iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 22/01/2026

Looking through my catalog of #seaanemone photos for something to use in an intro slide for one of my #marinebiology lectures and ran across this, one of my all-time favorite shots. The creature is Anthopleura xanthogrammica, the giant green anemone, photographed in #California on 2018-07-17.

3/4 shot of a green circular object with rows of tentacles along the outer edge

051

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 27/12/2025

Looking back at some old photos, and this is one of my all-time best. It's a 44-day-old larva of the bat star Patiria miniata. From top to bottom it is ~1mm long. How I did it: canaturalist.com/another-1000... #throughthemicroscope #larvae #marineinvertebrate #seastar #focusmerge

Transparent lobed object with a golden edging. Pear-shaped reddish brown structure in the lower third at the midline.

000

Reposted by Dr. Allison J. Gong

Alt National Park Service @altnps.bsky.social · 04/11/2025

Reminder: Election closing times. Please make sure to vote and remember, if you’re in line when the polls close, you still have the right to vote. Don’t get out of line! - 7 p.m. ET - Virginia - 8 p.m. ET - New Jersey - 8 p.m. ET - Pennsylvania - 9 p.m. ET - New York City - 8 p.m. PT - California

231702537

Reposted by Dr. Allison J. Gong

Lookout Santa Cruz @lookoutsantacruz.bsky.social · 04/11/2025

The Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors declared a local emergency over food insecurity Tuesday and approved a $500,000 donation to Second Harvest Food Bank, as federal food aid delays from the ongoing government shutdown leave thousands without assistance.

buff.ly

Santa Cruz County approves $500,000 donation to Second Harvest Food Bank

053

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 04/11/2025

Serendipity = lecturing on kelps and noting the morphology of bull kelp, then finding an intact one on the beach during the field trip! #fieldtrip #marinebiology

Long thin tubular structure stretched out over sand. Three people at far end looking down at it.

020

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

New month, new page in my calendar of #intertidal photos! July gets to show off Plocamium pacificum, one of the gorgeous red #algae we have in Northern California. It lives in the low intertidal in exposed rocky areas, and is one of my favorites. #rhodophyta #redalgae #sanmateocounty

110

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

Wow, Iceland is an amazing place to visit! Not only can you see the ocean ridge there, but they have puffins! These are Atlantic puffins (Fratercula arctica) that breed on cliffs, especially along the south and west coasts. I also saw them in Scotland but from farther away. #iceland #puffin #bird

Stocky bird with white front, red webbed feet, white face, and multi-colored beak, standing next to a burrow in the ground.

2171

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 06/03/2025

Three years ago today, on 6 Mar 2022, I caught indisputable evidence that birds are dinosaurs. Shadows don't lie! Western gull (Larus occidentalis) Santa Cruz, CA #birds

Duck-shaped bird with white head, neck, and belly. Back and wings are dark gray. Beak is yellow and feet/legs are pink. Bird's shadow on sand is dinosaur-shaped, with a long neck and rounded snout.

0271

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 02/03/2025

#MalabrigoMarch2025 means it's time to knit with some of my favorite yarns! These balls of #MalabrigoRios in the colorway Apple Green are going to be a cardigan for little old me. I salvaged them from some other project I don't even remember starting, and so far the yarn and I are both happy now.

11 balls of yarn of various sizes, in a bright green color, piled on a tablecloth decorated with fruits and flowers.

030

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 01/03/2025

Goodness knows I’ve needed a respite in the tidepools lately! Afternoon low tides aren’t my favorite, but there’s no denying the gorgeous light of the late afternoon. Really makes this moon flow anemone (Anthopleura artemisia) glow! #tidepools #seaanemone

Circular animal with translucent tentacles radiating out from a central disk. Tentacles are clear or reddish in color.

071

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 14/02/2025

On this day when so many celebrate romantic/sexual love, it's good to remember that the animal kingdom features many ways of having sex. Banana slugs, like all terrestrial mollusks, are simultaneous hermaphrodites. I caught this pair copulating in 2019. Can't tell which is acting as male this time!

Two yellow slugs in a yin-yang formation.

010

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 09/02/2025

Happy SuperbOwl Sunday! This is a great horned owl I photographed at the San Luis Nat'l Wildlife Refuge in Central California on 2025-01-12. #SuperbOwlSunday #bird #owl

Large bird with mottled brown feathers, ear tufts, and large yellow eyes perched in a tree

0182

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 25/01/2025

I'm lucky to be owned by a gang of 5 chickadees! They are year-round residents and are used to us, completely unfazed when I whip out the big lens and point it at them. Chestnut-backed chickadee (Poecile rufescens) in California #bird #songbird #backyardbirds

Small songbird perched on a twig. Head is a sooty black, with a white mask that is narrow behind the beak, extends just under the eye, and widens at the back of the head. Cinnamon-colored nape, gray-black wings and tail, and light gray belly.

0130

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 25/01/2025

Achievement unlocked: Perfect symmetry! Well played, girls, well played indeed! That's Lucie on the left and Maggie on the right. #caturday #cats #calicocat #tortiecat

Two cats, a calico on the left and a tortie on the right, sleeping on a blanket. Cats are positioned so that they are mirror images of each other.

050

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 22/01/2025

Yes! I can’t believe we have to spell it out like this.

210

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 19/01/2025

There were so many geese at the San Luis National Wildlife Refuge in Central California last weekend! These are snow geese (Anser caerulescens), but there were also many greater white-fronted geese, as well as tundra swans. #birds #birdwatching #birdphotography

Large white birds along the edge of a wetland.

