Mike Benard (@benardmf) — Bluesky Profile

1 day ago

Bird tracks in the snow ending at a divot with two clear wing prints on either side.

Sharp-tailed Grouse launch pad
(my subsequent 'heart-attack' not depicted 😂)
#birds

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1 day ago

Brown frog floating in shallow water with old leaves underneath.

Small woodland pond, with trees in the background. In foreground, underwater, with many round clusters of black frog eggs.

Lots of wood frog breeding in northeast Ohio on Wednesday and Thursday this past week.

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3 days ago

Grammarly Is Facing a Class Action Lawsuit Over Its AI ‘Expert Review’ Feature The feature, which Grammarly shut down Wednesday, presented editing suggestions as if they came from established authors and academics—without their consent.

I'm suing Grammarly over its paid AI feature that presented editing suggestions as if they came from me - and many other writers and journalists - without consent.

State law requires consent before someone's name can be used for commercial purposes.

www.wired.com/story/gramma...

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1 week ago

Close-up of regenerated salamander tail. More the half of the tail is regenerated. The original part of the tail is thick and has a mottled gray-blue and black pattern. The regenerated part of the tail is much thinner, and plain gray with no pattern.

Whole body shot of a salamander on a brown piece of bark. Salamander has a thick body. View is of side of salamander. body is mix of gray-blue to light-blue mottled markings on a dark gray background. More than half the tail is regenerated. More the half of the tail is regenerated. The original part of the tail is thick and has a mottled gray-blue and black pattern. The regenerated part of the tail is much thinner, and plain gray with no pattern.

Unisexual Ambystoma salamander from Ohio seen today with more than half of her tail regenerated. It may have been bitten off in a previous year by a predator like a raccoon. With a little time and energy investment, she grew it back.

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1 week ago

Photo of a backyard with a wooden fence. Snow is present in fence shadow, but not where sunny. Makes a line of snow across yard.

Fence effect snow

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2 weeks ago

White House stalls release of approved US science budgets The US Congress rejected sweeping cuts to science agencies. But the NIH, the NSF and NASA have had their spending slowed.

Congress rejected massive cuts to US science budgets for 2026, but much of the money still isn’t flowing to researchers.

The culprit? The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is quietly slow-walking the release of funds. 🧵👇

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2 weeks ago

A line graph showing NSF grant awards made through 2/27/26 for fiscal year 2026 compared with grant awards for fiscal years 2021-2025.

NSF Update (Awards through 2/27/26)

Directorates to follow

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2 weeks ago

UNC-CH Will ‘Scrap’ New Recording Policy, Chancellor Says The move comes less than three weeks after the controversial rules were enacted.

Congrats to @ncaaup.bsky.social & all who fought against this surveillance policy that would've allowed admin to hijack microphones in the classroom for secret recordings.

This move would've chilled classroom discussion & suppressed students' willingness to ask questions & take intellectual risks.

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2 weeks ago

Acceleration hotspots of North American birds’ decline are associated with agriculture Human activities might have accelerated declines of population abundance, but this acceleration remains underexplored. Using 1033 North American Breeding Bird Survey routes, we analyze abundance chang...

Thrilled to share our new paper out in @science.org, led by François Leroy and Petr Keil! Using the Breeding Bird Survey, we document not only a continent-wide decline in bird abundance since the 1980s — but, crucially, the acceleration of these declines over time. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

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3 weeks ago

It has been a cold, cold winter!

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3 weeks ago

A gloved hand holds a large black salamander. A pond in the background has dome ice cover.

Gloves hand holds a thick chunk of ice, about 3 to 4 cm thick, with pond in background.

Caught our first unisexual Ambystoma of 2026 yesterday morning! Despite the long stretch of cold, and some thick ice still on the pond, a week of warm weather was enough to bring a few out. With current forecast, big migration probably won’t happen until into March.

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3 weeks ago

large 10-foot long tree trunk is hoisted straight up and out of a culvert manhole in a street intersection. the trunk is visibly waterlogged and nearly 3/4ths of the diameter of the manhole.

when people ask "what's the wildest thing you've ever pulled out of a sewer?" i'm going to just start answering "tree."

