Jon Sullivan

Kia ora! I'm a #nature nut, addict of #iNaturalist NZ — Mātaki Taiao, and an #ecologist at #LincolnUniversity in #Aotearoa-#NewZealand.

I spend an inordinate amount of my time counting nature to watch what's changing (see https://wildcounts.org/).

#TwitterMigration #NZTwits #ecology #EcologicalMonitoring #NaturalHistory #iNaturalistNZ #iNaturalist #wildcounts #RStats #Biodiversity

Born when there was 326 ppm carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.


nostr:npub14q65q4chux7xxq3vhpudqjwkjyn2e0dasj8gdnythed7sxe4scfqratpkg There should be a hashtag for #AccidentalScienceArt. I’d follow that. 😃


nostr:npub10pe2uzvzf5ryn09hk9afhdn4mzkw37hjh7wf8x2sg0auly24flusmlqru6 #doggles 😄


Here's the #iNaturalist observation that one of our first-year ecology undergrads made. This was part of a #LincolnUniversityNZ field trip for our first year ecology and conservation course.

https://inaturalist.nz/observations/186251171


Check out this movie of a most excellent flatworm. Watch it crawl!

We found it yesterday on Quail Island, NZ, living under a rock near the water a low tide.

It's been identified to genus Notoplana on #iNaturalist.

#invertebrates #flatworm #creature #movie

https://flic.kr/p/2p7t9Zk


I was biking home from Lyttelton, about a fifth of the way up the Governors Bay side of Dyers Pass, and my chain snapped! I was on the side of the road trying to get my old chain tool to work with my modern chain, unsuccessfully, when someone called Jane pulled up and asked it I needed a lift. Did I ever! 10 min later my bike and I were by my house. I tried to get Jane’s contact information, to send her a thank you gift, but she refused, and insisted I should just pay it forward. #IILoveNZ!


nostr:npub1xc9n2lhhc6wy2wvsum8f9wcc955myh0pkx3y0788xkvzj6urp7mq9u47v9 Cool! Echidna snuffles!


nostr:npub1lm5rj2l4tm3ls9vm8876xsncf4che0ngh7sctzpxpn0f39ukrpcsv20qrr Nice. I like Steve Sailer's comment on that post:

If A correlates with B, then

A could cause B
or B could cause A
or C could cause both A and B
or it’s just a random fluke
or it’s due to incompetence
or it’s due to fraud or bias
or maybe a few other reasons.


nostr:npub1kc5nynfw5acnr7a40pjj6sz0gxav8xgsv9qp9dely4tv6zmufwnsl6wnc5 Fascinating. I’d not heard of “beaver bombing” and “rogue rewilding”.

“The rewilding fringe believes that something more radical than scientific reintroduction and conservation programs that are implemented at a sloth-like pace is necessary.“

I’m wary of “illegal anonymous rogue rewilding,” as we like to rush in with quick fixes instead of giving natural areas the space and time to heal wildly.  Still, with the climate warming fast, lots of species translocations will be needed.


nostr:npub13q72uml6e3slewcasxh6gvaxzc237yykdnw9ap07xeyw6dd82z5qslwcnd I’m not sure whether to say “yes” or “no” to that. 😄


What a wind!! Through yesterday evening and night Ōtautahi-Christchurch, NZ, was blasted with a furiously strong southwesterly wind.

Here are some of the photos I took on my bike ride home, of the weird clouds that the wind whipped up.

As usual, full-res images are on #flickr

#weather #nz #southwesterly #storm #photography

https://mastodon.nz/system/media_attachments/files/111/166/951/067/960/427/original/5dc53eb747e9f5c8.jpg

https://mastodon.nz/system/media_attachments/files/111/166/951/067/812/586/original/d18ed195bc1eed2a.jpg

https://mastodon.nz/system/media_attachments/files/111/166/951/071/324/535/original/d77234aaebcff5aa.jpg

https://mastodon.nz/system/media_attachments/files/111/166/951/075/629/338/original/e70fe8fe9c96d90f.jpg


nostr:npub1tfklt82ek7yag5w6cxr898ev40hkgdc8yt7ddjykl0adgfmscucsf0drhe Interesting history and perspective. I like their conclusion: "creatures have a right to exist in accordance with their nature, even if it is their nature to make trouble for humankind."


nostr:npub1fhawqey7c9jrs48d27dggwm0kvg9ufxl07227ue5dfx9mhy7mdgs993ru0 nostr:npub1zefsz2ep0j0vnzt8r466qjnr764dtmxytshxz2s693jlevuduvvqr26lzw Yes, Raoulia mostly grows in the mountains but they are also found in the gravels on braided rivers, and also on parts of old coastal dunes like Kaitorete.


