Dr. Solomon David

It’s morning of day 1 of my shark field research skills class! Wish us luck, and let me know if you want to sign up for the fall! 🦑🧪🌎🦈

Hahaha!
As @fishevodevogeno.bsky.social shows, you can certainly handle the eggs and not get poisoned. Wash your hands of course!

Although some people are indeed specifically allergic to gar slime 😮

Yeah right. That's exactly what a poisonous egg would post

Boophis reticulatus, a brown tree frog with weird ridges on its back, perched on a serrated bright green Pandanus leaf.

Platypelis pollicaris, a little brown narrow-mouth frog with flecks of gold over its body, sitting atop a bright green leaf

A female Calumma oshaughnessyi, a large green and grey chameleon with diagonal stripes up its body, walking along a branch toward camera left.

A portrait of Liopholidophis dolicocercus (sorry if you’re using a system that reads these Latin names aloud!), a black, brown, and bright yellow snake. In my years working with snakes in Madagascar, I think I have never had a more cooperative subject. It was totally calm and posable!

Yesterday we hiked out of the forest after five days totally off-grid. Hard to believe what’s happened in the world in the last five days! I’m quite glad we were out of signal range and able to focus on just excellent frogs and reptiles. 🧪🐸🦎🐍🇲🇬

It's the funding of taxonomic research & training that's dying out. Without an ability to identify life forms, we can't recognize/quantify invasions & extinctions and their impacts on ecosystems. Imagine trying to repair a complex steel structure if you can't distinguish different types of bearings.

Narrator: Dr. Shiffman confused “gourmet” with “garmet,” hence his final meal.

*the garnish was also toxic.

fin.

*perhaps* with *enough* hot sauce…might I recommend Tabasco GARlic😅

*DO NOT TRY THIS.

Thanks very much for your interest and questions!

People who tell me not to eat gar eggs: experts

People who cannot be trusted because they’re liars: experts

Conclusion:

Say no to cavigar, I mean garviar, I mean— just don’t eat gar eggs!

It can be high (which is relative), so best to consume in moderation, as with most top predator fish species.

Forbidden cavigar

Boy do I wish you had posted this before lunchtime

It’s *possible* that might reduce toxicity, but we don’t know much about the toxins. I’d highly recommend simply not eating the eggs (the meat is tasty though!)

It’s a niche “doctor” thing 😅😅😅

They look like plastic googly eyes that are so old the clear plastic is yellowing.

YouTube video by Bizarre Beasts Meet the Air-Breathing Fish with Poisonous Eggs

More on why you should NOT eat gar eggs in our episode @bizarrebeastsshow.bsky.social: youtu.be/Bcz67-n4GZg

a bald man is sitting in a chair with his hands folded and clapping . Alt: a bald man is sitting in a chair with his hands folded and clapping .

😂👍

They’re ALL toxic (to humans, other mammals, also birds, reptiles, amphibians, arthropods…but not to fishes!)

YouTube video by Bizarre Beasts Meet the Air-Breathing Fish with Poisonous Eggs

More on why you should NOT eat gar eggs in our episode @bizarrebeastsshow.bsky.social: youtu.be/Bcz67-n4GZg

Do NOT eat gar eggs!!! 🤢🤮

Big news for New York’s cutest. March 3rd.

This melts my cold, dead heart. I also got to play "bug hunt" with my friend's 3-year-old daughter yesterday. The kids are alright! They just wanna do fun stuff like learn about bugs and fish like the rest of us!

I guess now she's in the First GARde?

The Voyageurs Wolf Project of Northern Minnesota tags & documents grey wolf ecology & behavior: www.voyageurswolfproject.org

The video you see here is confirmatory proof:
Wolves. Love. Blueberries.

As much as 83% of a wolf's calories in summer months comes from eating berries.

Thanks for the reply! [re-]Posted it for myself as much as for sharing it; need SOME bright spots these days 🫠

My kinderGARtner (6-year-old daughter) tells us about gars!

While watching our fish tank (aka The Gar-den), I asked her to talk about gars for a bit. Proud parent 🥹 #SciComm #GarWeek

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

1/10

The croc lineage isn’t just a bunch of identical “living fossils.” They did ‘dinosaur’ before dinosaurs and did ‘dolphin’ before dolphins. Also phytosaurs did ‘croc’ before crocs did.

Everything is a call back to the Triassic.