Sarah Faulwetter
LightNews LightNews
banner
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
Sarah Faulwetter
@sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
670 followers 240 following 170 posts
Benthic ecologist & polychaete taxonomist at the Uni of Patras, Greece.

Also sci-arting and loving R.

Posts Replies Media Videos
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
Look, @thelongestjohns.bsky.social , the Wellerman also comes to marine science conferences nowadays! 😃
icesmarine.bsky.social ICES - International Council for the Exploration of the Sea @icesmarine.bsky.social · Sep 15
Serenading us with sea shanties🎶
ICES Choir kick off the Welcome reception with The Wellerman!
September 15, 2025 at 8:37 PM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
Fish sleeping on serpulid worms?!? link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Very lovely photos (and very interesting symbiosis of #fish and #polychaetes) in this paper.
Evidence of novel symbiotic relationships between Christmas tree worms and coral reef blennies and gobies - Symbiosis
Ecological interactions between sessile invertebrates and reef fishes are well documented, yet novel associations continue to emerge. Based on photographic and behavioral evidence, we describe the fir...
link.springer.com
August 1, 2025 at 7:14 AM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
laurakranich.bsky.social
This is just stunning. The northern Baltic Sea with ocean temperature anomlies of up to 11 degrees C, absolute temps of up to 24°C 🤯, the Norwegian Sea up to 7 deg C too hot, absolute temps of up to 23 deg C, due to the unprecedented heat wave in Scandinavia.
The future is grim.
July 25, 2025 at 3:07 AM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
Delightful!
k-hermit.com でんか @k-hermit.com · Jul 11
Let’s go tide pooling!
July 11, 2025 at 1:29 PM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
Diving over a #rhodolith bed the other day. Rhodoliths are calcareous red algae that are not attached to anything and just form little balls on the seabed. They are a highly biodiverse habitat and I saw so many species I have never seen before! Spot the cheerleeder #crab!
A very long-legged crab with little flappy red algae growing on its legs for camouflage. It sits on a muddy seafloor with more red algae and is basically not visible.
June 17, 2025 at 8:06 PM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
echinoblog.bsky.social
Many may not remember the DENDROGRAMMA mystery! This weird mushroom-shaped thing was described in 2014 as a "new metazoan" of unknown affinities! They were hinting that it might be a new phylum-but THEN 2 years later @drtimohara.bsky.social sequenced it and BOING! BENTHIC
#SIPHONOPHORE!
mushroom shaped organism with translucent base
June 15, 2025 at 3:31 PM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
Another day in the office... #greece #scuba #marinebiology #research #bestjobintheworld
View from the deck of a traditional Greek fishing boat, showing the prow above the water with the horizon in the distance The deck of a traditional greek fishing boat, fill of diving gear
June 13, 2025 at 10:32 AM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
frwildflowers.bsky.social
inaturalist•org
Update on June 11, 2025 9:15pm EDT
“We are not giving Google special access to your iNat data, and we have no obligation to use Google's infrastructure…If the demo… is not helpful, compromises data quality, has outsized environmental impacts, or is … too flawed, we will not keep it.”
We recognize that this announcement has caused a lot of upset and confusion among people who care deeply about iNaturalist. In the hundreds of comments, we hear that many people feel betrayed, disrespected, and without agency. We sincerely apologize. With respect for the ethical and environmental concerns raised, we'd like to offer more clarity about our plans with this grant and program. We know that trust is not easily rebuilt, but we'd like to try. First, to clarify some things we did not clearly communicate: 1. We are not replacing or changing the current human-curated system of identifications. Many of you have rightly pointed out that this is at the heart of iNat, and we wouldn't dream of doing away with it. Anything we explore with Al would only be meant to enhance the experience of some users: by, for example, providing an interesting tip about identifying the species, suggesting that the photographer try to capture a particular aspect of the plant or animal that might aid a human identifier, or explaining the computer vision's logic for the identification it's suggested. 2. We are not giving Google special access to your iNat data, and we have no obligation to use Google's infrastructure as part of this grant. Google is providing funding and advice on how to potentially leverage Al. 3. Naturalist has successfully incorporated machine learning and computer vision (kinds of Al) since 2017, with a very small footprint (primarily three machines running in spaces we control). We understand that new technologies can have much larger environmental impacts, and we aim to quantify the environmental footprint of Naturalist's infrastructure for 2025 and beyond. 4. This grant funds our team exploring new ways to surface and organize helpful identification comments - and if the demo we create is not helpful, compromises data quality, has outsized environmental impacts, or is overall too flawed, we will not keep it. This project is just getting off the ground, and we … Done • inaturalist.org AA The Naturalist community has always been a core partner in informing the direction of the platform, and we appreciate and hear your feedback (including but not limited to): • We understand that you are concerned about inaccurate, out-of-context and/or hallucinated information being provided by a tool like this. We agree that any Al-provided information be clearly labeled as such and that there be a way to upvote/downvote or otherwise flag potentially misleading information, and we are excited to explore more ways for how this may happen. • We hear that people would like to be able to understand and control how their data is used on and beyond iNaturalist. On iNaturalist, you own the copyright to your data, and iNaturalist Terms of Use prohibit the use of data for commercial Al training. Whether commercial Al companies are beholden to copyright law or terms of use or can argue "fair use" of publicly accessible data is being worked out in the courts and is something we are paying attention to. • Most importantly, the community will be involved in the creation of this and any major new features. We will not be implementing any new changes to what you see on iNaturalist right now without involving the community. Our plan is to have an initial demo available for select user testing by the end of 2025. If you have more feedback, ideas, concerns, or questions you'd be willing to share, please use this form so we can more easily keep track of them. Additionally, if you would like to attend a virtual Q&A session to have some of this discussion in real time, please let us know in this form (more details to be determined). Again, the project funded by this grant is just getting started. We will proceed carefully and respectfully, and we're immensely grateful for this incredible and engaged community.
June 12, 2025 at 3:23 AM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
Lil' seahorse I saw today while snorkling...😍
A photo of a seahorse. It is grey-brownish in colour, over a muddy seafloor with shells and other detritus. Two sea urchins are half visible at either end of the photo. The seahorse has affixed its tail to something on the bottom and is swaying in the water, its snout almost touching the floor.
June 12, 2025 at 1:06 PM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
##wormwednesday
tuexplorer1.bsky.social Lisa @tuexplorer1.bsky.social · Jun 11
Fancy footwork from a Swima polychaete #OkeanosExplorer ex1711 dive 11 #MarineLife
June 11, 2025 at 5:30 PM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
nollthere.bsky.social
Wormification - #InsertAnInvert2024
"Long, not limbless." I chose to do a paddleworm, specifically Phyllodoce medipapillata. I think this is the most beautiful worm I've ever seen on land or sea. I was DELIGHTED like a child seeing glitter for the first time looking at reference pics.
#sciart
Art of a shimmery marine worm with golden, paddle-like limbs.
April 20, 2024 at 11:50 PM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
seafloorscience.bsky.social
Look at this absolute beaut paddleworm Phyllodoce medipapillata.