nostr:npub1ep9klhe7pzqrrf2g8scm5hhz43tc0js0flctq8vf7p3vggkw0lasqhtgda You’re welcome. Thanks for commenting. 😀


nostr:npub1fhawqey7c9jrs48d27dggwm0kvg9ufxl07227ue5dfx9mhy7mdgs993ru0 nostr:npub1zefsz2ep0j0vnzt8r466qjnr764dtmxytshxz2s693jlevuduvvqr26lzw Yes, it’s a daisy, in the genus Raoulia. Those are the vegetable sheep. Some are less poetically called scabweeds.

https://inaturalist.nz/taxa/147226


nostr:npub1fhawqey7c9jrs48d27dggwm0kvg9ufxl07227ue5dfx9mhy7mdgs993ru0 Nice! You didn’t mention it early that your 55 mm was a macro lens. Handy.


nostr:npub1fhawqey7c9jrs48d27dggwm0kvg9ufxl07227ue5dfx9mhy7mdgs993ru0 Thanks. I was in a rush to get out the door to get to work, so just did it hand-held at 1600 ISO. I now wish I'd used my tripod.

I recently switched from a ~40-year old manual-focus 300 m  telephoto to a modern 300 mm with autofocus and image stabilisation.  I can confirm that a lot of progress in lens design has been made in 40 years. (Still not cheap though.) 😄


nostr:npub1fhawqey7c9jrs48d27dggwm0kvg9ufxl07227ue5dfx9mhy7mdgs993ru0 Yeah, birding with a 55 mm lens sounds like a challenge. 😮


Here is some scenery around Ōtautahi-Christchurch NZ that I photographed this week.

There's a swirling southerly front that passed overhead on my bike ride home from work on Thursday, and from Friday morning there's the moon set just before sunrise, and the first rays of sun rise on the snow covered Southern Alps.

Ōtautahi has some amazing skies.

Full-res photos are on #flickr (links in the alt-text).

#photos #landscape #scenery #mountains #storm #nz #otautahi #Christchurch

https://mastodon.nz/system/media_attachments/files/111/157/951/288/178/089/original/101034865be4bc1c.jpg

https://mastodon.nz/system/media_attachments/files/111/157/951/351/403/951/original/f4c1631b9e5251b4.jpg

https://mastodon.nz/system/media_attachments/files/111/157/951/352/670/096/original/c5c2a72006c9f760.jpg

https://mastodon.nz/system/media_attachments/files/111/157/951/448/996/336/original/9675950d8cddc6f0.jpg


nostr:npub1nzhh6veajjr7rmuljzc8revyzjkqmnp7524z80r25v7jk5qw20ps4t8qy7 😕 Tricky! I only know how old the oldest kahikatea trees are in Pūtaringamotu-Riccarton Bush. I'd have to guess the rest. I don't pay much attention to exactly how old are the city's heritage buildings. I do like having them around though.


nostr:npub1nvxde5z8w2uvvskc3vyvec3y6eydmn9slwjt7clwp3lzd88q6l7q3c8ejh Yes, exactly!! It's ridiculous. The risks to the climate of burning fossil fuels have been clear for over a century, and yet we're *still* doing it.  I would have figured that we'd get brought down by a mega-volcano or meteorite impact or some novel chemical with delayed toxicity, or, in the future, some rogue AI. Even nuclear war, as awful as it would be, would make for a better epitaph than death by knowingly turning up the planet's thermostat until we cooked ourselves. It's so dumb!


It dawned on me why I'm so annoyed at our inadequate collective response to the #ClimateCrisis. It's that it's embarassing! Of all the challenges to bring down civilization, it's going to be this?! Imagine pitching a script to Hollywood where evil aliens destroy humanity by, gasp, giving us a cheap polluting fuel *and* knowledge that burning it will wreck the climate. They then watch us burn the fuel for a few centuries. This plot line is just so stupid! We can be so much better than this!!


nostr:npub1hykucplphuhelaxutcw4jw3vuu7gcg42czhqmk7jhchs8vdga4fsj73p33 Great thread. David Pope did a great cartoon based on this same net-zero murders idea.

https://australiainstitute.org.au/post/carbon-credits-and-offsets-explained/

https://mastodon.nz/system/media_attachments/files/111/079/274/244/554/646/original/2a1f3a21f2ce868f.jpg


nostr:npub12nm5cjxe4t7ldf0fflvujmawt0p83yjzl6v09ynw7v79dvlf6s2qmwwh2s Yes, I've thought about this too. Slowing down is good.

