@sarahdalgulls especially in times of unprecedented climate change. Looking backwards is a hiding to nowhere, and increasingly one that will only generate environmental grief. Instead, let's look forward and plan for a new biodiversity rich future that can adapt and thrive in the Anthropocene.

@sarahdalgulls my answer is probably somewhat controversial, as I think the answer is simply whatever is greater of (a) the population that minimises extinction risk within 3 generations to below 99.9% and (b) the number most people who care want. Sometimes that will be small.

I really don't think historic values should come into this discussion, partly because we'll never agree what they were and what date to use, but mostly because I think conservation needs to be dynamic & forward looking.

@sarahdalgulls gannets, skuas, etc too, but when it comes to gulls, as I'm sure you know, the challenge may be greater still. The fact gulls in some places are common & unpopular with chip eaters yet are a conservation priority because they are declining perhaps due to discard reduction sets up an unnecessary conservation conflict that, I'm sure, affects people's sympathy for conservation in general. The bigger question conservation needs to address is how many is enough of anything?

If you're a UK scientist please consider adding your name to this letter to the secretary of state for science regarding her recent remarks on "kicking woke ideology out of science". Thanks!

https://hull.onlinesurveys.ac.uk/edi_in_science

Conservation prioritisation uses population declines to ID threat, & the fulmar is listed at Amber in the UK. Certainly, the warming of our seas https://climatereanalyzer.org/clim/sst_daily/ will be having a negative impact fulmars, but for seabirds where the decline is mostly due to loss of discards it seems that we shouldn’t be prioritising these #birds. I’d be sad if they go of course, watching them floating above cliffs is a delight, but is this a conservation problem? 5/5
Pic Tom Bensen flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Our best theories are therefore that an increase in diet flexibility of birds in Iceland enabled some birds to use fisheries discards, plus changes in ocean currents led to an increase in cold water in the Eastern North Atlantic enabling the expansion. The decline in fisheries discards is a good thing, but presents an conundrum for seabird conservation: it seems inevitable many seabird populations will also decline https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1365-2664.12072. 4/5

Pic roger mepsted flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

From modern tracking data, we know that for many birds discards are a major source of food https://www.int-res.com/articles/meps_oa/m679p181.pdf, but thanks to their endearing habit of projectile vomiting foul-smelling half-digested stomach contents on anyone approaching them we know lots of birds don’t use this resource, particularly not the birds on St Kilda, many of whom still eat mainly plankton https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/j.1474-919X.1984.tb00259.x. 3/5

Pic Bruce Jacobs flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

The first new colonies grew in Iceland in the 18th C, then colonised the Faroes in the mid 19th C before arriving in Shetland by 1878, then spreading as far south as France. By mapping the genetics of the expanding birds https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1600-048X.2013.00262.x, we know that this expansion is due to emigration from Iceland, not St Kilda. The earliest explanation for this change suggested that expansion followed a switch in diet to use waste from whaling fleets. 2/5

Pic roger mepsted flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

The Storm Petrel’s larger cousin is the Fulmar & they have just as interesting a #CuriousTales to tell. Just like Storm Petrels they spend their lives on the sea and 500 years ago their European breeding range was tiny, restricted to a colony in northern Iceland & one on St Kilda in the far west of the Hebrides https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/abs/10.1098/rspb.2002.2322. That these #birds now breed all around the UK and into France is a remarkable range expansion. 1/5

Pic roger mepsted flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

A few days ago I read the exciting news that Dimethyl Sulphide (DMS) had probably been discovered in the atmosphere of a #planet in a different solar system https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-66786611. This is pretty exciting because on earth DMS is uniquely associated with #life. Hunting for life on another planet by finding DMS would be cool, and reminded me that Storm Petrels use DMS to search for life on the high seas. 1/4

Pic Peter Steward CC BY-NC 2.0 DEED

Out at sea, these tiny #birds need to locate foraging areas. Feeding on zooplankton https://natuurtijdschriften.nl/pub/546218 the best place to forage would be above features that force nutrient rich water upwards. But where these are in a featureless ocean is where scent comes in: plant plankton being eaten by zooplankton gives off DMS, & storm petrels are strongly attracted to tiny quantities https://journals.biologists.com/jeb/article/211/11/1706/9495/Sensory-ecology-on-the-high-seas-the-odor-world-of So storm petrels find life at sea in the same way we might be finding life in the galaxy! 4/4

