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Kevin Healy

@healyke.bsky.social
1.2K followers 1.5K following 17 posts

Lecturer in Macroecology at the University of Galway #Macroecology Google Scholar: l1nk.dev/NJtVI

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Reposted by Kevin Healy
Molecular Parasitology Laboratory @mpl-uniofgalway.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
It was great to have this beautiful image brighten up September! 🔬 Delighted to see work from our lab, captured by Richie and Deirdre, featured in the Irish Society for Parasitology calendar. 🪱
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Brian J. Enquist @bjenquist.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Please pass along: I’m recruiting PhD students to join our Macroecology Lab. We study physical ecology, macroecology, and biodiversity — spanning scaling, trait-based ecology, theory, comparative biology & ecoinformatics. Several avenues for funding. Please reach out if interested 🧪🌐🌾
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Martin Wiener @martinwiener.bsky.social · 20/07/2026
Alpha rhythm determines speech perception rate? And speeding it up makes unintelligibly fast speech comprehensible? This is nuts! www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1...
pnas.org
PNAS
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...
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Belgian Red Devils @belreddevils.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Overturn this! 😎
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Stu West @stuwest.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
The University of Exeter have announced a programme of academic staff cuts, including all of www.exeter.ac.uk/research/gro... Sign the open letter of support at docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F... @crab-exeter.bsky.social
exeter.ac.uk
Centre for Research in Animal Behaviour (CRAB) | Research Groups | University of Exeter
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Cahir O'Kane @cahirokane.bsky.social · 02/07/2026
Yet more redundancies in UK universities
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Darren Dahly @statsepi.bsky.social · 28/05/2026
It 100% harms AHSS, but as a bonus, it also harms STEM. Curiosity driven, investigator led research drives innovation where there isn't a more immediate commercial incentive, and industry already pursues research where there is. Universities exist for the public good, not to subsidize industry.
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Michael Waldron @michaelwaldron.bsky.social · 27/05/2026
An open letter to Minister for Further and Higher Education James Lawless Concern about Research Ireland’s Strategy and Programme Plan openletter.earth/concern-abou...
openletter.earth
Concern about Research Ireland’s Strategy and Programme Plan
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Gavan Reilly @gavreilly.com · 23/05/2026
🗳️ By-election tallies LIVE! 🚨 🔵 Dublin Central bit.ly/DublinCentral26 🟣 Galway West bit.ly/GalwayWest26 Updates here throughout the day(s)!
The RDS. Home of all civilisation, including an allergy attack for me during first year UCD college exams. I am allergic to horses and the horse show prep was underway.
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Takaki Komiyama @takakikomiyama.bsky.social · 22/05/2026
Our new paper is out in Neuron! www.cell.com/neuron/fullt... How does the brain decide how much of the past to use when making decisions? In rapidly changing environments, recent experiences matter more; in stable environments, longer histories are useful.
cell.com
Adaptive reorganization of history encoding in the retrosplenial cortex supports flexible decision-making strategies
Zhang et al. show that mice flexibly adjust how past experiences guide choices in fast- and slow-changing environments. Retrosplenial cortex neurons display a wide range of history-integration timesca...
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Markus Eichhorn @markuseichhorn.bsky.social · 08/05/2026
Anyone else feel like we should arrange another meeting?
A fire rages in the background (label: marking) while people calmly continue playing golf in the foreground (label: academic staff meetings).
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Dr Keith Lyons @keithlnotions.bsky.social · 29/04/2026
The final research chapter of my PhD is published! 🥳🥳🥳🥳 It shows how the ability of spider venom to paralyse prey scales isometrically with its ability to cause prey mortality! It is published with open access in Toxicon: X. You can check it out via the following link - doi.org/10.1016/j.to....
