John Lill

Close-up of a small brown bat with its head covered in white pollen grains, held in human hands next to a pale green and white Merremia platyphylla flower. The bat's dark fur contrasts with the dusty white pollen coating its face and head, demonstrating evidence of the bat's role as a pollinator.

For the first time ever, scientists have confirmed bats pollinating a plant in the Merremia genus! This tropical vine's clever strategy involves changing its scent throughout the day to attract different pollinators.

#Botany #PlantScience 🧪

wp.me/pdRZhH-mbc

YouTube video by Dr. Mark H. Shapiro Destroying American Science

🧪In this video I describe the damage already done to science in the United States by the Trump Administration, and the additional damage that will be done if his proposed FY26 budget is approved.
youtu.be/7l14Twp1pWI

two little girls are dancing on a stage and one of them is telling the other to tell her . Alt: Wwo little girls are dancing on a stage and one of them is telling the other to tell her.

🧪 BOOM: The AAU, ACE, APLU, and 13 universities just filed suit today against NSF for slashing to 15% indirect rates.

Full compliant: www.aau.edu/sites/defaul...

Updates: www.aau.edu/resources-aa...

A similar group of plaintiffs won a *permanent* injunction against a similar change at NIH.

Coastal economies rely on NOAA, from Maine to Florida, Texas and Alaska – even if they don’t realize it NOAA’s work has kept fisheries from collapsing, helped coastal ecosystems survive extreme heat and battled invasive species, among many other tasks essential to coastal economies.

And NOAA supports a lot of business as well: buff.ly/qX1pW5d

a blue and yellow flag is waving in the wind against a blue sky ALT: a blue and yellow flag is waving in the wind against a blue sky

The US just became the bad guys today. Trump is clearly on the side of Putin. Unbelievable. Are we no longer part of the free world?

The foundations of America’s prosperity are being dismantled Federal scientists warn that Americans could feel the effects of the new administration's devastating cuts for decades to come.

"Dismantling the behind-the-scenes scientific research programs that backstop American life could lead to long-lasting, perhaps irreparable damage to everything from the quality of health care to the public’s access to next-gen consumer technologies."

www.technologyreview.com/2025/02/21/1...

NIH study sections are not meeting. The slaughter at NSF is also very bad - many permanent program officers who gave up tenured faculty positions to serve at NSF were fired last week. And the loss of staff means that it will hard or impossible to run panels.

From NatGeo explorer Nalini Nadkarni on Feb 18 we see the release of

Tree Notes: A Year in the Company of Trees 🧪

amzn.to/4bh0gnK

🍃 Bird flu outbreak in US unlikely to end without intervention
🧪
theguardian.com
New H5N1 variant in Nevada and Arizona

we reared a bunch of these from Polistes fuscatus nests we had in captivity several years ago. Turning the tables on caterpillar predators! My recollection is that the nest cells with carnivorous caterpillars had convex silken caps (as opposed to the intact concave caps on healthy wasp pupal cells)

Hi Chris!! Welcome to Bluesky! Im still learning my way around

One week left to apply! We are still looking for PhD students 👀✨Please spread the word!

We are far from conserving migratory butterflies. Our new
paper shows that current protected areas are inadequate for
👉84% of migratory butterfly species in at least one season
👉45% of species in all seasons. (1/7)
doi.org/10.1111/cobi...

So sorry to hear what your poor uncle (and his family) had to endure. Hope things can change.

There are a whole bunch of inflated caterpillars on wires in the NMNH! A lost art it seems.

ICYMI-

"Fatal Attraction: Argiope Spiders Lure Male Hemileuca Moth Prey with the Promise of Sex"

Here are the results of 5 summers of research on this fascinating topic:

www.mdpi.com/2075-4450/15...

easy mistake! the plants have no chlorophyll and no leaves so very unusual for plants.

These are ghost pipes - a flowering plant (Monotropa uniflora) that is parasitic on tree roots.

Some nice Jack-o-lanterns (Omphalotus) from a few weeks ago in Rock Creek Park.

@hanliconius.bsky.social #moths #caterpillars

@hanliconius.bsky.social Can you add me to the Lepidoptera list?

Awsome Brood XIV straggler! Hope you logged it on Cicada Safari. We will be in Cincinnati this spring!

Lill, John T. | Department of Biological Sciences | Columbian College of Arts & Sciences | The George Washington University John T. Lill

I am interested in joining the Ecology feed. Im an academic ecologist studying plant-insect interactions. My lab website is here: biology.columbian.gwu.edu/john-lill

Aboveground seed pods produced from a raceme of outcrossing flowers.

Trifoliate leaves of twining hog peanut

Seeds of belowground selfing flowers. Like peanuts, hog peanut also ‘plants’ its seeds!

Fascinated by this amazing native legume, American hog peanut (Amphicarpa bracteata) and its bizarre reproductive strategy. It is an annual that makes both below-ground (cleistogamous/selfing) flowers and aboveground flowers that are either cleistogamous or chasmogamous (outcrossing). Amazing plants

New here at bluesky! I read the recent Nature article describing the mass migration of academics to this new platform so jumped in. I’m an evolutionary ecologist studying plant-insect herbivore-natural enemy interactions. Fascinated by parasitoids that keep their hosts alive as ‘zombie’ bodyguards!

Pretty sure that is Fall webworm and not a tent caterpillar