Dave Rodland

Heron taking wing over a green pond

Some days, it's just not your jam.

At least one recent study had recent grads in the Earth Sciences just behind Nursing in the top ten lowest unemployment majors, and earning more than any majors that didn't have "engineering" or "construction" in the title. But advertised jobs certainly seem focused on environmental applications.

A black fossil gastropod shell resembling a horn-of-plenty, but wide. This is the dorsal surface, a tapered ovoid form. Label: "Platyceras aequilaterale Hall Mississippian Crawfordsville, Indiana"

While there is evidence that some species were the vampires of the deep, drilling holes into crinoids to suck on their vital bodily fluids, others chose a different mode of parasitism, attaching to their anal pyramids instead. They are thought to be obligate coprophages.

Yep, they ate crap.

A black fossil gastropod shell resembling a horn-of-plenty, but wide. Label: "Platyceras aequilaterale Hall Mississippian Crawfordsville, Indiana"

It's been an overwhelming sort of day, butterflies. But it is still #MolluskMonday 🧪⚒️🐚 ...

Honestly, these guys have been cropping up in conversation on and off for months, so I'm overdue. Meet the platyceratids, an extinct clade of Paleozoic gastropods with unsavory dietary preferences. 💩

Twilight Zone twist: heroine suddenly remembers this specific question from the SATs ...

a woman is holding a pitcher of lemonade in front of a man and a woman with #thegoodplace written in the corner Alt: a woman is holding a glass and a pitcher of margaritas in front of a man and a woman. She offers a glass to the woman, who takes the pitcher instead and starts drinking. #thegoodplace written in the corner

Obviously, that's going to require another margarita.

Make that a pitcher.

"Little" caldera.

(But I was following their dino blog very closely at the time and my sense of humor doesn't always come across properly!)

Depends on the airport and airport bookstore. PDX has Powell's and that's always worth a stop.

Can't remember which airport bookstore it was, but I do recall seeing a dinosaur book called "My Beloved Brontosaurus" Can't remember the author's byline, but I probably should've snagged it at the time.

What, the Ordovician isn't Cambrian enough for you?

No, you're right, that osteostracan is clearly too derived for the Ordovician. The eurypterid's just hanging with the old folks.

If you ever run low on horrible invertebrate anecdotes (which is to say, you get bored of the classics), I can recommend a variety of coprophagous gastropods and barnacles of the genus Sacculina.

10/04? 🤦🏻‍♂️❤️

I mean, just, generally ... the Induan is A Bad Time To Visit. There were bad places and there were worse places, but none of 'em were what I'd call comfortable year-round.

Especially not anywhere on the Tethys.

Eocene? So, 56-34 million years ago, very approx. I'd dig further, but these burgers don't flip themselves!

Sure! I'll take mine with four shots espresso, a couple fingers of amaretto, and powdered cinnamon.

I mean, since we're talking nostalgia here.

Late Holocene, +/- a thousand years? My dating game is horrible.

Definitely post-Triassic.

To be fair, memory is fluid and not to be trusted, particularly mine

a cartoon character is standing on top of a pile of rocks with the words " maniacal laughter " written on the bottom Alt: Experiment 626 (Stitch) is standing on top of a pile of rocks with the words " maniacal laughter " written on the bottom

I have distinct memories of you on a roll explaining a matriarchal hyena culture you'd spun up that mostly ended up in Digger down the line.

While it is often challenging to ascribe trace fossils to specific organisms, these have been associated with Charadrii, a group of theropod dinosaurs that includes modern plovers, lapwings and killdeer. These are ferocious predators, if you're a small aquatic Invertebrate. As opposed to, say, a 🦋.

A slab of fine-grained mudstone with numerous bird footprint impressions, although none seem to be organized into linear trackways. Catalog label: "Fossil bird tracks (Order Charadriiformes, suborder Charadrii) Soldier Summit Member delta facies, Green River Formation, Eocene Epoch, Tertiary Period Left Fork of the White River North of Soldier Summit Wasatch County, Utah." Collection label: "Fossil bird tracks on shale U-3 bed of Green River Fm. (Eocene)- Soldier Summit, Utah"

"There is no branch of detective science that is so important and so much neglected as the art of tracing footsteps." -- Sherlock Holmes, A Study In Scarlet.

#FossilFriday was here, my dear Watson! ⚒️🧪👣

Here, for your consideration, are some bird tracks preserved in the mud of the Green River Fm.

I don't even know if Ursula's sainted mother knows how far back that particular natural history fixation goes.

Without tuition support for graduate students (in return for grossly underpaid labor), a lot of the US research endeavor would collapse. Hence the attacks on higher education.

The educational debt crisis that's developed since the 90s is unsustainable, and it's 100% failure to provide funding.

I remember student protests against an increase in fees in the German university system, 20 years ago. The increase was modest compared to my own in the USA, but it was refreshing to see the intensity of student opposition.

There was no way I could have done my graduate work without full support.

There are reasons this administration goes so hard after both the neuro-atypical and higher education.

Venn circle.

Administrators not included.

A conversation with staff in my former Accessibility office: oh, faculty are all documented. The entire PhD process is about a group of people with documented Special Interests confirming that your Special Interests have crossed the threshold of Special.

a woman is covering her mouth with her hand while holding a bow and arrow in a field . Alt: a woman is covering her mouth with her hand while holding a bow and arrow in a field .

Ok, I can only resist commenting on this thread so long. Time lapse clam photography is apparently my limit. (I reviewed every single frame of time lapse to calibrate an early webcam based mollusk monitoring system ... most linear graph I ever published 😆)

So it is with deep respect I offer this:

Nope. Accent might pass, use of articles betrays a familiarity with non-Slavic languages.

I don't think many military folk understand just how much socialism there is in the American military. Speaking as someone with a number of military family members.

Also, Ursula has always been hilarious and insightful and it's a crime it took everyone so long to notice.

They really know how to put their foot down!

We had to glue freshwater mussels down in front of a webcam to track valve movement 20 years ago (so much for non-invasive methods) and I have video (at a 20s frame rate) of one working itself free without damaging its shell.

You can't make a clam stay where it doesn't want to.