doi.org
Redirecting
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Kevin Healy @healyke.bsky.social · 28/04/2026
New paper led by @keithlnotions.bsky.social showing that the ability of a venom to paralysis prey scales isometrically with its ability to kill prey in spiders www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
sciencedirect.com
Paralysis efficiency (PD50) scales linearly with lethality (LD50) in spider venoms
Historically, venom potencies have been assessed using measures of lethality, such as the median lethal dose (LD50). However, venoms may be selected p…
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The Irish Times @irishtimes.com · 22/04/2026
Wildlife experts call for ‘misleading’ timber industry book to be removed from schools
irishtimes.com
Wildlife experts call for ‘misleading’ timber industry book to be removed from schools
Foreword by Michael Healy-Rae champions virtues of commercial Sitka spruce without referencing environmental harms
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Goosed.ie @goosed.ie · 12/04/2026
Irish Instagram is quietly radicalising adults, and it's not teenagers you should be worried about. From nostalgia reels to rage-bait algorithms, here's how ordinary feeds are reshaping Irish political opinion.. Read now on Goosed.ie 👉 goosed.ie/news/how-iri...
goosed.ie
We're not just scrolling: how Irish Instagram is quietly radicalising adults - Goosed.ie
Irish Instagram is quietly radicalising adults, and it's not teenagers you should be worried about. From nostalgia reels to rage-bait algorithms, here's how ordinary feeds are reshaping Irish political...
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Nature Ecology & Evolution @natecoevo.nature.com · 27/02/2026
Using phylogenetic comparative methods across 237 species from disparate phyla, the authors show that species with fast-paced ecologies have higher temporal resolution of perception 🧪 www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
Pace of ecology drives the tempo of visual perception across the animal kingdom - Nature Ecology & Evolution
Using phylogenetic comparative methods across 237 species from disparate phyla, the authors show that species with fast-paced ecologies have higher temporal resolution of perception.
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Shervin Safavi @neuroprinciplist.bsky.social · 24/02/2026
This study is super cool (connecting ecology and perception), that suggest some aspects of animal's perception (temporal precision) is shaped by their environment (which somehow resonates w our proposal on internal foraging perspectives on perceptual selection www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...)
nature.com
Pace of ecology drives the tempo of visual perception across the animal kingdom - Nature Ecology & Evolution
Using phylogenetic comparative methods across 237 species from disparate phyla, the authors show that species with fast-paced ecologies have higher temporal resolution of perception.
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Kevin Mitchell @wiringthebrain.bsky.social · 24/02/2026
Speed of Life Shapes Animal Vision: How Ecology Determines the Pace at Which Animals Perceive Time bioengineer.org/speed-of-lif...
bioengineer.org
Speed of Life Shapes Animal Vision: How Ecology Determines the Pace at
In the vast tapestry of life on Earth, animals perceive the world around them in ways that profoundly differ, not only in terms of sensory input but in the very fabric of temporal experience. A
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Kevin Healy @healyke.bsky.social · 24/02/2026
Our new paper is now out showing how time perception in animals is linked to their ecology. Using data from 237 species we show temporal perception is faster in species that fly and pursuit predators www.nature.com/articles/s41... 🌐
nature.com
Pace of ecology drives the tempo of visual perception across the animal kingdom
Nature Ecology & Evolution - Using phylogenetic comparative methods across 237 species from disparate phyla, the authors show that species with fast-paced ecologies have higher temporal...
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Thiago Carvalho @cyrilpedia.bsky.social · 22/02/2026
"The problem is not simply that cross-species translation is difficult; it is that the field has largely accepted this difficulty rather than treating it as a central scientific challenge. Neuroscience has also struggled to confront the fact that different species often tell different stories."
thetransmitter.org
Neuroscience has a species problem
If neuroscience is serious about building general principles of brain function, cross-species dialogue must become a core organizing principle.
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Katie Mack @astrokatie.com · 13/02/2026
I feel this way about pretty much all vaccine-preventable infectious diseases. You shouldn't be allowed to dump cyanide into municipal drinking water and you shouldn't be allowed to recreationally spread viruses around shared public spaces.
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SK Winnicki, PhD 🏳️‍⚧️ @skwinnicki.bsky.social · 12/02/2026
Found an additional graphic that gets even more of these quotes together. I've kept "I hate myself, I hate clover, and I hate bees" pinned above my desk since I first started studying evolutionary biology as an undergraduate. So relatable to get extremely frustrated with your study system.
