Per Alström

🌍 “This is no longer a warning for the future; it is a diagnosis of the present.” Our 2026 State of the Climate report finds 7 of 16 planetary vital signs at record extremes. The planetary emergency is already here. doi.org/10.1093/bios...

Thank for this wonderful collaboration: @peralstrom.bsky.social, Takema Saitoh, Canwei Xia, Lijun Zhang, Shin-Ichi Seki and Urban Olsson! @istaresearch.bsky.social

Check our Open Access paper on the Tokara Leaf Warbler – a previously undescribed, threatened Japanese bird: doi.org/10.1093/pnas... Thx to all coauthors: Takema Saitoh, @dariashipilina.bsky.social. Shin-Ichi Seki, Canwei Xia, Lijun Zhang & Urban Olsson. @animecol-uu.bsky.social #birds #biodiversity

and Emerging Technologies in Bird Monitoring and Research: Artificial Intelligence, eDNA, Remote Sensing, and Other Approaches: www.keaipublishing.com/en/journals/...

The international ornithological journal Avian Research, which publishes Open Access for FREE, has calls for two special issues: Avian Conservation in the Anthropocene: Challenges, Innovations, and Future Directions: lnkd.in/dcWNqPxu (deadline 31 December 2026) and

Congratulations to my former student Lei Wu who recently published "Parallel divergence with shared barriers and niche separation between two sympatric avian species groups" (dx.doi.org/10.1111/jse....) (Open Access). Willow Tit Poecile montanus and Marsh Tit P. palustris species groups in China

Congratulations to my former student Zongzhuang Liu for publishing a paper on Weak nuclear divergence despite pronounced mitochondrial divergence within a widespread desert-inhabiting Palearctic lark (Aves: Alaudidae). See doi.org/10.1111/zsc.... (Open Access)

I was honoured to be invited to give a talk on AviList, the new unified global checklist of birds, at the Delta Birding Festival 2+ weeks ago, and the organizers just sent me a link to a YouTube video of my talk: www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO5x... #birds #ornithology #taxonomy

Just published: Conservation genomics of two endangered buntings reveal genetic diversity before and after severe population declines. doi.org/10.1186/s129... Despite severe population declines, both species retained high genetic diversity but experienced increased inbreeding. #ornithology #birds

As part of the Delta Bird Festival, I participated on a boat trip, where we saw a staggering c. 250 European Storm Petrels and lots of other birds and some Bottle-nosed Dolphins: ebird.org/checklist/S2... #birds #ornithology

The large newspaper El País published a paper on the Delta Bird Festival: elpais.com/espana/catal... (where a photo of me looks like I'm asleep😀). Kudos to singer-songwriter Bonner Black (www.bonnerblack.com) for sharing her interest in birding with her many fans! #birds #ornithology

I'm too inexperienced w Bluesky to know whether my comment on Delta Bird Festival, where I gave a talk on AviList (avilist.org), the unified global list of birds, is visible, so here's a link to paper where we present the work behind and future of AviList: doi.org/10.1007/s105... #birds #ornithology

📆 Saturday, September 20th, at Marquee 1, we’ll be joined by Prof. @peralstrom.bsky.social, ornithologist and former core member of the AviList team. 📔 He will present the new unified global bird taxonomy known as AviList, which aims to be the definitive tool for ornithological classification.

I'm proud to be part of this project, which was launched today after several years of hard work by an international team – AviList, a unified list of the world's species of birds (11,131, including 151 extinct ones since 16th Century): www.avilist.org #birds #taxonomy

More from Somaliland: Probably first-ever video of Lesser Hoopoe-Lark – frustratingly with microphone switched off!... Luckily, several decent sound recordings separately + photos of different individuals. search.macaulaylibrary.org/catalog?taxo... #birds # ornithology @animecol-uu.bsky.social

Congratulations to all — especially my good friend Claire!

More from my recent trip from Somaliland. Possibly first-ever video of Somali Lark (plus some photos and sound recordings): lnkd.in/dsFDW4s6 #birds #ornithology @animecol-uu.bsky.social

CONGRATULATIONS, Bridget Ogolowa, to an excellent thesis! Thanks, Alex Kirschel for inviting me and @borjamila.bsky.social to examine it, and for your great company. Some photos of birds on eBird: ebird.org/checklist/S2... ebird.org/checklist/S2...

In India’s Assam, women have joined forces to save the resident greater adjutant stork which was long considered a “dirty, smelly bird” that villagers would attack. The population rise linked to these efforts has caused them to be reclassified by the IUCN from endangered to near threatened.

