iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 20/04/2026

Many thanks to the bee folks who deal with the fact I butcher their taxon’s scientific names but they still make me feel welcome :D

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

Proposal in with 45 min to spare! 💪 here’s hoping they want to fund me to get some new urban bird (and bee!) research going…

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 12/04/2026

Making a talk this weekend to share some of our first preliminary findings from the Native Plant Ecotype Experiment! Also presenting on our modeling efforts to use big community collected datasets (iNaturalist!) and provide recommendations for plants for pollinators specific to your ecoregion.

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

This paper is making the rounds again! Exciting update is we just got some funding to study caterpillar performance on local and nonlocal ecotypes! (Plant genotypes adapted to other ecoregions). Stay tuned for more caterpillar pictures this summer! 🐛

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 15/10/2025

Check out this amazing fall migration track from our female Gray Catbirds we studied this summer! This lady picked up on that big night of Sept 29th and made a nice 40 miles per hour flight from western massachusetts down to Philadelphia! We're excited to see where she is picked up next!

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 12/09/2025

You can read an excellent piece about our work this summer by our lead bander Anna Peel: vtecostudies.org/blog/2025-mo...

Lead bander Anna Peel with a winter wren

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 12/09/2025

And of course the obligatory sunrise and mountain peak photos. This view never ever gets old

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 12/09/2025

We’re up on the Mt this week for Bicknell’s Thrush but the spruce-fir is buzzing with migratory birds! Surprisingly the top is very dense with migrants (mostly young) despite the low food and cold conditions. Here’s a few of our bycatch friends. (All birds captured under USGS BBL and state permits)

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 27/08/2025

Amazing what a week of full bellies and warm snuggles will do #catlove

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 27/08/2025

Not ever day that longhorn cuckoo bees (Triepeolus sp.) out number the bumblebees during surveys! Three species yesterday on one plot. All on blue vervain (verbena hastata) which appears to be heavily favored by this genus

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 23/08/2025

Worked from home this week to play catch up on papers but the cat distribution system had other ideas. Needless to say I haven’t gotten anything done because snuggles took priority.

Small, two or three week old kitten sleeping

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 28/07/2025

Now that you’re super stoked about #moths from #mothweek, check out a paper I published this year that I’m very proud of. Spoiler alert: the tree composition in a forest fragment predicts the abundance of specialist and generalist moths. More #keystoneplants = more moth diversity #plantanoak

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 23/07/2025

Fall migration has started! Techs caught a bay-breasted warbler this morning. The start of the molt migrants that don’t breed on Mt. Mansfield, but spend 2-3 weeks molting fresh plumage for the rest of their journey. #mansfieldsongbirds

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 18/07/2025

Here’s 1 year of blue vervain (verbena hastata) growth from plugs planted in our experimental #nativeplant gardens last year. Lots of activity! #vceecotypeproject #pollinators #buglove #gardensforwildlife

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

Tis the season for fun field work, awesome data collection, learning and mentorship, beautiful days on the mountain, and baaaaaabies #vcemansfieldsongbirds #ornithology #pollinators #vermont

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 25/06/2025

The pollinators we’re seeing in the garden plots are good and all, but dang was I excited to see this gorgeous creature 💚💚💚 Black swallowtail caterpillar on Zizia aurea

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 21/06/2025

And a bonus wood thrush nest, which was way easier to find!

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 21/06/2025

Fun day of Saturday field work! Helped my mentee Kevin band and find gray catbird nests. Getting around the habitat is no joke, but the weather was gorgeous! #femalebirds #ornithology #vceinthefield

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 20/06/2025

Heck ya white river junction @dunkindonutscoffee.bsky.social . Love the native plant landscaping! Way to go supporting biodiversity! Take my money! 🌱🐛🐦

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

Back on the mountain, saying hello to old friends #mansfieldbirdresearch

Bicknell’s thrush being held by a field researcher

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 21/05/2025

New paper! If trees are closely related, does it matter where they are from to plant-eating insects? We raised >950 Promethea moth caterpillars on 14 Prunus species to answer that question. Turns out, it matters a lot! Non-native trees = Lower performance OA paper here: doi.org/10.1002/ecs2...

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 20/05/2025

Beautiful but chilly day on the lakeshore for Birdathon+! I’m up to 40 species so far. What’s your guess for how many I get? All winged things count that are id’d to species.

