an aerial photo by Peter Yeung of lush gardens and waterways

an aerial photo by Toby Harriman of floating gardens

With her new book, ‘Lo—TEK Water’, Julia Watons wants to reshape the aquatic world through Indigenous technologies.

www.thisiscolossal.com/2025/10/lo-t...

Sunrise or sunset over a rocky beach with sea and cliffs in the background

Reflected Vista, 2018 by contemporary Impressionist US painter Erin Hanson #WomensArt

A purple flower with a small fly

Close up of the fly on the purple flower, showing the head and thorax mostly

A close up of the fly on the purple flower showing the wings mostly

A close up of the fly on the purple flower from the other side showing the front end mostly

Sicus ferrugineus on Centaurea nigra. Ferruginous Bee-grabber on Knapweed.

A plant growing between stones covered by clear water. The plant is flowering. The stem is red and the blossoms are white.

Lobelia dortmanna #aquaticplants

I found a barely moving click beetle ready for death after being trapped in my house for who knows how long, but life hack: if you give dehydrated bugs some water you can watch them drink it and then get better

Small pale coloured mushrooms growing with a bright green coloured liverwort. Gravel and soil are at the bottom of the picture along with dead leaves.

A close up of the pale coloured mushrooms and the green liverwort.

A zoomed in photo of the pale mushrooms. The caps appear pleated and they closely resemble lampshades.

Pretty shrooms growing on the river bank. Coprinellus diseminatus with Pellia sp. liverwort in the background. The #fungi were growing at the bases of Alder trees Alnus glutinosus.

That’s the female I think. Blue legs! Great photo.

A brilliant turquoise damselfly with sparkling brown wings perched on a blade of green grass and surrounded by more grass

Calyopterx virgo, Beautiful Demoiselle. #BlueSkyArtShow #Vibrant

A picture of some wild strawberry plants with ripe and ripening fruit.

Wild strawberry yumminess jackpot

A collage of six pictures of fence posts with bilberry plants growing at the top of the pole. Green fields behind, blue skies with various cloud cover.

A collage of four photos of fence posts with bilberry growing out of the top of the pole. Except for the first picture where the bilberry is also growing out of the side of the fence pole.

A collage of three photos of fence posts with bilberry growing out of the top of the pole.

Went back - there’s thirteen fence posts in about a 200m+ stretch with bilberry. I was thinking that lots of rain is a requirement for this fence post growth, but only the very smallest badly affected by the recent drought. Which suggests lots of rain necessary until long roots grow?

A sewage overflow valve in Simpelveld, the Netherlands. One of our sample locations where raw sewage mixes with the Eyserbeek stream. Yes, it smelled. Photo: Auke-Florian

A caddisfly casing, Chaetopteryx villosa, with green flat particle (RMNH.INS.1658129). On the left, beneath the specimen, a colourised SEM photograph of the artificial particle, and on the right, EDX mapping visualization showing the chemical elements found, in this case titanium, chloride and sulphur. This casings is retrievable in jar BE.2289652 in the collection of Naturalis Biodiversity Center. Images credit: Isabel van der Velden and Auke-Florian Hiemstra.

NEW PAPER, NEW THREAD! 👀

We collected insects in creeks polluted with raw sewage. 🤢 Microplastics in caddisflies were once rare. But now, in some creeks, more than half of all cases include artificial material! 🤯

A shitty thread on plastics and poop, thankfully, without the smell of it 💩

1/x 🧵👇

A fly with big brown eyes and a striped thorax and abdomen on a white flower head with many individual florets. The background is green vegetation and another white flower head is at the top of the photo.

Graphomya maculata #fly on Heracleum sphondylium.

A white script lichen with black elongate apothecia that look like abstract cave paintings

Lovely script #lichen in bark

And a little video showing it’s lovely white feet

A moth with a pale orange-brown body, head and wing tips. Most of the wing is a mottled grey, silver near the head and darkening towards the middle. It is on grey stone with some green leaves below and to the right.

The same moth seen from the front. Its antennae are brown and the tips of its feet are white. Its head is a little fuzzy.

The same moth perched on a pice of wood which is similar in colour to the paler parts of its body.

Thought this moth was a piece of bark blown along by the wind. Fab camouflage. Put it in a piece of timber out of the wind. The App says it’s Phalera bucephela.

A landscape photo. The sky is pale blue with grey clouds at the top of the picture with a bright light slightly behind the clouds which is the moon. Below there is a line of white clouds just above the dark hills. Then there is water which is reflecting the light from the moon. The land is still in shadow and there are some lights from houses scattered but mainly to the left of the photo. On the left foreground there are leafless tree branches.

For #BlueSkyArtShow #LightAndShadow Taken at the beginning of Winter, the moon about to set in the early morning.