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3 weeks ago

GEORGE RETES: “My name is George Retes. I was born and raised here in Ventura, California. I’m 26 years old and I am an Iraq combat veteran.

I was going to work like normal. I show up. ICE is there. There’s kind of like a roadblock. I get out. I identify myself — that I’m a U.S. citizen, that I’m just trying to get to work.

I’m trying to leave. I’m getting ready to leave and they surround my car, start banging on it, start shouting these contradictory orders.

Even though I was giving them no reason, they still felt the need to — one agent knelt on my back and another agent knelt on my neck. And during that time, I’m just pleading with them that I couldn’t breathe.

I was in isolation. I was in basically this concrete cell. I was stripped naked in like a hospital gown. And they leave the lights on 24/7.

They just came out and they said that I was violent and that I assaulted agents. Why lie when it’s on video of everything that happened? Why lie?”

PBS News Hour: U.S. citizens detained by immigration agents describe how they were treated.

Watch the segment here www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMgC...

I'm clipping transcripts of the citizens speaking in this thread 1/3

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1 month ago

Scatterplot, with average daily winter temperatures in x-axis (-3 degrees c to 7 degrees C) On the y-axis is the first date of breeding (from 6 February to 9 April). Data points are for years 2012 to 2025. The points form a negative relationship so that coldest winters have latest breeding in late March to early April, and warmest winters have earliest breeding around 10 February. A photo in top right of figure shows a large salamander held in two gloves hands.

It’s been a cold, snowy winter here in Cleveland. In 2923 and 2024, we caught our first salamanders around February 10th. I am now wondering if we won’t see them until late March this year? What’s your guess?

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2 months ago

I am excited to share my new book, California Amphibians and How To Find Them, hot off the press from Heyday Books and ready to help guide your wet winter frog and salamander adventures! It is available now from my website or Feb 3 at bookstores.

www.centralcoastsnakeservices.com/shop.html

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2 months ago

Sunlight on demand As long as Earth has spun on its axis in orbit around the sun, the planet has known night. Each day, half the world slips into shadow, creating the natural…

Friends, could you take a moment to sign this open letter about a proposal to illuminate the Earth during the night with giant orbital systems. This would be incredibly disruptive to nearly all North American songbirds who migrate at night. darksky.org/news/orbital...

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2 months ago

A pinhole camera photo taken from Summer to Winter Solstice. It's a bit blurry as the aperture was made with a tiny needle and no focus mechanism. There are yellow to green lines across the photo, that's the Sun moving across the sky over the course of a day. The top line is from the Summer Solstice, the bottom line from the Winter Solstice. Cloudy days don't have any lines or broken lines as the Sun was obscured by clouds. There are some trees on the left, right and in the background.

A pinhole camera photo, a 6 month exposure from Summer to Winter solstice. There are trees on the right side and background. A house with two cars in the drive are visible almost in the center of the photo. The lines are made from the Sun moving across the sky with the bottom line being the Winter Solstice and the top line the Summer solstice. On cloudy days the lines are broken or not visible as the sun was obscured by clouds. The lines show some reflections from a tree trunk. The lines are mostly a white color with some hints of blue, green and yellow in places. Some of the colors could be from rain or snow staining the paper I was using.

A solargram/pinhold camera photo taken from the Winter Solstice of 2024 (21 Dec) to Summer Solstice of 2025 (20 June).
It's a 6 month long exposure taken with a beer can pinhole camera, it shows the sun's movement across the sky during that time period, each day the Sun scribes a line on the paper in the pinhole camera. The bottom line is Dec 21 2024 and the top line is 20 June 2025.
This kind of photo makes the movement of the Sun during the day into visible trails on the paper in the camera.
There is a long orange-yellow arc going across the paper showing the whole 6 months. There is a shadow of my tree on the image, the tree blossomed during the exposure. Shades of blue and pink are on the paper too. There is a black kind of semi circle at the top of the image, that's where the water was disintegrating the top part of the paper.

Happy Winter Solstice!

