Ned Dochtermann

The editorial 'Beyond bias: building a more inclusive and rigorous research culture in animal behaviour' summarises the 13 papers on how bias (taxonomic, geographic, observer, statistical,...) shapes our field, and how to address them. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

I'm so excited to finally see the special issue "Addressing Biases in Animal Behaviour" fully published: www.sciencedirect.com/special-issu.... Huge thanks to my brilliant co-editors @viveknityananda.bsky.social & @nicolakoyama.bsky.social. Special issue grew from @asab.org's 2024 Winter Meeting 🧵

🐟🚨 New paper! 🚨🐟 Where do behavioral differences come from? Early life environment clearly matters... ...or not? Early environment affected behavior, but NOT how different individuals became from each other. Those differences were seeded before birth through factors OTHER than genetic variation 🤯

I've been asked for photos of us "doing science" in the lab. I have no idea what that's supposed to look like for evolutionary/behavioral ecology. We might all huddle around watching crickets doing things (?). I suppose I could also be at my computer with R open. Any ideas, serious or otherwise?

The party of family (farm) values.

It is not hyperbole to say these people (Bovino and his ilk) are evil.

Well, this is a bad way to hear the news.

I’m probably one of the few people that read this book (and series). The answers are all hilarious(ly wrong). Solid book focused on Herbert’s central question of what happens to people and a people when under pressure.

Do you have snacks?

ALERT #SICB members The Office of Management and Budget (#OMB) www.federalregister.gov/documents/20... The public comment period closes July 13, 2026. Submit your comment directly www.regulations.gov/document/OMB... Strong, individualized comments carry far more weight than form letters.

I am excited to tell you about our new study led by Tyler Audet and in collaboration with Stefan Lüpold's group. Below you see two species. On the right is Drosophila melanogaster. On the left, Drosophila prolongata. Notice the highly exaggerated legs of the males in D.p! doi.org/10.1093/evol...

How important it is to explore a new environnement!

Some of us don’t need the help and naturally give bad talks! (jokes aside, useful short note)

That we live in a world where fantastic artists can’t do their art is a sad indictment of our world. The devaluing of arts and science is a devaluing of humanity.

Some of the news coverage from our latest paper in @animalecology.bsky.social! We used a meta-analytic approach to understand whether and how behavioral change is associated with urban environments. Dream collaboration with @neddochtermann.bsky.social and @annecharmantier.bsky.social!

I generally don't go for formality but getting referred to as Mr. Dachtermann in an email from a student submitting a late assignment... I guess it's good they got the second n into the last name. Not sure if that's better or worse than "Dr. Man"

I think the National Academies are damaging their reputation in an attempt to curry favor from political figures or to appease funders. I am disappointed and hope (and will try to insist) that they will take different approaches in the future. 30/30

This is a figure from a text book. This was not produced with "AI" (predates it). The book's author, editor, and copy editor all were okay with this. (you may have to click on the thumbnail to see the problem)

A worthwhile, and depressing, read.

I’ve no idea why but I have TONS of horseshoe crab art showing up. How delightful! I quite like this viridis one.

Rep. Delia Ramirez to DHS officials: "I have as much respect for you as I do for the last white men who put on masks to terrorize communities of color. I have no respect for the inheritors of the Klanhood and the slave patrol. Those activities were criminal and so are yours."

DAVE MATTHEWS: “I don’t want my taxes to pay for masked thugs to roam our streets & terrorize our communities... She was trying to get away. He shot her 3x in the head. Murdered in cold blood. They’re trying to tell us not to believe what we see. FUCK ICE.” (H/T @marcofoster.bsky.social )

Some hope in the world, and animals send us a message of peace and play: when the big one respects the small one, it’s a win-win situation.

Last spring, I was asked to give carreer advice to grad students. And the one thing I told them was: our best skill is our ability to learn difficult things -- it's also the first skill you will lose unless you intentionally don't let yourselves go.

We are pleased to announce the inaugural Gordon Research Conference on Urban Evolution and Ecology which will be held from Jan. 31 - Feb. 5, 2027. Please save the dates, and we look forward to welcoming you to beautiful Ventura Beach, California!

This is one of my wife and I's favorite movies. We watch it regularly. In addition to Rickman, every performance is amazing. Rockwell's "DO I?" and Weaver's "Hold please" get repeated far more often than they probably should.

I'm working on something that requires a lot of professional puffery. Unfortunately, I default to extreme self-deprecation and my colleague on the project is, well, Dutch. I suspect the outcome might look something along the lines of: "Dochtermann is just okay but we would really like the money"

Accurate news reporting from yesterday’s joint lab meeting with @batsrkul.bsky.social‘s group.

I am looking for a postdoc to work in our long-term system of food-caching mountain chickadees in the Sierra Nevada mountains. The expected start is April 2026. Please see details here: chickadeecognition.com/positions If interested and qualified, please contact me directly (email on the website).

Over the last two years I’ve seen “Yet, …” surge in use in place of “However, …”. This seems increasingly the case regardless of field, publication, or country of author. Is this LLM driven or just an emerging norm? (I also don’t like it so it could be biased detection but I don’t think so)

For the Aussies, the zoologists and the architects out there. 💩🧊🧪 By @chazhutton.com

Check footnote 7. Personally, the formula notation has always made a lot more sense to me than the tidyverse "pipes".

We wrote the Strain on scientific publishing to highlight the problems of time & trust. With a fantastic group of co-authors, we present The Drain of Scientific Publishing: a 🧵 1/n Drain: arxiv.org/abs/2511.04820 Strain: direct.mit.edu/qss/article/... Oligopoly: direct.mit.edu/qss/article/...

Hi folks, Any recommendations of dissecting scopes with digital cameras that are sufficient for insect (cricket) morphometrics and relatively inexpensive (<2000)? Thanks!

I cannot believe our work is finally out there and in @journal-evo.bsky.social ! This was an enormous group effort! We provide an updated estimate of the number of buzz pollinated angiosperm species, genera, and families, look at consequences for diversification, number of transitions, and more!