Ben Vernasco
LightNews LightNews
banner
verntasco.bsky.social
Ben Vernasco
@verntasco.bsky.social
1.5K followers 720 following 34 posts
Research Scientist/Adjunct Assistant Professor @WhitmanCollege
Posts Replies Media Videos
Pinned
verntasco.bsky.social
Ben Vernasco @verntasco.bsky.social · Sep 13
New paper published in collaboration with Kira Long, Mike Braun and Jeff Brawn! We examined the relationship between genetic and telomeric variation in a manakin hybrid zone. Especially stoked because our paper got featured on the issue’s cover!!!

doi.org/10.1111/mec....
Genetic and telomeric variability: Insights from a tropical avian hybrid zone
Telomere lengths and telomere dynamics can correlate with lifespan, behaviour and individual quality. Such relationships have spurred interest in understanding variation in telomere lengths and their....
doi.org
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
thecowbirdlab.bsky.social
@fieldornith.bsky.social new position search!
November 11, 2025 at 2:16 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
emilyhduval.bsky.social
We're hiring! Florida State University’s Department of Biological Science is seeking a tenure-track Evolutionary Geneticist. Our E&E group is outstanding - join us! Please share with anyone who might be interested! #Evolution #Genetics #EvoDevo #FacultyJob
jobs.sciencecareers.org/job/675930/a...
November 2, 2025 at 3:03 AM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
mollyschumer.bsky.social
Anyone looking for an undergrad research assistant this coming summer? I have a truly phenomenal undergrad with expertise in genetic mapping, long read sequencing & bioinformatics who wants experience in another lab before grad school. She has been in our lab for 3 years & writing her first paper!
October 23, 2025 at 11:16 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
amynusbaum.bsky.social
Looking for an adjunct to teach Indigenous Psychology in the spring. Could be asynchronous or via Zoom in the evening (Pacific). Very open to whatever approach/content you'd like to cover. Pay is $3,300 for the semester. We're a Native American Serving Non-Tribal Institution, as well as an HSI!
October 16, 2025 at 10:56 PM
verntasco.bsky.social
news.cornell.edu/stories/2025...
Bezos grant to fund AI innovations to monitor and protect wildlife | Cornell Chronicle
A $1.8 million grant from the Bezos Earth Fund will help the Cornell Lab of Ornithology develop acoustic sensors and artificial intelligence analytics to identify real-time threats to forests from ill...
news.cornell.edu
October 23, 2025 at 10:21 PM
verntasco.bsky.social
The perfect paper, the perfect grant proposal, the perfect fellowship application…
grantdraws.bsky.social Grant Snider @grantdraws.bsky.social · Oct 16
Some thoughts on destroying the illusion of perfection:
incidentalcomics.substack.com/p/destroying...
October 21, 2025 at 7:52 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
benardmf.bsky.social
New from CWRU alumn Troy Neptune, with Diana Koester (CLE Metroparks Zoo) in @animalecology.bsky.social. Gray treefrogs use daylength as a seasonal cue to prepare for winter. Autumn daylength triggers frogs to accumulate 14-fold more liver glycogen than summer photoperiod.
doi.org/10.1111/1365...
Adult Gray Treefrog. A treefrog is sitting in brown, dead cattail fronds. The treefrog has a mottled pattern of light and dark green patterns on its back. Figure showing the amount of daylength in the three treatments from the start of the experiment (Day 0) to the end of the experiment (around day 90). The early treatment simulates breeding starting in april, and the daylength is about 12.5 hours per day, and goes up to about 15 hours per day. The average treatment simulates breeding in july, and simulates breeding starting in July and at 15 hours of light per day, and going down to around 12 hours of light per day. The late treatment simulates breeding in mid-august. Late treatment starts with about 14 hours of light per day, and goes down to about 10 hours of light per day. Plot of total glycogen in liver. The values are low (between 0 and 20) for frogs from the early and average photoperiod, but are much higher (40) for frogs from the late treatment. Figure showing size-corrected growth rate (grams per day) from the three photoperiod treatments. The late photoperiod treatment has the lowest growth rate, significantly lower than the average photoperiod, and lower (but not significantly different from) the early photoperiod.
