Irene García-Ruiz

I am looking for a PhD student to join my new Socio-Eco-Evo group, hosted in Katie Peichel's Evolutionary Ecology Division @ University of Bern. We're offering a fully funded 4-year position, studying social plasticity and behavioral adaptation among stickleback in Greenland. Please share around!

Experts warn: Mass removal of stray dogs could backfire on public health | India News - The Times of India India News: A coalition of multisectoral experts from a range of global institutions has lent its weight to petitioners in the stray dog case being heard in Supre.

timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/expert...

Scared of spiders? The real horror story is a world without them Members of the arachnid class—think spiders, scorpions and harvestmen (daddy long legs)—are often the targets of revulsion, disgust and fear.

Despite their reputation, insects and arachnids are vital to ecosystems, yet nearly 90% of North American species lack conservation status due to significant data gaps.

A Day in the Life of an Ensh*ttificator YouTube video by Forbrukerrådet - Norwegian Consumer Council

www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4Up...

Schematic of experimental design in new study.

Dwarf mongoose acting as a sentinel in Limpopo Province, South Africa

📢NEW paper alert

📖How #aggression between groupmates can have lasting consequences both for #cooperative #behaviour & responses to #intergroup threats:

doi.org/10.1016/j.an...

👑Led by @josharbon.bsky.social

#fieldwork #experiments #mongooses #mammals #bioacoustics
@bristolbiosci.bsky.social

I think they usually mix it with other drugs to make them more addictive.

Ecological harshness has a weak influence on reproductive trade-offs in a great tit population Abstract. Lack’s seminal work on bird clutch sizes has spurred expansive research on reproductive trade-offs, especially focusing on offspring quantity–qua

New paper out in @jevbio.bsky.social
Using 58 years of data, we look at the effect of environmental variation on reproductive trade-offs in great tits.

With @jsmartin.bsky.social, @dzchilds.bsky.social, Ella Cole, @sheldonbirds.bsky.social, @paniw.bsky.social & Arpat Ozgul

doi.org/10.1093/jeb/...

Please stop the madness!

How insects’ sex is determined is unlikely to be what makes them so social

Does haplodiploidy - a method of sex determination seen in bees and ants among other animals - promote eusociality?

New research from @rbonifacii.bsky.social and @stuwest.bsky.social enters evidence into this long debate that - despite popular belief - this is not the case 👇
bit.ly/4qEoEWm

Happy birthday to one of my favourite haters, Charles Darwin

Comic. [2x2 chart. Top left quadrant: seem like dinosaurs x are dinosaurs. Silhouettes of dinosaurs stegosaurus, triceratops, tyrannosaurus, velociraptor, and long-neck dinosaur. Top right quadrant: seem like dinosaurs x are not dinosaurs. Silhouettes of mosasaur, quetzalcoatlus, dimetrodon, plesiosaur, and pteranodon. Bottom left quadrant: don’t seem like dinosaurs x are dinosaurs. Silhouettes of penguin, egret, ostrich, pigeon, falcon. Bottom right: don’t seem like dinosaurs x are not dinosaurs. Silhouettes of squirrel, stapler, plant, person, and bicycle.]

Dinosaurs And Non-Dinosaurs

xkcd.com/3204/

Principles of experimental design for ecology and evolution Here I argue that we do not discuss experimental design, often until it is too late. This editorial seeks to begin a conversation about how and where to replicate appropriately.

The principles of experimental design in ecology and evolution has 20k downloads, but unfortunately I still have to reject ~20% of papers without review because they lack replication at the right level. More discussion among mentors and mentees please.
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

How is this even a thing?!

Why termite kings and queens are monogamous: Scientists uncover surprising answer Termites are among the most successful animals on Earth, forming vast societies that can number in the millions. But how did such complex social systems evolve from solitary ancestors that looked much like today's cockroaches?

Termite societies evolved greater social complexity not by gaining genes, but by losing those linked to sperm competition, supporting the role of monogamy in the rise of complex insect colonies. doi.org/hbmvcr

IMAGE SHOWS GRAPHIC OF CORNELL LAB OF ORNITHOLOGY PHYLOGENY EXPLORER TOOL.

MAJOR NEWS! We just launched an awesome new tool! The illustrated Birds of the World Phylogeny Explorer lets users trace any bird’s lineage, compare species relationships, and explore major evolutionary milestones with a click of a button. SHARE and EXPLORE! birdsoftheworld.org/bow/news/phy...

I feel what is missing is a detailed description of what the Mediterranean diet exactly is, as there seems to not be fully consensus.

We experienced a truly incredible moment at the aquarium when this octopus decided to be a total jerk to its tankmate.

Sorry but MDPI is not a trustworthy publisher, I would take anything pushed there with a grain of salt.

Promoting the use of phylogenetic multinomial generalised mixed-effects model to understand the evolution of discrete traits Abstract. Phylogenetic comparative methods (PCMs) are fundamental tools for understanding trait evolution across species. While linear models are widely us

NEW METHODS ARTICLE: Phylogenetic GLMMs open doors to study evolution of discrete traits. We show how binary models extend to ordinal & nominal traits, using bird data, and provide tutorials to make these methods accessible to evolutionary biologists:

doi.org/10.1093/jeb/...
Mizuno et al.

We've got ISSUES. Literally.

We scraped >100k special issues & over 1 million articles to bring you a PISS-poor paper. We quantify just how many excess papers are published by guest editors abusing special issues to boost their CVs. How bad is it & what can we do?

arxiv.org/abs/2601.07563

A 🧵 1/n

Wow! and at daylight, such a beautiful specimen

A tiny mouse hints at why some mammal mothers may benefit from choosing more than one father Many animals do something that still surprises researchers: females often mate with more than one male. This behavior—polyandry—has long raised a blunt question.

House mice show that females mating with multiple males can lead to larger litters when food quality is low, suggesting that reproductive strategies may shift with environmental conditions. doi.org/hbjtjv

Yes, in other countries it's on a Sunday and if you have to work on that day you still get half day off to vote.

As Gibson said, you cannot disentangle the environment from the animal - "animal and environment make an inseparable pair.“

Change the environment, change the animal (and your results)

Getting strong Black Mirror vibes.

How a biological version of rock-paper-scissors determines if lizard colors are maintained or lost Two new studies into lizard colors reveal how one species maintains its colorful diversity while others are losing their ancient colors.

Interactions similar to rock-paper-scissors help maintain color diversity in some lizard species, but the introduction of a dominant new phenotype can disrupt this balance and lead to color loss. doi.org/hbhxh4

Yeah right

Or as I do now, buy a real tree in a pot that will grow each year, as a house plant that you decorate for Christmas time.