How cute is that face?
And the beautiful luminescent shimmer on the body. Small but mighty.

📷Alex Heyman via iNaturalist
#NoVERMber
A paddleworm that has leaf-like parapods on the side of the body (like paddles), two eyes on the head and a shimmery segmented body.
November 4, 2024 at 7:07 AM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
entobiologist.bsky.social
the new developments on inat inspired me to make a diagnostic thread for every insect order because there's only like 30something of them. going to try and avoid exceptions and extremely technical characteristics when possible. 🧵
June 11, 2025 at 4:30 AM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
They were amazing! 😍 a field of sabellid #polychaetes for early #wormwednesday
A group of sabellid polychaetes. The photos shows about 10 individuals. They consist of a tube and a bluish feathery crown speckled with darker spots. A group of sabellid polychaetes. The photos shows about 10 individuals. They consist of a tube and a bluish feathery crown speckled with darker spots. A larger aggregation of sabellid polychaetes. They consist of a tube and a bluish feathery crown speckled with darker spots and cover the seafloor in dense patches.
June 10, 2025 at 1:59 PM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
This looks amazingly useful! Congrats to the authors for this huge effort!
June 5, 2025 at 4:09 PM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
drcraigmc.bsky.social
To give you an idea of the scope of #MOBS onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/.... There are 52,505 species of marine Mollusk, MOBS has body size data for 46,110 of them (88%).
MOBS 1.0: A Database of Interspecific Variation in Marine Organismal Body Sizes
Motivation Body size is a fundamental trait influencing an organism's life history, ecology, physiology and evolutionary dynamics. While extensive body-size databases exist for terrestrial vertebrat...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
June 5, 2025 at 2:08 PM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
Congratulations to my master student Alexandra Zachariadou for her first paper. She studied the impact of #aquaculture on coastal macrophyte communities in #Greece. Apart from a nice work that came out of this It was really a pleasure to work with her! www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Macrophyte-based ecological assessment of coastal areas near fish farms in the Aegean and Ionian Seas
This study examined the effect of aquaculture on benthic macrophytes growing on coastal hard substrates across Greece. Stations were categorized into …
www.sciencedirect.com
June 3, 2025 at 8:18 AM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
paulmsmithphoto.bsky.social
I've been accused of AI quite a bit lately.
I get it, the current social media trends do not foster an environment of trust.
But with real photography, we have the human touch and true imagery of nature that can uncover secrets about our world that an AI eye simply cannot.
June 2, 2025 at 4:16 PM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
hleehurley.com
This is beautful. And so simple.

