Nick Collins

THIS IS SO COOL

#paleostreamooc featuring @ambylotl.bsky.social @ppaleoartist.bsky.social @calamacow75.bsky.social

Mastophora phrynosoma 40 min sketch

Digital drawing of a pteromalid wasp. The entire wasp uses teal as the base colour with highlights in pure white across the eye, the abdomen, and parts of the thorax, and shadows in pink. The wings are transparent. The word "pteromalidae" is written in handwriting above the thorax of the wasp.

Drew this pteromalid wasp during #Hymathon2024. Always wanted to draw something using teal and light pink - very iridescent, bubblegum, dental hygienist vibes 🩷🩵✨️

Maybe I need to take another close up next time!

An absolutely beautiful showing of the scales of this Gymnandrosoma, people really sleep on the beauty of tiny #moths!

Three graphs showing how diphtheria, polio, and measles cases all declined right after mass vaccination.

These trends weren't an accident.

cdn.britannica.com/04/20904-050...

One of my fav theropods, #Saltriovenator and I in front of the #MSNM this last Friday. Sadly there were shut down due to national strikes throughout the country but uhh, kinda understandable.

Rearing container for a few of the 3,600 Winter Moths in the experiment (📷 @jamiecweir.bsky.social)

Herculean efforts by @jamiecweir.bsky.social in rearing 3,600 Winter Moth caterpillars to measure their growth and survival on nine different tree species 🐛🌳🐛🌳🐛🌳 link.springer.com/article/10.1... #teammoth

Using eDNA to play whack-a-mole with invasive species in green yard waste Abstract. As large cities begin to overrun their landfill capacities, they begin to look for alternative locations to handle the waste stream. Seeing an op

Collecting DNA from the environment (environmental DNA, eDNA) is a useful method for tracking invasive species.

Researchers monitored yard waste destined to be shipped from Vancouver BC to Washington State and found evidence of 3 invasive insect pests. 🍂

🧪 🌎 🪲 🪳

academic.oup.com/jee/article/...

Trump picks former congressman and Fox Business host Sean Duffy as next Transportation secretary | CNN Politics President-elect Donald Trump announced Monday he has selected former congressman and recent Fox Business co-host Sean Duffy to serve as the next secretary of the Department of Transportation.

Last week my two careers—racism scholar turned airline pilot—collided when Trump promised that his nominee for Secretary of Transportation "will make our skies safe again by eliminating DEI for pilots and air traffic controllers.”

Wait, what? 🧵 1/

That is quite a large one, I’m very interested in what it turns out to be

As I go through old student collections, you’d be shocked by how many things labeled as #Coleoptera are #Hemipterans! This was labeled as “Coccinellidae” which is… wrong. This is likely a species of Galgupha within Thyreocoridae, also known as #ebonybugs. Could be G. ovalis, though I am unsure.

Wow! What’s the magnification one that photo? Scydmaeninae are already super small. What a cool photo!

So, @frankashwood.bsky.social persuaded/reminded me that I should come back to Bluesky, especially after the exodus from Musk’s odious platform, as many people seem to have come here. So here’s a baby Holacanthella laterospinosa, which be of the amazing giant springtails from New Zealand…!

Three isopods on a sandy seafloor. One has a pair of shears and is cutting a red coral-like algae, one is planting seagrass, and one has a basket on its back.

Baltic isopods. Did this for pollinator week last year, a study showed that this species of aquatic isopod helps certain kinds of seagrass spread, making them one of the first known underwater pollinators!

➡️Our new🪳🦟🐛🌱🍃SPECIES INTERACTION NETWORK critique & analysis tips! Let's debate & let us know if you disagree! Ask for PDF via nico.bluethgen@web.de
A Critical Evaluation of #Network Approaches for Studying Species #Interactions | Annual Reviews - go.shr.lc/4fph7q0

2024 was a good year for getting to grips with #sawflies on Larch, and so next year can be all about adding some more dots to the distribution maps, as they're so poorly recorded in Yorkshire up to now. 🙂 #ento #yorkshiresawflies #symphyta #ukwildlife

People aren’t big fans of grain pests but when it’s a #weevil, I can’t help myself. This is Sitophilus zemais, the greater rice weevil, they are absolutely adorable.

Reactions mixed after LSU Disability Services quietly replaces human note-taking with AI LSU’s Office of Disability Services introduced a major change to its note-taking services this semester by replacing the student-peer note-taking system with Glean, an AI-powered program designed to t...

Like every other academic, I'm deeply concerned and dispirited by how AI is flooding the university at every level. I'm particularly frustrated and dismayed by the move to use AI to, in most cases, replace peer note-takers. www.lsureveille.com/news/lsu-dis...

Pseudopachybrachius basalis (Rhyparochromidae)

Likely Lygus, maybe Lygus lineolaris (Miridae)

Another Mirid, Phytocoris!

Neuroctenus (Aradidae)

Been at the lab IDing tiny #hemipterans small guys are always good fun, but here are a few! (For more info check alt text)

small gray scalloped fungus. shows the gills on the underside. the fungus has spider webs covered in dew drops on them.

Dainty little scallops on a walnut branch 🍄📷

A photo looking down at a white weevil liberally sprinkled with black spots, with its legs spanning the width of a thin leaf that cuts through the frame at a diagonal.

They're not just for Wednesdays: here is your Weekend Weevil. (A species of broad-nosed weevil, Emas National Park, Brazil). #insects 🐙🌿

Augochorella sp.

Chironomidae(?)

The insect Photo Booth

Aeschnidae naiad

Been getting quite a few followers lately so I thought I’d introduce myself! My name is Nick, and I am all about bugs, I work at the Virginia Tech insect collections and I am a full time student! I do a lot of insect ID and specimen work! Check out a few pics as of late!

I fit the bill! Would love to be included!

I also articulate skeletons, collect skulls and pin bugs on top of my other hobbies. A girl can never have too many.

It’s been a while since I’ve been active here!
Here’s some of my art as a reintroduction :)

a cartoon lambeosaurus, sticking its tongue out and drooling. a speech box reads " I CRAVE PLAMBTS!"

A dead splattered microraptor (drawn badly in pen) in a sauropod footprint. it looks like a roadkill bird.

A silhouette on innovatiocaris on sand in shallow water with trilobite tracks underneath it. in the bottom right is a trilobite. there are refracted sunspots from the water surface on the sand.

a haplocheirus from behind, standing on one foot. the other one raised. it looks like a cassowary of ostrich, or other big bird and has its head, long and goose-like, turned sideways on to the viewer. the tail and arms are fluffy. it is coloured like the roadrunner ccartoon and has a big head crest and moustache like feathers.

Tonight's #Paleostream #Flocking haul: a derpy Lambeosaurus, a Micraptor doing an impression of Kashaw, an Innovatiocaris hunting trilobites, and a Haplocheirus going "Meep Meep!". #paleoart #FossilFriday

Results from the Flocking #paleostream
Lambeosaurus, Microraptor, Innovatiocaris and Haplocheirus.