A Forest Wagtail (Dendronanthus indicus 山鹡鸰 shānjílíng) on the patch today, doing its typical sideways tail-wagging. A local summer breeder and passage migrant in the capital. #birds #beijing

Finally out: Predicting adaptation to climate warming www.nature.com/articles/s41... We find that there are many genomic routes to heat-adaptation, but this can also make genomic data of limited value for prediction. A tour de force by @denovorego.bsky.social , with @stelkens.bsky.social.

I was in Somaliland in late March/early April, primarily to study larks. Here's one of the ones I was extremely happy to see: probably first video and some of first sound recordings of this species: Collared Lark search.macaulaylibrary.org/catalog?taxo...

Your daily Avian Hybrids story! Are Snow Bunting and McKay’s Bunting different species? buff.ly/UIKUc6M #ornithology

Avian Research (www.sciencedirect.com/journal/avia...) is planning a Virtual Special Issue on “Asian Flyways under Global Change: Movement Ecology and Emerging Threats”. Read more here: www.keaipublishing.com/en/journals/... Free, Open Access, ranked #4 in ornithology! #ornithology #birds #ecology

Jag intervjuades nyligen av Fågelpodden om mitt liv som fågelskådare och fågelforskare. Hör två avsnitt som jag medverkar i här: patreon.com/fagelpodden #fåglar

A short walk in Uppsala this morning produced, e.g. a Tawny Owl (kattuggla) in a tree hole and a drumming Lesser Spotted Woodpecker (mindre hackspett). See video of former and eBird report here: ebird.org/checklist/S2... #birds

🐺 Today, the Bern Convention's decision to weaken #wolf protection officially enters into force. Wolves in Europe are still far from a favourable conservation status: this move threatens their fragile recovery instead of promoting true coexistence and listening to science. #SavetheWolf

🔥Yesterday, along with Oxfam, WWF, Fern, BAN and T&E we gathered in front of the European Parliament to demand an end to public funding for harmful bioenergy. Read our joint open letter "Beyond Bioenergy - A Civil Society Statement on EU Bioenergy policy" here: www.eubioenergy.com/wp-content/u...

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

We are one of 48 scientific society signatories on a letter from the Union of Concerned Scientists calling on Congress to take action to support federal research funding, and oppose cuts to workforces of federal science and funding agencies. www.ucsusa.org/about/news/s...

HUGE CONGRATS to @axeljensen.bsky.social for a truly awesome PhD thesis and an excellent defense of the same (and a great party afterwards)! And thanks to @joanameier.bsky.social for an excellent "opposition"! And without supervisor @kguschan.bsky.social this thesis would never have happened!

I agree! I wish I could apply...

Finally ready to see the world! Theories of balancing selection - past, present and future: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... A true collaborative effort that brought together theoreticians and empiricists, models, data, and fresh perspectives on how balancing selection can shape genetic variation.

I am honored to have been invited to give a webinar for Cornell Lab of Ornithology/Birds of the World on 20 Feb at 12:00 PM US ET (18:00 Swedish time) on Integrative taxonomy (with examples from research I've been involved with): lnkd.in/dt_Vjnv2 . Registration needed beforehand. Welcome!

@axeljensen.bsky.social is next in line to defend his PhD thesis — it's already 'nailed' according to Swedish tradition ✨ Read his work, "Genomics of an African primate radiation" 👉 uu.diva-portal.org/smash/record... The defense will be in two weeks, with @joanameier.bsky.social as the opponent!

Interested in doing a POSTDOC on PASSERINE BIRD EVOLUTION with me? Birgitta Sintring Foundation can provide a tax free stipend of 33,000 SEK/month for 2 years (lnkd.in/dprR7z6W). If you're an experienced BIOINFORMATICIAN, and preferably a birder, email me ASAP. Deadline on 9 Feb.

I also enjoy photography, videoing and sound recording (e.g., search.macaulaylibrary.org/catalog?user... ; more links to video, including some lectures and "bird walks", from university web page, above).

I'm also a birder, and actually interested in all animals and other organisms (admittedly mainly terrestrial ones visible by the naked eye – which is actually just a fraction of all organisms, but enough for me...).

My first posting on bluesky. I'm an ornithologist and evolutionary biologist at Uppsala University, studying systematics and evolution of birds, with a focus on Asian and, in recent years, African species (www.uu.se/en/contact-a...).