Long life, very large eggs and the ancestors being huge albatrosses suggests Storm Petrels may have evolved from a larger ancestor, keeping some of the usual large species traits. And that continues at sea, where even during the nesting season tiny GPS tags show us that #birds make foraging trips of 1-3 days, covering nearly 1000 km & getting over 300 km from shore. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/bird-conservation-international/article/gps-tracking-reveals-highly-consistent-use-of-restricted-foraging-areas-by-european-stormpetrels-hydrobates-pelagicus-breeding-at-the-largest-uk-colony-implications-for-conservation-management/DE6A57A1B5C3141DAB63A854610334D7 3/4

Pic Muchaco flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 DEED

Storm Petrels are tiny sea #birds. Weighing just over 30 g they’re pretty similar in mass to House Sparrows, but they spend their lives far out to sea and they live forever: the oldest ringed individual was over 38 years old and still going https://app.bto.org/ring/countyrec/results2021/longevity.htm#520. Compared to their body size, Storm Petrels lay one of the largest eggs of any #bird (25% of adult mass) https://academic.oup.com/auk/article/129/3/510/5148686 2/4

Pic Oscar Valencoso - Salomé CC BY-NC 2.0 DEED

A few days ago I read the exciting news that Dimethyl Sulphide (DMS) had probably been discovered in the atmosphere of a #planet in a different solar system https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-66786611. This is pretty exciting because on earth DMS is uniquely associated with #life. Hunting for life on another planet by finding DMS would be cool, and reminded me that Storm Petrels use DMS to search for life on the high seas. 1/4

Pic Peter Steward CC BY-NC 2.0 DEED

Or most interestingly, if they know that patch quality declines over time, they should sample for a day and if foraging is slow would leave soon, but if foraging is above a critical threshold, would stay until they are fat. It is this strategy that Sedge Warblers actually do when fattening, meaning that in any one site, depnding on the foraging conditions of their arrival day some birds could leave with low mass, & others with extremely high ones. 4/4

Pic Tom Lee flickr CC BY 2.0 DEED

Firstly, they could simply stay as long as it takes until they reach a target mass, & then leave. If foraging is slow they’d stay longer as it takes longer to reach optimal mass. Secondly, they could do the opposite: sample the food for a day, & if foraging is slow they could leave overnight & hope to find a better patch. In this case, the higher the initial foraging rate, the higher their departure mass. 3/4
Pic ianpreston flickr CC BY 2.0 DEED

In the autumn if food is abundant they can do this day on day. Fattening Sedge warblers love Reed Aphids, which can be superabundant, but are patchily distributed: some reedbeds are full, others not so much & even full reedbeds are hard to forage in when it is windy. Each bird arriving at a potential fattening site has to make a decision about how long to stay. If getting to Africa is the objective, there are several strategies birds could try. 2/4

Pic ianpreston flickr CC BY 2.0 DEED

The daily fat deposition of #birds in the winter are impressive, but nothing like the fat accumulation that is achieved by the Sedge warbler as it gets ready to migrate. With a lean weight of ~10g, when they are ready to migrate south birds are often >20g, completely covered in a layer of yellow fat! Like Goldcrests, fattening Sedge Warblers can increase body mass by 20% in a day https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0003347207002321 1/N

Pic Mrs Airwolfhound flickr CC BY-ND 2.0 DEED

The strain on scientific publishing 📄:

The publishing sector has a problem. Scientists are overwhelmed, editors are overworked, special issue invitations are constant, research paper mills, article retractions, journal delistings… JUST WHAT IS GOING ON!?

Myself, pablo, @paolocrosetto and Dan have spent the last few months investigating just that.
https://arxiv.org/abs/2309.15884

A thread🧵1/n

#AcademicChatter #PublishOrPerish #Elsevier #Springer #MDPI #Wiley #Frontiers #PhDAdvice #PhDChat #SciComm

Cyrtodactylids are among my favorite geckos and there are more species than I could possibly see in a lifetime. Here's an Oldham's Bow-fingered Gecko (Cyrtodactylus oldhami) doing a little face maintenance. The human equivalent would be sticking your tongue in your ear :) Phuket, Thailand. #herps #geckos #nature #naturephotography