Image of Charles Darwin quotes, with the recipient of the letter and the date the letter was written. He said "I hate every wave of the ocean" to W.D. Fox on 15 February 1836, "Oh my God how I do hate species and varieties" to J.D. Hooker in 11 March 1858, "I am very tired, very stomachy, and hate nearly the whole world" to Thomas Huxley on 10 September 1860, "I am very poorly today and very stupid and hate everybody and everything" to Charles Lyell on 1 October 1861, "I hate myself, I hate clover, and I hate bees" to John Lubbock on 3 September 1862, and "I am languid and bedeviled and hate writing and hate everybody" to J.D. Hooker on 23 June 1863.
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Maynooth University School of Law and Criminology @maynoothlaw.bsky.social · 06/01/2026
New Article “Should we patent the 'Woolly Mammoth'? Ecological and animal welfare objections”, funded by @researchireland.ie , published in Journal of Property Law & Practice and co-authored by Dr. David Doyle. You can access the article here: tinyurl.com/amemee3w
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Prof. Maria McNamara @mariamcnamara.bsky.social · 13/11/2025
Check out our new and improved Fossil Map of Ireland! With an incredible 176 new fossil sites, courtesy of the Irish public - thank you for all your submissions! An amazing citizen science project www.ucc.ie/en/fossil-he... @ucc.ie @thepalass.bsky.social @erc.europa.eu @researchireland.ie
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Kevin Healy @healyke.bsky.social · 28/10/2025
New paper out led by @scanavan.bsky.social were we use twitter usage to help understand how the general public perceives invasive species ecologyandsociety.org/vol30/iss4/a... 🌐
ecologyandsociety.org
Ecology & Society
A journal of integrative science for resilience and sustainability
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Catherine Sheard @sheardcat.bsky.social · 30/07/2025
New bird tree who dis. www.cell.com/current-biol...
a figure from the linked paper, showing extremely high rates of species diversification in the higher latitudes, higher diversification in the passerines (and in the early history of the oscines), and a marked (but unevenly distributed) uptick in diversification towards the present day
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Galway Advertiser @galwayadvertiser.bsky.social · 17/07/2025
Proponents of the Galway City Ring Road (GCRR) have argued that moving some of the city traffic away from the centre and onto a by-pass will reduce congestion and free up space for alternatives to the car such as bus and cycle lanes. But will it? www.advertiser.ie/galway/artic...
advertiser.ie
Will the Ring Road free up space in the city?
This argument is dubious at best, and simply not supported by the data in the GCRR submission, which is currently before An Coimisiún Pleanála (formerly An Bord Pleanála ).
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Markus Eichhorn @markuseichhorn.bsky.social · 10/07/2025
It's @besmacro.bsky.social meeting time! Follow #BESMacro2025 for updates on big ecology today and tomorrow 🌏🌐
Joe Bailey starts the meeting York Minster is massive
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Andrew Jackson @yodacomplex.bsky.social · 30/06/2025
New paper: in which we get grumpy with GenAI / LLMs polluting the human corpora of text rendering many cultural analyses void. Open access with @healyke.bsky.social @adamdkane.bsky.social @rcorreia.bsky.social doi.org/10.1007/s442... ping @edzitron.com might be of interest?
doi.org
Generative AI - Signal to Noise - Digital Society
The sudden deployment of large language models (LLMs) has been a seismic event for science, with professional scientists, including biologists, struggling to work out how to fit this new technology in...
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Kevin Healy @healyke.bsky.social · 26/06/2025
In our latest commentary piece we highlight that AI has likely already poisoned the well of online data used in culturomic studies that aim to understand shifts in the cultural zeitgeist link.springer.com/article/10.1... 🌐 @yodacomplex.bsky.social
link.springer.com
Generative AI - Signal to Noise - Digital Society
The sudden deployment of large language models (LLMs) has been a seismic event for science, with professional scientists, including biologists, struggling to work out how to fit this new technology in...
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Kevin Healy @healyke.bsky.social · 26/06/2025
Just out our latest commentary piece highlighting that AI has likely already poisoned the well of online data used in culturomic studies that aim to understand shifts in the cultural zeitgeist link.springer.com/article/10.1... #AcademicSky #🌐
link.springer.com
Generative AI - Signal to Noise - Digital Society
The sudden deployment of large language models (LLMs) has been a seismic event for science, with professional scientists, including biologists, struggling to work out how to fit this new technology in...
