tengo la celda lista..." m.youtube.com/watch?v=77qQ...

A heart-stoppingly faithful rendition of Eurasian Curlew extended song by this little fellow this morning, a potential first for our garden. Curlew do breed in Breckland, which is presumably where this Starling learned the prank.

We have been involved with SAVE Brazil's conservation efforts for the Blue-eye Gound Dove through our Conservtion Awards Programme. Here is their press release in with an update on progress. @birdlifeglobal.bsky.social @aba.org @abcbirds.bsky.social www.savebrasil.org.br/post/tr%C3%A...

Our work on re-evaluating the status of Venezuela's shorebirds/waders is finally out in Cotinga. We hope to have addressed confusion perpetuated in the literature and present a new official checklist comprising 46 confirmed species. #ornithology

Is anybody else finding problems with distance-time-route measurement in the new @cornellbirds.bsky.social Android eBird update? Today's 3.77km survey track initially truncated by eBird to 3.00km, now showing 30.00 km! Track, time and distance all incorrect. #ornithology

With the 'conservation optimism' fad justifying the acceptance of shifting baseline syndromes, we refer to the stark reality of biodiversity and nature loss apologetically as 'doom-mongering'. Aldo Leopold had it right.

I'll be in London next week discussing misinformation and the #biodiversity crisis with @amydickman.bsky.social and @clarecarlile.bsky.social at an event organised by the ‪@linneansociety.bsky.social ‬https://members.linnean.org/events/67fd2addd5f1de00084dd431/description 🌍

A sad end to the wanderlust of a Western Marsh Harrier, but an amazing bit of detective work!

Surprise encounter with a huge ancient coppiced Small-leaved Lime (Tilia cordata) along R Thet—possibly a naturally occurring tree? Lovely to behold whatever the case.

How bad will it be? Catastrophic. Proposed cuts to #NSF, #NIH, and #NASA will set the US R&D landscape back 25 yrs+, cause economic and job loss now, and undermine innovations to come. But, this is the WH's *proposed* budget. Speak up now before it is too late. (inflation adjusted $-s below)

Why is Elon Musk still a member of the Royal Society? www.aba.org/proposed-bir... #ornithology

No shorebirds on today's wader survey on ancient grazed heathland on the upper R Thet—but all the warblers are back and it looks and sounds wonderful! #NorfolkBirds

Yup... #birds

El 30 de abril cierra la convocatoria para los 'Pequeños Fondos Manomet' 2025, becas de financiamiento de $ 3.000 para acciones de conservación y/o investigación que tengan beneficios medibles para las aves playeras del Neotrópico. www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Rvh... #ornithology

After a record dry March the R Thet is low and easily forded on foot, but the remaining riparian alder carr on the upper Thet at Honeypot Rough is still supplying plenty of stored winter rainfall—and acting as a magnet for nesting birds.

My last Breckland OS square finished for @btobirds.bsky.social Woodlark survey this morning. Still no Woodlark, but 1st Whitethroat & Sedge Warbler together with 80 Fieldfare & a few Redwing. #norfolkbirding

A real mix of winter and summer along the upper R Thet this morning: Redwing and Fieldfare yielding to Willow Warbler and House Martin. Chiffchaff and Blackcap everywhere. Waders on territory: Stone-curlew, Oystercatcher, Lapwing, Curlew & Snipe. #NorfolkBirding

One of my favourite thrushes on Suffolk farmland today, and a pair of Short-eared Owl flushing from under my feet—I felt sorry for making them the butt of mobbing by gulls and crows as they soared away over Lowestoft. 2 Snipe too and a fieldful of Fieldfare.

1st Swallow of the year, Breckland waders—13 Curlew, Snipe, Oystercatcher, Lapwing—Great Egret, Marsh Harrier, Barn Owl, Woodlark & Stonechat at a sensitively managed local S Norfolk Breckland sheep farm this morning—a joy to behold. 64 spp. #ornithology