October 19, 2025 at 2:14 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
jlwilliamson.bsky.social
My lab is hiring a 2-yr hummingbird evolution and genomics postdoc and a 1-yr salaried research and lab tech. Both with full U. Wyoming benefits. Please spread the word! Info below. Best consideration date Nov 1, start dates early Spring 2026.
October 14, 2025 at 8:08 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
rosvall-lab.bsky.social
This is a nice IU short on our eclipse project. #NSF youtube.com/shorts/PrQGn...
Indiana University scientists lead project on how birds responded to the 2024 Great American Eclipse
YouTube video by Kimberly Rosvall
youtube.com
October 9, 2025 at 9:36 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
wilsonornithsoc.bsky.social
Latest articles from the WJO: Call rate and types of calls produced vary with flock movements in wild Pine Siskins (Spinus pinus). #ornithology doi.org/10.1080/1559...
Call rate during Pine Siskin flock movements (arrival, circling, departure) was significantly greater than during baseline minutes.
October 7, 2025 at 1:03 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
dirtbagqueer.rocks
thank you bills tiktok
October 3, 2025 at 1:11 AM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
instbirdpop.bsky.social
🪶 If you are able, you donate here: birdpop.org/pages/do...
We lost roughly $1 million in funding without warning. Projects cancelled included all of our bird monitoring work for the National Park Service & projects w/ the Bureau of Land Management on Gunnison's Sage-Grouse, Pinyon Jays & more. 1/4
Graphic with the following text followed by The Institute for Bird Populations logo: Emergency Appeal: Federal Funding Cut Last week 9 of our federal grants were abruptly cancelled without cause. If you can make a donation today, it will have a big impact. Thank you for your support, The Institute for Bird Populations
October 2, 2025 at 12:11 AM
verntasco.bsky.social
Happy to share a new USFS General Technical Report on passive acoustic monitoring my collaborators and I put together. We discuss sampling design and introduce the Simple Passive Acoustic Monitoring (SPAM) protocol (R/python code/scripts included!)!

link here: research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/6...
Workflow and training materials for validating species detections from passive acoustic monitoring: a case study from the northern Blue Mountains | US Forest Service Research and Development
research.fs.usda.gov
October 1, 2025 at 4:29 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
bou.org.uk
Call rate and types of calls produced vary with flock movements in wild Pine Siskins (Spinus pinus) | www.tandfonline.com/... | Wilson Journal of Ornithology | #ornithology 🪶
September 19, 2025 at 1:30 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
s-m-aguillon.bsky.social
The first Aguillon Lab paper is officially out in early view at Evolution!! Led by postdoc @devonderaad.bsky.social, we’ve explored the hybrid zone between black-headed and rose-breasted grosbeaks in the Great Plains. #ornithology #hybridization #speciation #evolution doi.org/10.1093/evol...
Figure 1A from the paper shows the distribution of black-headed (western) and rose-breasted grosbeaks (eastern) throughout North America. Small illustrations of males of each species are shown. Black-headed has a rusty orange breast and black head, while rose-breasted has a small reddish bib with a bright white belly. There is an inset map of South Dakota showing the transect across the hybrid zone
September 12, 2025 at 3:49 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
biorxiv-behav.bsky.social
Genetic and environmental sources of behavioral individuality: a test of the standard model https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.08.27.672710v1
September 1, 2025 at 6:45 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
mustelidmay.bsky.social
Anyone here who can tell me more about the wildlife program at Oregon State?
August 27, 2025 at 8:11 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
evolutionpirate.bsky.social
Amid all the continuing good news from the world, another preprint!