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 19/05/2025

Spent some time out in the field yesterday to enjoy some birdy bycatch. Nothing is better than bird banding in the morning and pancakes for brunch. 💜 Baltimore Oriole, American Redstart, Mourning Warbler, and Least Flycatcher

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 09/05/2025

New Paper! We tested the effectiveness of keystone plants by examining moth communities along both an urbanization gradient & forest composition gradient. Spoiler alert: tree species matters! besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/... Pic: Kit Straley

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 06/05/2025

And my Canadian lousewort came back! It’s a hemiparasite of other plants

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 05/05/2025

A student of mine is starting a new project on catbirds this summer and I am weirdly excited to learn more about these goobers

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 01/05/2025

Orpine (live-forever) is coming up in the northern woodlands. An invasive succulent found along roadsides in New England. Seems to crowd out other early spring flowers like trillium and trout lily. Immensely satisfying to remove. Two years of pulling & this year I have only a handful to remove.

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 26/04/2025

Another successful adopt a plant meetup! 36 more people took new native plants home across the Manchester NH area. Including one random family I met in the boba tea shop 🤣

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 25/04/2025

Folks are submitting data on planting conditions for #adoptaplant! We had 700 folks sign up, & 550 confirmed they would pick up plants at one of our events. During the 1st event, ~90% of volunteers came (50/56). 1/2 have already submitted data successfully on our app. six more events to go!

a map of volunteers that have submitted data so far for adopt a plant showing dots in Vermont, New hampshire and massachusetts

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 23/04/2025

I discovered a new game this morning. It's called "Can #Merlin beat me?". I run Cornell's Merlin app for 10 minutes on my porch and see how our species list compares. +1 for each species, -1 for each one misidentified. Let's go!

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 19/04/2025

Disgusting that home depot sells Vinca to unknowing customers. Every one these can completely decimate the forest ground for native spring ephemerals. 🤮

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 19/04/2025

Yesterday I daydreamed about writing a grant to study bluebirds just because they are beautiful and I want to look at them all day. Female eastern bluebird. (By Sandysphotos2009 - 20100410_16Uploaded by Snowmanradio, CC BY 2.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?...)

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 16/04/2025

They’re alive!!! Here goes nothing little plants. Let’s see how you do. #VceEcotypeStudy

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 08/04/2025

Thoughts and prayers to those of us in the great north. It’s white-out conditions today. 😭 where is spring???

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 15/03/2025

Spring is here! (Well some places not quite VT) We’re getting 2025 observations for our Pollinator Interactions on Plants project! We know much more about herbaceous flowers than we do tree flowers but trees are incredible floral resources! Watch your trees and submit data to help us learn more!

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 14/03/2025

Two proposals submitted in one day! Yea I’m not doing that for awhile 😅 time to party

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 13/03/2025

Do you have a passion for scicomm? Do you want to make a difference for biodiversity? Do you love connecting people with science? Then this jobs for you! vtecostudies.org/about-us/emp... 🧪

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 13/03/2025

paper acceptance day! This time with MOTHS :D

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 11/03/2025

This summer my research group and I are starting 3 (!) new field projects. 1) migratory behavior of blackpoll warblers & swainson’s thrush 2) nesting behavior of female gray catbirds 3) pollinator support in our common gardens It’s going to be a crazy, busy summer but bring it on! I’m so excited

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 26/02/2025

We’re hiring! Looking for a seasonal insect job? Come survey butterflies and bees with VCE! vtecostudies.org/about-us/emp...

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 25/02/2025

Had a hard day yesterday but this face lifted my spirits. Maybe it will lift yours too. Sweet Rosie dog.

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 15/02/2025

And in one of the expensive areas in the country. This is what they did to 2000 employees

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 14/02/2025

Last year our spatial science intern, Eli Byington, produced a story map on the West Virginia White to help community scientists monitor this elusive species. We just learned her entry was selected as a finalist in the 2024 ArcGIS storymap competition! Visit this link to vote! lnkd.in/gJqanhid

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 13/02/2025

We've got a fun new common garden experiment looking at perennial ecotypes and insect support! 🐛 🦋🐝 so many baby plants last year. I was in heaven.

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 07/02/2025

If you were wondering what it’s like to live in Vermont 🍁….snow squalls this morning on the mountain 🌨️🌨️🌨️🌨️

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 04/02/2025

Oh yes! If you add yourself as a member to the project, it will show up as a project in the app. Then for each observation you make your phone, you can add to the project and it will prompt you to add the interaction field.

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 04/02/2025

During covid I started annotating species interactions on iNaturalist. I thought it was fun, so I started the “Pollinator Interactions on Plants” project in 2022 to amp up data collection for the Northeast. 3 years later this Common Drone Fly represents observation #200,000! (Photo:erikamitchell)

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Desirée L. Narango @dlnarango.bsky.social · 31/01/2025

Great paper! Immediately going into our proposal! We have a current project working on female Bicknell’s Thrush across the annual cycle. It’s hasn’t escaped me that this is one of my first projects as the only female conservation scientist at my org 🤔

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