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Catherine Sheard @sheardcat.bsky.social · 30/05/2025
It's the last day to apply for #BESMacro2025 ! Come join us in beautiful York for two days of awesome macro-scale science (plus an optional pre-conference workshop on scientific storytelling) www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/bes-macro-...
eventbrite.co.uk
BES Macro 2025
A British Ecological Society specialist group conference for researchers in macroecology and/or macroevolution at any academic career stage.
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Mel Pardi @drpardi.bsky.social · 27/05/2025
🐶 Animal #666 🐈 I figured it out in 3 guesses! 🟧🟨🟩 🔥 1 | Avg. Guesses: 5.7 metazooa.com #metazooa
metazooa.com
Metazooa
Become an evolutionary detective to find the Mystery Animal!
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Cosáin Climate @cosaingalway.bsky.social · 22/05/2025
City Council officials emphatically declared several years ago that implementation of the "€200-million 10-year" #GalwayTransportStrategy was proceeding in parallel with the ring road project, and was not waiting for it. All lies. Is anybody surprised? www.advertiser.ie/galway/artic...
advertiser.ie
Transport policy paused until Ring Road decision
The National Transport Authority has decided to pause developing Galway city’s transport strategy until a decision is made for or against the N6 Ring Road.
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Josef Uyeda @pseudacris.bsky.social · 21/05/2025
Unsolicited listicle: My list of the most criminally underused/underappreciated phylogenetic comparative methods. Note, I am not involved in ANY of these methods; but I see them as things people are often asking of comparative data but have been surprised at how infrequently they have been cited.
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Dr Keith Lyons @keithlnotions.bsky.social · 21/05/2025
Doi for our manuscript can be found in CASSYNI alongside our seminar, using the doi link above.
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Dr Keith Lyons @keithlnotions.bsky.social · 21/05/2025
Along with our research on spider venom potency published in Biology Letters, we were kindly asked to prepare a seminar discussing the manuscript for @royalsocietypublishing.org/@cassyni.bsky.social's "Ecology and Evolution Seminar Series" doi.org/10.52843/cassyni.slp5xv. It's free to watch! Enjoy!
doi.org
Cassyni | Science starts with a seminar
Seamlessly organise, run and publish academic research seminars. Get started in minutes.
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Dr Keith Lyons @keithlnotions.bsky.social · 21/05/2025
Our latest research on the factors influencing spider venom potency has been published in Biology Letters! doi.org/10.1098/rsbl... Big thank you to my supervisors Dr @healyke.bsky.social and Dr Michel Dugon along with the media team @uniofgalway.bsky.social for spreading the word!
doi.org
Spider venom potency exhibits phylogenetic prey specificity but does not trade-off with body size or silk use in prey capture | Biology Letters
Spiders employ a diverse range of predator traits, including potent venoms, complex silk-hunting strategies and mechanical strength coupled with larger body sizes to capture prey. This trait diversity...
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Kevin Healy @healyke.bsky.social · 21/05/2025
Delighted to see our latest paper on the macroecology of spider venoms led by @keithlnotions.bsky.social published today in Biology letters. royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/epdf/10....
royalsocietypublishing.org
Spider venom potency exhibits phylogenetic prey specificity but does not trade-off with body size or silk use in prey capture | Biology Letters
Spiders employ a diverse range of predator traits, including potent venoms, complex silk-hunting strategies and mechanical strength coupled with larger body sizes to capture prey. This trait diversity, along with the quantifiable nature of venom potency, ...
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The Journal @thejournal.ie · 21/05/2025
A new study from the University of Galway’s School of Natural Sciences has revealed why some spiders possess venom that is far more potent than others. jrnl.ie/6709955
jrnl.ie
Galway researchers have discovered why some spiders are more venomous than others
The researchers analysed venom from more than 70 different spider species, to see what could explain the wide variation in venom strength.