Queer people are scared. This is all you have to do as a cis het person to help take some of that fear away.
gjertm.bsky.social Gjert Moldestad @gjertm.bsky.social · May 28
For noen kan et lite regnbueflagg bety at vi føler oss tryggere. Man ser flagget og tenker; « her kan jeg passe inn»
En enkel måte å vite at jeg også blir satt pris på.

Veldig fin video
Oslo Pride🌈
May 29, 2025 at 10:24 AM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
k-hermit.com
浅瀬で見つけたのは、泳ぐウミウシの仲間「ムラサキウミコチョウ」

初見はまさに胡蝶の夢🫧
ウミコチョウと名付けた人のセンスに脱帽です！

In the shallow tidepools, I found a swimming sea slug—
Sagaminopteron ornatum🫧

Seeing it for the first time felt like Zhuangzi’s butterfly dream.

Whoever named it “Umikochou” (Sea Butterfly) had truly poetic sense!
May 29, 2025 at 1:28 PM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
gugunderwater.bsky.social
One of the biggest, most beautiful larval-stage #dragonfish ever!
.
Shot while drifting in the open ocean at night
#deepseafish #larvalfish #blackwater #blackwaterdiving #blackwaterphotography #chrisgug #gugunderwater #gug #scubadiving #underwater #plankton
May 28, 2025 at 4:13 PM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
acanofsardines.bsky.social
Packing up to go to Hamburg for the annual meeting of the @icesmarine.bsky.social Working Group on Comparative Ecosystem-based Analyses of Atlantic & Mediterranean marine systems (COMEDA). Looking forward to seeing familiar faces, meeting new ones & discussing the amazing science they are all doing!
Skyline of the port of Hamburg
May 17, 2025 at 10:07 AM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
Last week we explored an area with our new ROV and came across this gorgeous field of sabellid #polychaete worms. We don't know the species and generally not much about these aggregations. But they are very beautiful! #wormwednesday
A low angle view of a dense aggregation of sabellid worms. These live in tubes which are whitish and upright and from their top the worm emerges. Only their tentacular crowns are visible - a feathery, flowery light blue crown with a few dark spots. The sabellid field is bright in the foreground, illuminated by the lights of the remotely operated underwater vehicle, and dark blue above. A view of the same sabellid field from.a higher angle - the field of feathery crowns stretches far into the background of the photo until.it becomes one with the dark background.
May 14, 2025 at 7:15 PM
Reposted by Sarah Faulwetter
jajeumm.bsky.social
Painting of pompeii worms (Alvinella pompejana), which live in communities near deep sea hydrothermal vents. Also the piece featured in the #Invertefest artbook
#art #invertebrate #SciArt
Three red pompeii worms emerging from tubes on a blue background of a hydrothermal vent
May 6, 2025 at 2:27 PM
sarahfaulwetter.bsky.social
So SMOL!
inaturalist.bsky.social iNaturalist @inaturalist.bsky.social · May 9
Hello from possibly the teeniest, tiniest poppies (Canbya candida) you'll see today!

📷 keirmorse on iNaturalist
📍 United States
🔗: www.inaturalist.org/observations...
#ObservationOfTheDay
A small, round white flowerbud atop round, pale-green leaves. There's a penny for scale, and the flower only reaches about two-thirds of the way up the penny! A few small clusters of tiny, round white flowerbud atop round, pale-green leaves. There's a penny for scale — the flowers are barely taller than it!
May 9, 2025 at 7:11 PM