Terrible video, but did anybody else know that turkey chicks just... Tumble down hills? They were so cute but so clumsy!

Welcome Jonathan Nations, our new curator of mammals! Like many scientists, the path from curiosity to profession was a winding journey—one filled with marmots, voles, shrews and rats. 🐀

More about Jonathan:
floridamuseum.ufl.edu/science/new-fa…

Celebrating #IMD2024 doing museum stuff today: installing new material, cataloging a legacy series from a late ornithologist, double-checking subspecies IDs in woodcreepers/tanagers, and realizing of a new species for 🇨🇴 based a 2005 skin (wrong ID). Have a nice museum day y’all!

Love this idea. Let's take it a step farther and pick a color for de novo reference genomes from specimens. Purple?

Y'all sequencing genomes best be doing it from vouchers! 🧐

I love the days when I get to do good ol' fashioned #mammalogy . Double checking IDs on Peromyscus nasutus and P. boylii from Arizona; only two mis-IDs in the field which I think is pretty darn good considering how similar those mice are 🐭

Check out our latest Christopher Witt publication! If you’ve ever wondered how parasites might maintain population boundaries, affect vagrancy in birds, or just want to know which ocean vagrant brown boobies from New Mexico and Colorado originated from, this is the article for you.

After 20 years working in natural history #museums , I still get surprised with things like, 'Oh look, there's a box of #penguins '. 📦🐧🐧

Researchers at #UofUHealth are mapping what areas in Utah harbor the Valley fever fungus. The fungal infection spreads through spores in the soil and dust, and could be more widespread than anyone thought. Katharine S. Walter Katrina Derieg
bit.ly/3xlvuKq

The Prehistoric Museum is excited to announce the opening of a new position - a #Paleontology Lab and Collections Manager in our Price, UT museum! Most of the details are listed in the link below. #FossilFriday

higheredjobs.com/search/details…

Fellow zoologists: what Pesola sizes (<1kg) do you use? I am shocked at the # of options! 10, 20, 30, 50, 60, 100, 300, 500...

We have 100g & 1kg, but it would be nice to have in-between sizes. Which do you find yourself using most? Our catch ranges from shrews to fox squirrels.

First pre-print posted for Ben Wiens out of KU!! 🎉 Best practices in identifying hybrids and hybrid classes using triangle plots, and showcasing the new R package:
🔺triangulaR🔺

Currently locked into a back-and-forth with university purchasing over the 'restricted vendor' I'm trying to purchase from. Is it really that surprising that a museum would be purchasing products from a funeral home supply company?

I suppose it does make me look a tad crazy...

New entomology cabinets were delivered today! NHMU collections are growing!!
#CollectionsAreEssential
#naturalhistorymuseum

I’m in the informal stage of recruiting a graduate student to join my lab at this fall. Likely MS, but PhD possible for the right candidate. If you’re interested, email me a brief description of your goals and interests—no materials necessary at this point.

📣 Hello Community! Exciting news: #BlackMammalogists Week is in the process of becoming a 501(c)(3) and we are seeking board members! If you’re interested, please check out the attached info and reach out if you have any questions. Also please share widely! #sciencetwitter

Amazing how important biology collections are to the world… (checks notes)

Duke.

Thanks to David C. Blackburn 🐸 for leading the way in this massive project! I was so happy to be part of the #ummz group that produced thousands of CT scans for #overttcn .

#naturalhistory #collectionsareessential

New paper in BioScience (American Institute of Biological Sciences) summarizing the #oVertTCN effort to 3D digitize 6,400 vertebrate genera & counting. This was a huge effort across many museums & institutions led by David C. Blackburn 🐸 & Ed Stanley at Florida Museum

academic.oup.com/bioscience/adv…

Scan: Dr. Jaimi Gray

🚨New paper alert🚨 – We demonstrate how phyllostomid bats radiated via an early burst, a pattern that is only apparent in traits linked to diet:
The hierarchical radiation of phyllostomid bats as revealed by adaptive molar morphology
authors.elsevier.com/a/1iic63QW8S6D…
Current Biology

Parasite extinction is more complicated than it seems, even to parasitologists. It was really exciting to work with Colin Carlson (the birthday boy) and Emily Driscoll on this video and film in the NMNH Invertebrate Zoology Collections! Smithsonian NMNH NMNH Invert Zoology