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Joel Morris @gralefrit.bsky.social · 02/05/2025
The Green Party don’t get as much media coverage as Reform because the continuation of civilised human life on the planet isn’t as interesting as cunts.
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IrishCycle.com @irishcycle.com · 24/04/2025
Galway deserves a chance to breathe, but emotive arguments cannot brush away the fact a second ring road will suffocate the city in traffic irishcycle.com/2025/04/24/g...
irishcycle.com
Galway deserves a chance to breathe, but emotive arguments cannot brush away the fact a second ring road will suffocate the city in traffic
Comment & Analysis / Long Read: It’s a seductive claim that building a second ring road in Galway will let the city and county breathe, but all the evidence we have — including from…
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Galway Cycling Campaign - Feachtas Rothaíochta na Gaillimhe @galwaycycling.bsky.social · 14/04/2025
Why have we not made progress on this in Galway yet? Combining a bicycle with the light rail stops allows a greater catchment area for that last mile of travel. Light rail would also free up roadspace in our city so that any cars bypassing the city could use the orbital route effectively.
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BES Macro @besmacro.bsky.social · 28/02/2025
You: hey, is #BESMacro open for registration? Us: yes, it is! Main deadline May 31, apply for the student plenary by May 2. Come join us in York for great talks, posters, workshops, and macro-scale fun! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/bes-macro-...
eventbrite.co.uk
BES Macro 2025
A British Ecological Society specialist group conference for researchers in macroecology and/or macroevolution at any academic career stage.
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Benjamin Rosenbaum @benrosenbaum.bsky.social · 28/02/2025
I completely re-worked my course "Introduction to Bayesian statistics with brms" and taught it for the 1st time this week. It is meant as a tutorial for ecologists, but should be general enough for other sciences as well github.com/benjamin-ros... #stats #Rstats #brms #Stan #Bayesian
github.com
GitHub - benjamin-rosenbaum/bayesian-intro: Introduction to Bayesian statistics
Introduction to Bayesian statistics. Contribute to benjamin-rosenbaum/bayesian-intro development by creating an account on GitHub.
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Darren O'Connell @daroconnell.bsky.social · 24/02/2025
Check out our new blog summarising recent meta-analysis assessing treatments for the Varroa mite #pathogen of honey bees! This #invasive #parasite has huge impacts on crops from lost #pollination 🧪 @ucddublin.bsky.social @healyke.bsky.social @cristinabotias.bsky.social www.ucd.ie/earth/news-o...
ucd.ie
24 February tackling varroa mite
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Susan Canavan @scanavan.bsky.social · 20/02/2025
Check out our new-ish paper. This paper pushed me to become a @wikipedia.org editor so I could create and update pages for endangered or invasive species. Updating wiki not only helps share conservation information with a wider audience, but also helps our work break out of the academic bubble 🐢
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Sal Keith (she/her) @salkeith.bsky.social · 06/02/2025
A commentary piece from me to you (...if you're an #ethologist / #BehaviouralEcologist) link.springer.com/article/10.1... #Macrobehaviour needs you! @asab.org @biorxiv-behav.bsky.social @mpi-animalbehav.bsky.social @abcmicrogrants.bsky.social @besmacro.bsky.social
media.tenor.com
a group of people are dancing in a hallway with a sign that says white water rafting
Alt: a group of people are dancing in a hallway with a sign that says white water rafting
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Michael Tremmel @michaeltremmel.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
We hoped that the reorganization to Research Ireland would make this better but so far it hasn’t. We need to invest in basic research, do away with student-led grants, and ensure timely review processes. There is opportunity to make Ireland a leader in research but so far the gov has failed at this.
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Darren O'Connell @daroconnell.bsky.social · 20/01/2025
Our new meta-analysis assessing treatments for the Varroa mite #pathogen of honey bees! This #invasive #parasite has huge impacts on crops from lost #pollination We synthesise the best options and future prospects 🧪 @ucddublin.bsky.social @healyke.bsky.social www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
sciencedirect.com
A systematic meta-analysis of the efficacy of treatments for a global honey bee pathogen - the Varroa mite
The western honey bee Apis mellifera is the world's most important managed pollinator. However, globally honey bees have been facing increasing colony…
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