Textile artwork featuring two birds in flight, flring right, against a swirling sky

'Twisting and turning' by UK textile artist Rachel Wright, machine embroidered #WomensArt

A chart of the different types of insect antennae First row: Setaceous (like a bristle) Filiform (like a thread) Moniliform (beaded) Serrate (toothy) Second row: Pectinate (comb-like) Bipectinate (double combs!) Clavate (club-like) Capitate (club-ended) Third row: Aristate (a nub with a hair stuck to it) Pilose (brushy) Plumose (feathery) Geniculate (bendy straw) Fourth row: Stylate (small and pointy) Flabellate (fan-shaped) Lamellate (stack of plates)

Know your insect antennae!
#insects #bugs #antennae #entomology #education #art #SciArt

E aí, seus tucanuçu (Ramphastos toco)

"tucano-flecha"

📍 Nova Serrana, MG, Brasil
📅 05/2025
#birdsoftheworld

A small bee on a yellow flower. The bee’s abdomen can be seen through its folded wings and it’s striped yellow and black I think. Yellow pollen can be seen at the end of its legs. Its thorax and head are mostly black and surrounded by fine pale furry hairs . Its eyes are big and black. Its antennae are black. Mostly green vegetation in the background.

For #WorldBeeDay little solitary bee

A black and white Ink handmade illustration of Queen Bee of Apis cerana indica (Indian honeybee), two eyes, two antennae on the head, six legs with hair, transparent wings, six black rings on the abdomen. Hairy abdomen and legs. White background. My signature on righthand corner. Here is an ink study of Queen Bee of Apis cerana indica (Indian honey bee) for #WorldBeeDay Since the time we moved to my studio space in 2005, have been extremely lucky to witness a lot of urban wildlife in and around. My late mother’s neem tree is home to diverse insects and substantial honeycombs. Seeing these honey bees built their hives is one of my pleasured past times. During the summer holidays, my kids have also seen these hives grow in size and an empty hive. The circle of how there is a buzz during spring is a sight to behold. Wishing these bees thrive and grow in years to come! Indian honey bee (Apis cerana indica) Title: Penance_53! Medium: Ink on paper Size: 8.1/4 x 11.1/2 inches (20.5 x 28.1 cms) size; 120 GSM Duration: 2 hours May 19th, 2025 Reference: Own Image Location: Kalkere,Horamavu,Bangalore,Karnataka,India

Here is an ink study of Queen Bee of Apis cerana indica (Indian honeybee) for #WorldBeeDay

1/2 Since the time we moved to my studio space in 2005

#art #nature #illustration #sciart #indianwildlifeartist #scientificillustration #inkart #wildlifeart #traditionalart #penart #scicomm #insects #bugsky

A bunch of pink flowers blooming in a green hedge. Blue sky in the background at the top of the picture.

Another view of the same pink flowers in the green hedge and the sky is blue.

A close up of the pink flowers. The flowers are small but there are many on each stem. The flower stems are red. The green leaves of the flower have a wavy edge. Some ferns and other green vegetation surround the flowers, the sky is blue.

Lovely frothy clouds of pink Saxifraga spathularis in the hedgerow

An orange lichen on a grey rough textured wall. Part of the wall has crumbled away leaving a rounded cavity. An orange lichen sits vertically inside the cavity and a second orange lichen sits horizontally outside and on the edge of the cavity.

For #BlueSkyArtShow orange lichen on a crumbling concrete wall with a rough #texture

Stones and rocks. One large blue colored rock and one large dark purple colored rock surrounded by smaller stones that are mostly variations on dark purple with some bluish

For #BlueSkyArtShow seaside rocks with smooth #texture

A bumpy tree frog is holding onto jagged, rough bark of a tree cavity.

#BlueSkyArtShow #texture

A yellow lichen with lots of large orange apothecia surrounding a white crustose lichen with brown apothecia.

Xanthoria and Lecanora #lichens

Small dark coloured insect with long antennae, a pinched waist and a long ovipositor. Background is white with mostly brown crumbs.

A closer shot of the same insect.

A less clear picture of the same insect on a large crumb which is mostly brown but green on top. Zooming in on the insect the coloration on her legs is easier to see than the previous two photos.

Found a little Ichneumon wasp on a plate among breadcrumbs. She nearly got brushed into the compost.

a Masai warrior stands on a hillside, looking out over a hazy landscape, with a pink picnic blanket on the rocks behind him

In his new book, 'The Anthropocene Illusion,' Zed Nelson takes us on a global journey that lifts the veil, so to speak, on what we think of as “wilderness” and our progressively uneasy relationship with the environment.

www.thisiscolossal.com/2025/05/zed-...