Hannah O’Regan

Small stream in a forest with fallen branches and trunks, mosses, and different types of ferns (Polypodium & Dryopteris)

Young fern sporophyte on muddy soil

Part of a large fern frond with a hand for scale

Where the wild #ferns grow 🌱🌿 Happy #FernFriday!

The internet is fast becoming so choked with this, it'll be unusable. We'll all be boats chugging blindly through the gloom and the muck, finding nothing, barely each other, uncertain what's true or even real anymore.

Førsteamanuensis innen nordisk arkeologi (284576) | Universitetet i Oslo Stillingstittel: Førsteamanuensis innen nordisk arkeologi (284576), Arbeidsgiver: Universitetet i Oslo, Søknadsfrist: lørdag 31. januar 2026

There's lots of ongoing work as we're preparing for the new Museum of the Viking Age to open in Oslo. Our museum, @kult-hist-museum.bsky.social is now hiring an Associate Professor in Nordic archaeology, with expertise in the Viking Age. www.jobbnorge.no/ledige-still... #Vikingtidsmuseet

Photo of a human finger tip on grey limestone pointing at a bryozoan fossil that looks like lacy cloth.

Human finger on grey limestone pointing at a fossil bryozoan that looks a bit like a lacy feather. To the right of the bryozoan fossil is the fossil of the rear third of a trilobite arthropod that looks a bit like a woodlouse. This is a trilobite butt.

@nhmbryozoa.bsky.social saw these Fenestrate #bryozoa (?) In #Devonian limestone from Belgium. They have these feathery extensions, like in the 2nd pic. Have you seen anything like this previously? #geology #paleontology ⚒️ 🧪

#fossilfriday

Let me warmly recommend the Emeritus Fellowships to any research-active retirees out there: experience totally positive with sensible application process and super-helpful administration of the grant

A flock of Bewick's Swans by Ben Cherry/WWT

📉 Our new paper shows Bewick’s Swan numbers in NW/NE Europe have fallen to ~12,900 birds - a 56.7% decline since 1995, with further losses predicted by 2026 unless survival or breeding success improves. Flyway-wide conservation is urgent. 🦢 Download paper > tidsskrift.dk/Wildfowl/art... #Ornithology

This #FossilFriday I am delighted to say that I have been awarded a @erc.europa.eu Consolidator Grant looking at selection in #Ediacaran animals. If interested in Ediacaran life, do come and chat at #palass2025 @thepalass.bsky.social

New Bluesky archive account to follow 🎉

(Festive) welcome to @arundelcarchive.bsky.social!

If handing someone their arse, was a video clip

as my neighbours are moving today, i've quietly stolen back our wheelie bin that they had nicked a few weeks ago (but i said nothing about it)

if that isn't an automatic pass on the life in the uk test, i do not know what is

An insight into the process happening at Essex: My brilliant colleague Lucy Noakes is*President of the Royal Historical Society* and is still, like me, officially "at risk" of redundancy.

Screenshot showing rejected post with convincing text written by AI

This is a heads-up about fake AI accounts which have proliferated across social media.

The screenshot is from a genuine thread asking for advice on a mountain route; there are plenty of useful, real human replies.
The attempted reply (we stopped it) looks very real - but it is from an AI bot.

Dear Professor, I trust that all is progressing smoothly for you. Due to shortage of article, we need your support and wish to have any of your magnificent articles to get published in our journal before December, 6 2025 the successful release of our Volume 8 Issue 2 towards our journal. Hope to receive your contribution and dedication soon.

My magnificent articles bring all the predatory journals to the yard

Highly pathogenic avian influenza caused a mass die-off in Eurasian cranes during their autumn migration through Germany, France and Spain. More than 18,000 dead cranes were reported dead in Germany alone. The full demographic impact of this mortality on the crane population needs to be assessed.

Ooh, you’re getting the ‘right-sizing’ lingo too. I wonder which consultancy provided that gem of a phrase. Hugs to you and all of those affected.

Small bronze, very stylised pig or wild boar with huge ears, long snout and spiky back.

This little Iron Age piggy from Hounslow, Middlesex, would love to wish you a happy #FindsFriday, but is concentrating far too hard on sniffing out a truffle hidden beneath the baize.
2nd-1st century BC. British Museum.

If you're looking for research organisations such as the British Library (or other key players and enablers of SHAPE research) in the NRO, you'll be disappointed. 1/2

UK economy unexpectedly contracts by 0.1% in October Growth has slowed throughout the year

apparently there's 'falling growth' in the 'scientific research' sector, and yes, that is what will happen if you slash jobs in universities

Re-posting with alt text because the post accompanying this is obviously wrong, it's clearly a picture of a woman on a Crosscountry train having found a place to sit on the floor and read, her coffee cup beside her, folks queuing for the loo behind her

How come the media isn't reporting what is going on in universities? The implications of this (and this is just 1 of many universities doing the same) are terrifying. For the local populations, for the towns affected, for the next generation, for research & development, for the future! #academicsky

Assistant Professor position in non-seed plant diversity ( #bryophytes, #ferns, #lycophytes) Department of #Botany of the University of British Columbia, Vancouver:
botany.ubc.ca/job-postings...
⚠️ Deadline is soon, December 19.
#Paleobotany is explicitly included 🌿⛏️

And there it is. Updated with the latest results from work with @thibaut-d.bsky.social & @cartapaniso.bsky.social & the @archaeobears.bsky.social #Boxofficebears , 50 mins of 🐻 from the lateglacial to present in Britain. So much more I could have said! Ta for the invite @geoffreymsmith.bsky.social!

In the tenth century a charm to control a bee swarm was added, upside down, in the margin of an earlier mss. It's one of the earliest Old High German texts. Tim Hertogh argues in recent article it was intended as an amulet to cut out & place in a hive - explaining the margins excised elsewhere.👇

We're hiring!

We are seeking two Postdoctoral Research Assistants/Scientists to join our new Microplastics and Marine Pollution Group.

These roles are part of the UKRI-funded MICROMIX project, led by Dr Alice Horton, investigating how microplastics and other stressors impact marine ecosystems.

Very appropriate footprints at Paddington station - I didn’t have time to queue for a photo with Himself though. #bear #paddington

Okay, I don't do this sort of thing very often, but I truly feel like @artsemergency.bsky.social puts the effort in and makes actual change for people's lives.

I have a societally significant birthday coming up. I'd love to raise enough money to pay for another bursar's place. It's been a while!

Photo of a sign hanging from a train station roof. It says ‘Nottingham’. There’s a red brick building with large white painted windows behind it.

‘I’m on my way,
I don’t know where I’m goin’
But luckily Geoff Smith does, and I’m off to share the knowing of 🐻🐻 at the Uni of Reading #archaeology seminars today.

There are so many bear-related papers in this, including one co-authored by @palaeohan.bsky.social. The whole book looks fascinating, I can’t wait to read it.

One of a series of late 19th century Christmas cards which follow the sometimes troubled progress of road racing cats on penny farthing bicycles. This card shows a close finish as the leading two cats push for the finishing line, with a third following just behind. The race finish is being viewed by an enthusiastic and entirely cat-based crowd, including a bookie and one lad up a tree. All the cats are clothed, this is the 19th century after all.

We're opting for a traditional Victorian Christmas this year, so BRING ON the penny farthing racing cats

"Merry and happy may your Christmas be"
With cats cycling, cheering and sitting precariously up a tree

#ArchiveAdventCalendar #ChristmasCards