Beer can, pinhole camera photos of the Summer to Winter Solstice (2024) and the Winter to Summer Solstice (2025).

You never know quite what you're going to get with these photos, set the beer can pointing towards the sun at hopefully the correct angle and wait 6 months!

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2 months ago

Graphic explaining the Winter Solstice on December 21, 2025 at 10:03 a.m. ET. Side-by-side Earth images compare December (winter solstice) and June (summer solstice), showing Earth’s tilt relative to the equator from the Sun-facing view.

Happy Winter! 10:03am ET today marked the Winter Solstice, the day of the year when the Earth's northern hemisphere is tilted furthest away from the Sun – making today the shortest of the year for those of us north of the equator.
Will wintry temperatures be in your area? 😬
Visit weather.gov to see

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3 months ago

How old are they?

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3 months ago

The best part about amphibian season is touching all the things. California Tiger Salamander, handled with appropriate permits. #herps

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3 months ago

UNL used bad data to make $27.5 million cuts, faculty say UNL's faculty takes issue with the data used by the university to propose program budget cuts. The eliminations are partially financial, but all of the programs up for elimination made more money in s...

It is also grossly ironic to use faulty data to cut the statistics program.
www.dailynebraskan.com/news/unl-use...

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3 months ago

BREAKING: ‘This hurts’: UNL eliminates 4 programs despite faculty, student pleas The University of Nebraska-Lincoln eliminates the Earth and atmospheric sciences 8-0, educational administration 7-1, statistics 7-1, textiles, merchandising and fashion design 7-1 programs.

It's over.

Despite the fact that the academic council recommended against it, despite the fact that the program brought in more tuition than it cost, and despite the fact that Nebraskans need & deserve this expertise, Earth & Atmospheric Sciences will be cut.

www.dailynebraskan.com/news/adminis...

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3 months ago

Decades-old palm trees in Rio de Janeiro flower for the first — and only — time Talipot palms in a Rio de Janeiro park are flowering for the first and only time in their lives. These palms were introduced by landscape architect Roberto Burle Marx in the 1960s.

Talipot palms in a Rio de Janeiro park are flowering for the first and only time in their lives.

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3 months ago

Can you teach human anatomy - or know someone who can?

CWRU Anatomy is recruiting, and it would be great to have another paleontologist in the department!

More info and application: apply.interfolio.com/151831

Please share widely!
@societyofvertpaleo.bsky.social

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3 months ago

Side image of a brightly colored frog on the trunk of a small tree, captured as it climbs the tree. The frog's body has alternating stripes of black and orangish-red, while the limbs have reticulating patterns of black and yellow. The most notable feature are the two large, gray tadpoles clinging to the frog's back.

#FrogFriday > BlackFriday - Here's a male Uakari Poison Frog (Ranitomeya uakarii) hauling two of its tadpoles to a location with permanent water, where they can continue development. Rainforest in the Rio Tahuayo drainage north of Iquitos, Peru. #herps #frogs #NaturePhotography 🌿

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3 months ago

When a meal fights back!

I’ve only gotten distant looks at Yellow-crowned Night-heron adults, delighted to find one close! It’s trying to eat a crab but the crab’s got its beak pinched.

Super compressed video quickly moved to my phone from my camera (sorry!) just too excited to wait to share

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3 months ago

🚨 HELP NEEDED!!!

Please, help us to evaluate how differences in aesthetic perception can affect the development of conservation strategies in #butterflies.

www.unveiling.eu/en_US/

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3 months ago

A bright green snake has its tail in a knot as it is mostly swallowed by another snake with a multicolored pattern on its back.

Since BlueSky seems to like (or dislike enough to hit "like") snakes, here's my favorite photo of a snake I've taken:

A smooth green snake knots its tail in a last-ditch effort to avoid being consumed by a garter snake. Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, CO.

#photography #snake 🐍

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3 months ago

Freikorps militia gun down opponents during the Spartikus Revolution in Berlin in 1919.

Finished page from THE DISSIDENTS. I'm putting the last touches on this bad boy. It'll be in the can by Thanksgiving! What a relief.

Out in Fall 2026, y'all.

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