0130

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 16/01/2025

Got to watch this beautiful predator in action this afternoon! #wildlife #california #wildlifephotography #nikon www.canaturalist.com/spying-on-th...

Reddish-brown doglike animal with large ears standing on a hillside looking off to the right with the right foreleg slightly raised

060

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

I love how the black-necked stilt (Himantopus mexicanus) flies with its super long legs straight out back! #birdphotography #addBirder

Bird with white body, black wings, and long red legs in flight over water and plants. Legs are extended straight out behind the body.

160

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

I've visited this place several times but have never been able to photograph the owls that roost there. But yesterday I was lucky! These are great horned owls (Bubo virginianus) roosting in denuded trees at the San Luis National Wildlife Refuge in Central California. #wildlife #birdphotography #owls

Two large mottled brown birds with eyes closed, perched on tree branches

Large mottled brown bird with one yellow eye open, perched on a thick tree branch

050

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 27/12/2024

Everybody has heard about how the Santa Cruz wharf and harbor were hit hard by big swell a few days ago. But there was also damage that most people will not be aware of. www.canaturalist.com/collateral-d...

canaturalist.com

Collateral damage

My home town of Santa Cruz made national news the other day, 23 December 2024, when a series of massive swells caused part of the Municipal Wharf to collapse into the ocean. People in the restauran…

23513

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 24/11/2024

When I had a desk in a zooplankton ecology lab the folks who went out on the trawls used to do that with those styrofoam heads for wigs. Draw a face on it with Sharpie, send that sucker down with the bongo net, and you got yourself a shrunken head! Ahh, fun times!

020

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 23/11/2024

Choose 20 books that have stayed with you or influenced you. One book per day for 20 days, in no particular order. No explanations, no reviews, just covers. #Books #BookSky 💙📚 #BookChallenge Day 8

170

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 23/11/2024

Every year I make a wall calendar from photos I've taken in the intertidal. It occurred that I'd better get started on the 2025 version! This is the photo I used for November 2024. Pisaster ochraceus, the ochre star. #marineinvertebrate #tidepools

Purplish-red star-shaped animal on sand, with reflection in the surface of the water

0102

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 22/11/2024

030

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 22/11/2024

A student club for which I am a faculty sponsor decided that they wanted to make a brochure of the 10 most common iNaturalist observations of native flora and fauna on campus. I was lucky and got to draw the California poppy, Eschscholzia californica!

120

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 21/11/2024

Don't you sometimes wish you could just crawl back into that sea cucumber's butt and hide from the world? No? Is it just me, then? #marineinvertebrates #oddhidingplaces

030

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 21/11/2024

Choose 20 books that have stayed with you or influenced you. One book per day for 20 days, in no particular order. No explanations, no reviews, just covers. Day 6 💙📚 #Books #BookSky #BookChallenge

000

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 21/11/2024

One of my favorite animals is the staurozoan, Haliclystus. It looks sort of like a sea anemone polyp but is instead a stalked medusa! Strange beast. They are patchy in both space in time, at least where I see them in #NorCal. Always makes me happy to find them! #staurozoa #cnidaria #addOcean

Golden brown trumpet-shaped animal with tufts of tentacles at the tips of 8 arms, against a background of green and dark red

36216

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 20/11/2024

Choose 20 books that have stayed with you or influenced you. One book per day for 20 days in no particular order. No explanations, no reviews, just covers! #BookSky 💙📚 #Books #BookChallenge Day 5

Book cover, title "The Name of the Rose" by Umberto Eco.

110

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 20/11/2024

Good morning! I was greeted by a lovely #sunrise this morning, before the first #atmosphericriver of the rain season is supposed to blow in. We need the rain, but 🤞🤞🤞 that it doesn’t cause catastrophic flooding.

030

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

010

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

Lucky hermit crab to have found such a nice shell! Pagurus sp. in the shell of Calliostoma annulatum.

0143

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 17/11/2024

Choose 20 books that have stayed with you or influenced you. One book per day for 20 days, in no particular order. No explanations, no reviews, just covers. #BookSky #Books #BookChallenge Day 3

010

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 16/11/2024

The kitty on the left (Maggie) cost me a lot of $$$ yesterday but she's sweet and I love her to pieces. Her sister (Lucie) still isn't happy that Maggie came home smelling like the vet. But she'll get over it. #cats #tortie #calico #caturday

040

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 16/11/2024

Choose 20 books that have stayed with you or influenced you. One book per day for 20 days, in no particular order. No explanations, no reviews, just covers. #BookSky #Books #BookChallenge Day 2

Human wearing white futuristic armor standing in front of trees

000

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 16/11/2024

Hell yeah, I'll play this game! Choose 20 books that have stayed with you or influenced you. One book per day for 20 days, in no particular order. No explanations, no reviews, just covers. #BookSky #Books #BookChallenge Day 1

000

Reposted by Dr. Allison J. Gong

Space @redditspaceviewes.bsky.social · 14/11/2024

Pillars of Creation through MIRI | JWST

208311651403

Dr. Allison J. Gong @allisongong.bsky.social · 14/11/2024

So, there's this new thing called Bluesky, eh? Well, let's give this a shot and see if I can figure out how to make it work. To get started, here I am collecting algae in the intertidal. Taken by my friend @brandygale.bsky.social

1111