Ben Sheldon

The Checklist v2025 The AviList team worked for four years to harmonize the global checklist of birds. The final product includes a consensus taxonomy combined with a full set of taxonomic and nomenclatural components, t...

Are you sure about the Crossbills? The current AviList checklist has Parrot and Scottish still as distinct (as well as Cassia, Red & Hispaniolan)

www.avilist.org/checklist/v2...

Citizen science reveals host‐switching in louse flies and keds (Diptera: Hippoboscidae) during a period of anthropogenic change A study of louse flies in the United Kingdom, Isle of Man, and Ireland found 212 different interactions between Hippoboscidae and their hosts, of which 70 were previously unrecorded. No louse flies ...

More Mapping the UK's Flat Flies Project results published today with Adrian Smith & @sheldonbirds.bsky.social 212 host-parasite interactions, including 70 not previously reported, & a recent switch to gulls by some Louse Flies, Hippoboscidae. @btobirds.bsky.social @dipteristsforum.bsky.social

Reminder of today’s @egioxford.bsky.social seminar from @cornishjackdaws.bsky.social in @biology.ox.ac.uk - will actually be in Lecture Theatre 1

Part of a sonogram of a singing Coal Tit

A very close singing Coal Tit yesterday morning - fascinating to see these almost perfectly regular repeated motifs in the song with very rapid changes over huge frequency range. Must require some very precise neuromuscular control of bird's vocal system
macaulaylibrary.org/asset/644354...

Interesting: it immediately ID-d an inland bird (here in Oxford) a couple of weeks ago. We had a wintering one for 3-4 weeks back in 2023; perhaps that is enough to tip the algorithm

BBC Radio 4 - In Our Time, Bird Migration Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss how birds navigate and the risks and benefits of migration

Coming up soon (9 am today) an opportunity to hear this classic episode of In Our Time on Bird Migration featuring Tim Guilford of @biology.ox.ac.uk

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b...

A story in Private Eye, headlined "Minority representation on TV causes outrage". The article reads: "There has been widespread support for prominent Reform MP Sarah Pochin after she complained about the over-representation of minorities on television. Said one angry viewer, "She's right. Every time you turn on the telly there's another Reform MP being interviewed by Laura Kuenssberg." She added, "I respect their way of life and their strange customs, but Reform MPs comprise only 0.7 percent of the House of Commons. Yet Nigel Farage is on Question Time more than Fiona Bruce." "I'm not prejudiced. Some of my best friends are swivel-eyed loons, but enough is enough. There are too many people with angry red faces on television."

Private Eye nailing it.

Flyer designed by the local eco group. Thursday 6th November, 7:30pm, Coach House, Quarry Road, Oxford OX3 8NU - see you there!

If you are in the Oxford area next Thursday, I’m giving a talk on the birds of the Lye Valley area. It’s a multimedia presentation (pictures and calls!) covering the resident and migratory birds recorded in this part of the city. See you there!

@friendlyevalley.bsky.social
#Oxonbirding
#Oxford

POSITIONS default description

I am looking for a postdoc to work in our long-term system of food-caching mountain chickadees in the Sierra Nevada mountains. The expected start is April 2026. Please see details here: chickadeecognition.com/positions
If interested and qualified, please contact me directly (email on the website).

I'm very excited to go back to Oxford, where I did my undergrad, to talk about the group's recent work on jackdaws and what it tells us about the evolution of sociality and cognition!

E.g. I think Mealy Redpoll was split from Lesser in those days, and I have not counted GW Teal as it is just about to be lumped again!

Bit hard to compare because of changing taxonomy & what one counts (e.g. I count Snow Geese as Cat C as they seem to be self-sustaining now), but by my rules on 191, so unlikely to get near that (late autumn/winter 2009 was exceptional with Slav Grebe, BT Diver, Snow Bunt, RB Merg, RC Starling etc)

eBird Checklist - 23 Oct 2025 - Farmoor Reservoir - 1 species Submitted by Gareth Casburn.

Fine photos of the recent pair of Twite at Farmoor by Gareth Casburn. Can anything be done from plumage to assign to subspecies? - tagging @j-dunning.net

ebird.org/checklist/S2...

Crumbs! That’s a blast from the past… Not sure how much of that has held up to scrutiny. Those were simpler times!

Similarly choice of males for EPCs (in the rather dated terminology of the 90s which is when I did this stuff) based on ornaments needn’t be evidence for good genes since plausible pathways linking male ornamental phenotypes to functional fertility can easily exist…

We’re kicking off the year’s EGI seminars this Friday - follow @egioxford.bsky.social for details of these & forthcoming jobs, papers etc

The Life & Mind Building aglow at the end of the day. It’s thrilling to see this so busy from top to bottom with everyone from undergraduates to senior professors

Superb birds, and that's without mentioning the Norfolk Lesser Grey as well!

Congratulations Joe!!

A view of a river at sunset. By combining many exposures I have multiple images for single birds flying through the scene, making the appearance of trails. One bird flies in an arc across the scene close to the camera and the sunlight can be seen shining through its tail feathers.

Homage to Xavier Bou: little swifts at the Olifants River high-water bridge, Kruger National Park. Unstacked from video taken with an Iphone 14. #birds #photography #SouthAfrica #iPhone

Humans perceive but animals don’t: pitfalls in using plasticine models for assessing biotic interactions buff.ly/7hcLYXx | #ProcB #Ecology

Crikey! Bill like a Hawfinch on that one!

📢4-year fully funded #PhD on seasonal timing of egg overwintering insects 🦋🦗🪳
🔬Identify universal mechanisms underlying #insect egg developmental time under #ClimateChange
📌@niooknaw.bsky.social @animalecol-nioo.bsky.social

ℹ️ vacatures.knaw.nl/job-invite/2...
❗Application deadline: 7 December 2025

A Causal Inference Framework for Climate Change Attribution in Ecology Accurately attributing ecological shifts to climate change remains a significant challenge. Here, we present an accessible causal inference framework designed for climate change attribution in observ...

Putting this here, partly to remind myself to read it (🙄) but also because it looks important and useful

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10....

🚨 2nd master’s project!
Interested in bird migration & genomics? 🧬🐦
Use whole-genome data to trace the recent colonization of Ouessant Island by Blue Tits and explore how irruptive migratory events can shape colonization dynamics. Please share! #ornithology

www.vogelwarte.ch/de/wir/mitar...

Potentially a massive future county blocker for a junior Mackenzie in 2100!

I hadn’t anticipated our work having relevance for understanding neural psychoses… @nilomr.bsky.social

Amazing photo!

The run of recent excellent county birding in Oxfordshire continues with a pair of Twite at Farmoor late afternoon today - first for about 20 years! Almost all the birds have been found by the same observer who’s on a remarkable run…

Lecturing to a group of first year biologists outside in Wytham Woods, Oct 2025

A figure used to illustrate the way that different traits show different environmental sensitivity. Each plot shows the distribution of observations of first egg date (left) and clutch size (right) for all female great tits in Wytham Woods, in each year from 1960-2025. For each plot, the vertical line shows the mean for the entire data set. The laying date distributions show much more variability, both in their average each year, but also in the shape of the distribution. Furthermore, a gradual shift to earlier values in more recent years can be seen. Figure prepared by Irene Martinez Baquero

Two full days teaching this week introducing ~120 1st yr undergraduate biologists to Wytham Woods, long-term population studies & @biology.ox.ac.uk. Always great teaching outside. The eagle-eyed might spot Chris Perrins in the front row (undergrad days >70 years ago!) - not much I can teach him…