Jen Kepler

A special treat for my birthday girl! Sydney is a blue tongue skink and has been with me since she was a little skinklet! #birthday #skink #lizard

When we tag horseshoe crabs, we sometimes have to remove barnacles or slipped snails from their shell I order to place a tag.
We made sure that the slipper snails made good on their sacrifice, as a snack for our Horseshoe crab pals.
They were happy to accept our snack offering!

Pushing in a tag for a male horseshoe crab

Releasing a tagged crab together with my daughter

We drill the hole to insert the tag into

Doing cool kid things in nyc tonight…

Tonight my daughter tagged her first horseshoe crabs! I’m a very proud mama 🥹
#communityscience #wildlife

Red knots on the beach in Queens, NYC. An amazing migrating bird, and absolutely handsome. I get so excited to catch them in their spring finery. #birds

mama piping plover crouches, seemingly with two extra pairs of legs... this is part of the illusion...

With a little wiggle, she makes a chick appear out of thin air!

Another wiggle and, abracadabra, a second chick!!

HOW DID SHE DO IT?! A plover never reveals how she performs her magic. A cute plover chick, stares us down, before another disappearing act... camouflage!

Piping Plover magic... the big reveal is actually quite small, and very cute. #birds

I see those bird moms and every single time I'm like, "i see you, you're doing great, mama!"
I think us moms like to cheer each other on a bit...

The bus depot here, I have seen leave out dry ramen for them…

I don't know who needs to hear this, but sharks absolutely do get cancer.

And even if they didn't get cancer, eating shark wouldn't cure your cancer any more than eating LeBron James would make you better at playing basketball.

📷: Andrew Fox

It’s an honor to be graced by their presence

A great egret takes off, wings spread wide to to right. With a fore and background of the Gowanus canal in Brooklyn. The landscape is heavily urban, buildings, bridges and bulkhead!

Also… why do Egrets make everything beautiful?!

American black duck showing an important field mark- blue on the wings, not bordered by white. Sets it apart from a female mallard.

A mourning dove foraging along the rip rap on the Gowanus shore.

A great egret with the backdrop of the Gowanus Canal, Union street bridge, downtown Brooklyn and in the foreground, the Carroll street bridge (yes, it’s still stuck open)

Canada geese pair with the backdrop of the Gowanus canal looking north toward downtown Brooklyn. And that one hideous residential building that looks like the eye of Sauron should be atop….

A few gems while waiting for my tour group at work today… American black duck, mourning dove, great egret, Canada geese… all at the Gowanus Canal waterfront.
#birds #brooklyn #urbanwildlife

A number of common terns are born and raised New Yorkers! I love these birds and their attitude, I wish more of our beach nesting birds took the tern approach to nesting... dive, defend, and defeat.
#Birds

Bird Blep.

I love when I catch animals with their tongues out. Extra special when it's a sweet piping plover.
#birds

I hope it sticks, sounds like no one has spotted it today… that, or it only prefers overcast/rainy days.

Recent life-bird: Fork-tailed flycatcher on Randall's Island, NYC! Such a great rare #bird, esp for beginners, it's easy to spot, observe, and its flight is easy to follow as it hunts slowly by fluttering and hovering. Big recommend if you are a new birder and want to add a li' spice to your list!

Talk flier including QR code for registration

If you're in the Washington, DC area, I'm giving a free public talk about shark science and conservation, including why Federal funding for research and conservation is important! Friday 5/30 at 7 p.m. at Silver Branch in Silver Spring. This is through @standupforscience.bsky.social 🧪🌎🦑🦈 #SciComm

a book with a chill tiger on the cover

the front page of the book Tigers Between Empires, with a large, blue tiger track stamped upon it

***GIVEAWAY*** This signed/stamped Advance Readers Copy of TIGERS BETWEEN EMPIRES, forthcoming Nov 2025 from @fsgbooks.bsky.social! Like=1 entry, Share=1 entry, Like + Share=2 entries. Will randomly select winner on Friday, May 23, 2025. US addresses only.
Preorder info: shorturl.at/OXr0Z
#booksky

Off to do my water quality monitoring in the Gowanus Canal… and I found myself an urban Canada Goose family on 7th street, just outside the Bell House here in Brooklyn…

Rescinding the Definition of “Harm” Under the Endangered Species Act The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) (collectively referred to as the Services or we) are proposing to rescind the regulatory definition of "harm" ...

OPPOSE!!!!!! Oppose the rescinding of "harm" under the ESA: www.federalregister.gov/documents/20...

SUBMIT TODAY!!!!

I was like wtf is shrieking?! Oh, that’s your song 😂

I just had a common nighthawk calling as I put some recycling outside and shut off the yard lights…. I am so fucking jazzed for that yard bird! #birds

#birdbot

Male red-winged blackbird, belting out its song.

A male common yellowthroat.

A yellow warbler, singing its sweet song.

Cedar waxing.

Marine Park, Brooklyn, familiar faces for this time of year.
#birds

Met local Broad Channel, Queens
Celebirdy, Edgar the Great egret.
I also learned where the purple martins in Jamaica Bay live!
#birds

Learned a new plant today, cypress spurge.

American snout butterfly

A few Trillium growing on the slope of lookout hill in prospect park

Mating horseshoe crabs, both carrying a number of freeloaders, including blue mussels

American snout, trillium, and mating horseshoe crabs… bonus blue mussels on the male HSC!

We also nerded out over plants and insects... Plumb Beach had tiger beetles all over the sand.

A worm eating warbler in Prospect Park. What a joy to see this bird on a perch, singing!

A Baltimore oriole singing about how great his tree is.

An Eastern kingbird in Green-wood cemetery, posing on one of the lot marker signs as it hawks insects.

A female red-winged blackbird in Shirley Chisholm State Park showing off her lovely plumage.

Brooklyn birds from the #globalbigday Birdathon last Saturday. Our team saw 118 bird species in Brooklyn, NYC in 12.5 hours - even lunch at L&B Spumoni Pizza got us a peregrine! I also got my first Kings County Broad-winged Hawk. #bird

Mama American robin tied to her maternal duties, fueled by the various hormones flowing through her veins that compel her to sit really still for long periods. She's doing her damn best and I love her for it.
#birds #momlife #wildlife

Two weeks in a row we have caught northern pipefish in the Gowanus Canal! How cool is this water noodle?!
It is among a more common fish of the Canal, mummichog. All were released alive.
#fish