Darcy Shapiro
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darcyshapiro.bsky.social
Darcy Shapiro
@darcyshapiro.bsky.social
BioAnthro PhD. Miocene apes, hips, locomotion, trabecular bone. 💀
Editorial Director: PBS Eons, Bizarre Beasts, and anything else the Greenhouse team cooks up. 🦕🦔🪴
she/her #GoBlue
Hi! I’m Darcy, an evolutionary anthropologist turned science communicator. My PhD was on primate hips & locomotion in fossil apes. Now I’m an editorial director at Complexly, working mostly on the YouTube channels PBS Eons & Bizarre Beasts!
August 25, 2025 at 1:58 PM
The angle of this shot makes Hesperornis’s feet look super long

Hesperornis regalis, ~80 million years old, from Kansas @ummnh.bsky.social

#FossilFriday 🧪
August 15, 2025 at 3:51 PM
Bats in the fossil record: yeah, pretty much always looked like this. No awkward stage to speak of.

Onychonycteris finneyi, 53 million years old, from Wyoming @ummnh.bsky.social #FossilFriday 🧪
June 27, 2025 at 4:01 PM
I am, once again, asking #paleosky: is there anyone on here who is a big Permian nerd, has written about science for general audiences, and would like to do it again? DM me!

Diadectes @harvardmuseums.bsky.social for eyeballs #paleontology #Permian #scicomm 🧪
May 13, 2025 at 4:42 PM
This little guy is Arenahippus grangeri @ummnh.bsky.social. Dated to 50 million years ago, from the Eocene of Wyoming, it was one of the first horses 🐎

Can you see the family resemblance? #FossilFriday 🧪
May 9, 2025 at 4:30 PM
Dazzled by Dimetrodon? Enchanted by Edaphosaurus?
If you’ve ever wanted to write for Eons and the Permian is your jam, please DM me!

#FossilFriday #scicomm 🧪
April 25, 2025 at 4:57 PM
The Pleistocene giant beaver, Castoroides ohioensis at the New Jersey State Museum 🧪

#FossilFriday #paleontology
April 18, 2025 at 5:09 PM
This is also not a dire wolf, even if it looks kinda wolfy.

It’s Sinonyx, a 56 million-year-old meat-eating mammal from China that had little hooves on each toe. #FossilFriday 🧪
April 11, 2025 at 3:45 PM
Just a little Bactrosaurus (a hadrosauroid from the Late Cretaceous of Asia) for #FossilFriday!

Photographed at the Goseong Dinosaur Museum in South Korea 🧪
April 4, 2025 at 5:43 PM
If you see this, post a skeleton
February 23, 2025 at 5:08 PM
Violets are blue,
Roses are red,
Edaphosaurus had
A comically small head
📸 @ummnh.bsky.social
#FossilFriday 🧪
February 14, 2025 at 7:15 PM
A close encounter with a northern saw-whet owl for #SuperbOwlSunday 🦉
February 9, 2025 at 3:51 PM
Paleozoic amphibians were big chompers in their day - @harvardmuseums.bsky.social #FossilFriday 🧪
February 7, 2025 at 4:56 PM
Just some Permian weirdos, including the classic Diplocaulus boomerang-head and a skeleton of Seymouria @harvardmuseums.bsky.social #FossilFriday 🧪
January 10, 2025 at 5:38 PM
I would’ve liked to see a giant lemur…

This is the cranium of Palaeopropithecus maximus @nhm-london.bsky.social for #FossilFriday! 🧪 #paleontology
December 20, 2024 at 5:45 PM
Quetzalcoatlus northropi at Le Musée des Dinosaures in southern France for #FossilFriday 🧪
December 13, 2024 at 4:28 PM
Imagine this not-kitty staring in wonder at your Christmas tree…

Dinictis is a nimravid or “false saber-toothed cat” from 30 million years ago & a member of the suborder Feliformia, which includes actual cats & cat-like guys, like hyenas & mongooses #FossilFriday 🧪

📸 taken @ummnh.bsky.social
December 6, 2024 at 6:02 PM
Happy #FossilFriday! This is Maiacetus, a 47 million-year-old early whale from Pakistan, hanging out @ummnh.bsky.social 🧪

I helped prep this fossil in undergrad 🤩 (and was totally freaked out by it when it was mounted on a hanging frame in the dark basement of the old museum 😂)
November 29, 2024 at 5:46 PM
It’s a throwback #FossilFriday to one of the coolest places I stopped on my move from
NJ to CA: Ashfall Fossil Beds in Nebraska.

12 million years ago, the horses, rhinos, camels, and other animals there were the victims of several feet of volcanic ash (pro tip: don’t breathe it in). 🧪 #scicomm
November 22, 2024 at 4:56 PM
Happy #FossilFriday! The big guy here is Edops craigi, a temnospondyl from the Permian on display at Harvard MNH.

I can only assume he chomp 🧪
November 15, 2024 at 4:42 PM
Just wanted to introduce myself to all the new folks here!

I’m Darcy, an evolutionary anthropologist-turned-science communicator. My PhD was on primate hips & locomotion in fossil apes. Now I’m an editorial director at Complexly, working on the YouTube channels PBS Eons & Bizarre Beasts 🧪 #scicomm
November 13, 2024 at 5:28 PM
Meet Sinonyx, a 56 million-year-old meat-eating mammal from China.

One weird thing about it? It had hooves…little ones on each toe. #FossilFriday 🧪
October 25, 2024 at 3:41 PM
Just a chonky beaky guy from the Triassic of Brazil @HarvardMNH

He’s labeled as Scaphonyx, but it looks like this material has been referred to Hyperodapedon. Either way, he’s an ancient relative of the living tuatara #FossilFriday 🧪 🦎
October 18, 2024 at 5:05 PM
Just a pair of mastodon butts @ummnh.bsky.social for #NationalFossilDay 🧪 🦣

(Yes, I know, the emoji is a mammoth)
October 16, 2024 at 9:14 PM
We need more living animals that are this orb-shaped

The glyptodont Panochthus tuberculatus - an ancient South American relative of the armadillo at Harvard’s Museum of Natural History #FossilFriday 🧪
September 27, 2024 at 4:55 PM