Dan Baldassarre

Birds of the World | The Cornell Lab @birdsoftheworld.bsky.social [ View ] Feb 15, 2024 at 14:21 UTC

The Red-backed Fairywren ranks among the world's coolest birds. Yes/No? Thank you @evornithology.bsky.social, et al., for revising/updating the species profile. Read it this week during the open-access period. Image ©BirdsoftheWorld | Art by Hilary Burn. birdsoftheworld.org/bow/species/...

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Feb 11, 2024 at 13:51 UTC

Her: I’m coming over. You better not be using your super-absorbent belly feathers to soak up and transport water to your nestlings. Me, a Namaqua Sandgrouse:

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Feb 11, 2024 at 02:17 UTC

That time during my PhD when my field site burned to the ground 🥴 Queensland (2009)

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Feb 10, 2024 at 15:21 UTC

The fastest poop on the planet 💩💨 #binoblast

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Feb 07, 2024 at 19:13 UTC

Convergent evolution at work! Australia doesn't have any hummingbirds, but it has plenty of honeyeaters like this Eastern Spinebill that also evolved to feed on nectar. These guys target mainly flowering trees and shrubs and also eat a lot of insects. Queensland (2009)

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Feb 04, 2024 at 03:01 UTC

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Feb 03, 2024 at 02:03 UTC

Stabby fella! 😳 Sacred Kingfisher, Queensland ca 2010

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Jan 31, 2024 at 00:53 UTC

“Hummingbirds and swifts are actually very closely rested to nightjars, suggesting they evolved from a nocturnal common ancestor”

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Jan 29, 2024 at 00:51 UTC

This really is an astonishing photo by @chavecito.bsky.social. A pack of bloodthirsty Vampire Finches attacking a booby on Wolf Island in the Galápagos. A few thousand years of convergent evolution managed to produce avian mosquitos!

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Jan 14, 2024 at 00:59 UTC

Most bird color studies focus on flashy species with obvious sex differences. Here, we found that even drab, seemingly monochromatic species can show subtle variation that is nearly impossible for humans to perceive! 5/5 tinyurl.com/5berv84a

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Jan 14, 2024 at 00:59 UTC

We also compared plumage color between mated individuals and found an unexpected pattern of disassortative mating: more black and saturated birds pair with more gray and unsaturated birds. Plumage may be a signal allowing individuals to choose a genetically dissimilar mate. 4/5

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Jan 14, 2024 at 00:58 UTC

Even though the difference is minor, avian visual models suggest it is perceptible to the signal receiver. Especially since Black Terns occur in wide open habitat conducive to visual signaling, we're pretty confident they can use plumage to distinguish the sexes. 3/5

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Jan 14, 2024 at 00:58 UTC

If you've ever watched Black Terns, you know that males and females are nearly impossible to tell apart. But our quantitative analyses showed a subtle, but significant difference: males are darker than females. 2/5

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Jan 14, 2024 at 00:57 UTC

🚨 NEW PREPRINT ALERT! 🚨 With talented SUNY Oswego undergrad Kristina Davis and Black Tern Whisperer Dave Shealer, we used reflectance spectrometry to see if Black Terns might use plumage color as a sexual signal. 1/5 📷 Ian K. Barker

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Jan 13, 2024 at 01:24 UTC

🚨 NEW SPECIES ACCOUNT! 🚨

With Emma Greig & Mike Webster: the @birdsoftheworld.bsky.social Red-backed Fairywren species account! Turns out we know a lot about this cute little puffball. Read up and amaze your friends with fairywren trivia! birdsoftheworld.org/bow/species/...

📷 Ian Davies, eBird

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Jan 10, 2024 at 14:20 UTC

“Get a load of these dingbats.” -me, probably Stumbling upon a family of roosting Tawny Frogmouths in Queensland, ca 2010. Their camouflage is incredible and they remain completely still all day long. How many do you see?

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Jan 07, 2024 at 15:15 UTC

Thinking of her… (Bertha, my FJ60 Land Cruiser field vehicle)

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 29, 2023 at 16:39 UTC

Is this photo of Richard Owen and a moa skeleton the most unintentionally terrifying image in the history of science? Ol buddy looks like he's about to cast a fucking spell and turn us all into flightless birds.

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 27, 2023 at 13:57 UTC

All these TikTok kids talking bout rizz when the Greater Sage-Grouse invented the damn word 📷 Andrew Spencer, eBird

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 24, 2023 at 19:13 UTC

Love this student eval comment: “This was no Netflix documentary: the evolution of your favorite thing! This was nitty gritty details, understanding concepts, and showing if you understood what was taught.”

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 20, 2023 at 01:48 UTC

We’ve lost about one of every nine bird species in the last 126,000 years. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 19, 2023 at 15:01 UTC

Wreath Witherspoon is that anything

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 17, 2023 at 19:25 UTC

Tax churches and we could fix every problem in this country.

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 16, 2023 at 15:08 UTC

Lol

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 16, 2023 at 13:41 UTC

I'm currently deceased. 💀 New prof friend of mine just graded their first final exam and got so excited because the student received a perfect score! It was the answer key, folks. They graded the answer key.

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 13, 2023 at 03:18 UTC

New one for me: I told my students when the "final draft" of their paper was due and one asked, "Since that's only a draft, when is the actual final version due?" 🙃

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 11, 2023 at 22:44 UTC

Forget about grants and publications, number of empty styrofoam coolers is the true indicator of your lab’s productivity. Add yours to the thread! 👇

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 07, 2023 at 22:40 UTC

Ah yes the three food groups

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 03, 2023 at 23:14 UTC

Guys, what’s stopping you from dressing like this? Satin Bowerbird 📷 Ian Davies, eBird

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Dec 03, 2023 at 13:59 UTC

So good! I think we do still have some of those floating around.

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Nov 26, 2023 at 00:51 UTC

Back in my PhD days when I was down at my fighting weight. We had an epic swimming hole behind our field house. There was an Azure Kingfisher that lived there. Samford Valley, QLD, Australia; ca 2011

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Nov 21, 2023 at 16:09 UTC

From the paper www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Nov 21, 2023 at 16:09 UTC

Penguin behavior experiment or s&m dungeon you be the judge

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Nov 20, 2023 at 20:21 UTC

“They’re changing the name of my gull???”

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Nov 18, 2023 at 19:25 UTC

My toxic trait is batrachotoxin. (I’m a Hooded Pitohui, a poisonous bird endemic to Papua New Guinea.)

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Nov 17, 2023 at 17:30 UTC

You know I keep that thang on me

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Nov 17, 2023 at 00:36 UTC

This kind of smart, walkable, mixed-use urbanism is illegal to build in most American cities

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Dan Baldassarre @evornithology.bsky.social [ View ] Nov 14, 2023 at 16:00 UTC

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