Inbreeding depression and tuberculosis susceptibility in the critically endangered white-winged wood duck Asarcornis scutulata (photo by Katie Lubbock, Sylvan Heights Bird Park)
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Photo of three white-winged wood ducks at Sylvan Heights Bird Park, photo by Katie Lubbock
August 22, 2025 at 5:30 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
jarome.bsky.social
Pick an idiom: "more than meets the eye", "beauty more than skin [feather] deep" etc.

In work led by Rosalyn Price-Waldman, we describe a hidden (and ignored!) black or white layer found below the visible surface of bird feathers which helps make bird colours so striking!

🧪 🪶 #colsci
Songbirds play optical tricks to make their feather colors ‘pop’
Concealed black or white bands on feathers boost the vibrancy of bird plumage
www.science.org
August 13, 2025 at 3:35 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
jesshightower.bsky.social
Invertebrates are declining even in pristine tropical forests and climate change is the culprit.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Stronger El Niños reduce tropical forest arthropod diversity and function - Nature
Time-series data from tropical forests tracking weather and declines in arthropod diversity and function show that fluctuations in species were largely dependent on their El Niño sensitivity and ecolo...
www.nature.com
August 6, 2025 at 5:51 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
johnwares.bsky.social
Paying attention to the USDA reorganization plan? Comment window is open. www.usda.gov/about-usda/n...
www.usda.gov
August 2, 2025 at 12:51 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
sjcfishy.bsky.social
After SCOTUS decision a few days ago, potential staff cuts for essential conservation programs is very real. If you are a US citizen and care about nature, fishing, hunting, bird watching, the environment, etc, time to let your elected officials know this matters to you! www.hcn.org/articles/mas...
Mass layoffs can move forward, with devastating impacts for conservation and science - High Country News
‘Shortsighted’ cuts could eliminate bird banding program, federal bee research and much more.
www.hcn.org
July 11, 2025 at 6:01 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
instbirdpop.bsky.social
🪶🌎🧪 Bird Banding Lab threatened by budget cuts: The lab falls under the U. S. Geological Survey’s Ecosystem Mission Area, the agency’s major ecology program, which under President Trump’s 2026 proposed budget would see funding cut to $29 million, from $293 million. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/08/s...
Trump’s Budget Would Clip Bird Banding. Hunters Are Not Happy.
www.nytimes.com
July 8, 2025 at 8:20 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
kevinfpbennett.bsky.social
New paper published! How does a mid-size river impact gene flow and population structure, including when there is an adaptive sexual trait present on one bank but not the other? With Peri Bolton, Robb Brumfield (@limpkin.bsky.social), Jerry Wilkinson, and Mike Braun.
doi.org/10.1093/evol...
Impact of a putative riverine barrier on genomic population structure and gene flow in the presence of sexual selection
Abstract. Gene flow connects populations and facilitates the exchange of alleles, impacting speciation and adaptation. In western Panama, lekking golden-co
doi.org
July 8, 2025 at 7:09 PM
Reposted by Ben Vernasco
spahn711.bsky.social
Millions of acres of public lands are eligible for sale in the Senate budget reconciliation package (as of 6-14). This would be the largest public lands sell-off in US history, and would bypass traditional safeguards such as public hearings & environmental reviews. 1/x
map: tinyurl.com/Lands4SaleMap
A map showing what BLM and USFS lands would be up for sale in the western CONUS. An image taken of Colorado's Maroon Bells from the still lake before it. In the foreground is the glass lake mirroring the landscape and sky above. A long log on the water reaches out from the left of the frame toward its center. On the other end of the lake is a lush green forest, with the forest stretching up the steep hills that bracket the image. Sitting right in the center of those hills are the Marron Bells - mountain peaks - partially coated in snow, and bathed in the saturated orange glow of the just-rising Sun. Overhead are blue skies with numerous puffy white clouds, some of which are still in the shadow of other mountains.
June 23, 2025 at 10:43 PM