Our massively unsustainable environmental impacts stem from how we put an equivalent dollar value on time and resources. For example, it would cost a lot in time for an employee to take a bus to a job in the next city. In our economic system, it's much cheaper to fly. Yet the Earth doesn't care whether that journey takes half an hour or a day, just the carbon emitted.

We shouldn't be able to trade our time for burning resources.


nostr:npub1mep8ymvgmhwq94922adu4pjvzaf73jfnd5haus7hm3g4zzhyk3hq0rsad7 Cool. That's one top-notch poster of a gannet.


nostr:npub17mw7ejdqn6xet2afjky0gl3y8rn7373athrqhx5d2vl8jr8sl9qsf3xy9f nostr:npub1xes9xt8aw0lzfy0efa6eq30k9sjx5yac50fgfuu6l6ryl80vfdyqjxsfk6 Fantastic! :partyparrot: :partyparrot: :partyparrot:


The National Party is proposing to reduce the already stretched budget of the NZ #DepartmentofConservation by a whopping $46 million.

The chief executives of Forest & Bird, WWF-New Zealand and the Environmental Defence Society (EDS) have just put out a joint press release highlighting how insane this is.

“I can think of no more expedient way to shoot ourselves in the foot,” said Dr Kingdon-Bebb [CEO of WWF-New Zealand]

https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO2309/S00116/leading-environmental-groups-deeply-concerned-at-proposed-defunding-of-doc.htm

#conservation #nz #NZpol


nostr:npub169j5mxq52p0e6eqn49rkx0h8y68pg3ssrumtg95r65emy7cddexs68mvs2 I stopped using headphones years ago, as I wanted to better hear cars approaching from behind. Yes, cars are loud, but I bike on country roads where cars move dangerously fast. I now count birds and butterflies (and other species) while I bike. I've been similarly asked whether that's safe, with the intimation that I should just concentrate on biking.

There's this double-standard that only cyclists should compromise to be safe, when it's car driving that kills people, not biking.


nostr:npub12kqefdzypv633n3x7g6m5jss4m40lw33gvt986nazpwrhxgwgyrscf25h0 Magic!


nostr:npub1x66kkxv0au04p28l3ch40jrz3g6s0jlre255rpt7yu3sglf0ewfqfz342y What amazing looking birds these are! https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/117070-Prionops-plumatus


nostr:npub1trdnqrfstufc45awha43p6xy2n0v6czuhapzh4r09hap08dg0c6s9gussx nostr:npub1xes9xt8aw0lzfy0efa6eq30k9sjx5yac50fgfuu6l6ryl80vfdyqjxsfk6

b) reforestation gets some carbon back where we want it (in biomass, soils etc), and reduces emissions from degraded areas. So even where it's viable, we don't have the luxury of time to wait for natural regeneration.

For the same amount of a money, you can regenerate *much* more land into native forest than plant it, in landscapes that still have some native forest to act as seed sources. Still, yes, it’s all very case and context dependent.


nostr:npub1tdjprtq7kape7xtc383q945y3qmt9cjcqvunxzx68pakup8w5x3qv4cvf4 yes, there’s quite a bit of LIDAR data from across Canterbury: https://koordinates.com/data/?q=Lidar+Canterbury.

If you’re interested in having a go at this in R, perhaps we can get together and share code, I’ve got quite a bit of ground-based biodiversity data form across wider Christchurch, that I expect could be explained by the cover and height of vegetation that could be extracted from LIDAR data. I haven’t got around to trying that yet but it’s on my to-do list.


nostr:npub1tdjprtq7kape7xtc383q945y3qmt9cjcqvunxzx68pakup8w5x3qv4cvf4 That looks helpful. I haven’t tried to wrangle LIDAR data in R yet. Thanks for sharing.


For those of you doing #EcologicalMonitoring, note that a group at #TDWG, led by Yanina Sica, has been working on a set of global data standards for ecological monitoring, called the #HumboldtCore. This builds on the widely used #DarwinCore that is used for museum collections and casual observations (it's the biodiversity data sharing standard that makes #GBIF possible).

This month the final draft of Humboldt Core is open for public feedback at https://github.com/tdwg/hc/milestone/1

#biodiversity


nostr:npub1fhawqey7c9jrs48d27dggwm0kvg9ufxl07227ue5dfx9mhy7mdgs993ru0 Absolutely. If a weed is new to and area and rare, take the time to pull it out there and then.