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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Gee, weather app - are you sure fifteen decimal places is enough precision?

Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

This #bobcat often traverses our back yard (and even passes the front door) but this is the closest “encounter” yet. 02:05 this morning, suburban #Hamden, #Connecticut.

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 01/08/2026

Always astonishes me to see a company that developed a product, market it with a misspelled name.

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

This little guy is fast! Running up my leg to my waist. Third (?) instar of the invasive Asian planthopper known as the Spotted Lanternfly, 𝘓𝘺𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘮𝘢 𝘥𝘦𝘭𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘵𝘶𝘭𝘢.

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

A green lacewing (Neuroptera: Chrysopidae) chose this fine-mesh plastic netting over a peach tree as the perfect surface to deposit her eggs, each on its own transparent stalk. First time I’ve seen these amazing tiny wonders. Single iPhone photo (best of 15).

About 35 tiny oval eggs, each dangling from the end of its own thin, transparent stalk. Green grass blurred in the background.

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 15/06/2026

Bobcat trots past our front door at 05:50 this morning in suburban Hamden, Connecticut.

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 18/03/2026

Bobcat strode across our yard last evening. First one for us. Lynx rufus rufus #Connecticut #Hamden #suburbanwildlife #bobcat

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 10/02/2026

That red fox was back tonight and again a security camera caught a few seconds of its antics in a far corner of the video, here cropped. It seems to be retrieving a squirrel it must have killed and stowed earlier.

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 05/02/2026

Red fox troops through snow w/ an Eastern Gray Squirrel. Love its tapeta lucida in the IR. Not sure what’s going on at the extreme edge of the frame; stowing the squirrel for later? Squirrel wriggled loose and tries to escape? Zoomed in on one corner of backyard security camera, 4 am, Connecticut.

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 17/01/2026

“Castle Rock,” the 2019-20 Netflix series, briefly shows a character’s handwritten notes including (for no reason discernible to me) a redrawn copy of Darwin’s famous tree of life doodle, complete with his “I think.” This is at 37:54 of S2 E9.

Darwin’s original doodle of a tree of life

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 23/06/2025

That’s a tiny adult longhorn beetle on my fingertip. 𝘏𝘺𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘺𝘴 𝘮𝘢𝘤𝘶𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘢. Hamden, Connecticut.

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 10/04/2025

New cichlid nomenclature paper by Chris Scharpf! One hopes it lays to rest this long-simmering issue. Paywalled but with free abstract. doi.org/10.11646/zoo...

doi.org

Scantily clad but not naked: an analysis of the Metriaclima vs. Maylandia (Teleostei: Cichlidae) debate | Zootaxa

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

How is it that, after walking on my living room carpet daily for years, I only noticed the Guinea pig today?

Part of the geometric design on a carpet, resembling a dorsal view of a Guinea pig head.

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 22/12/2024

1/9 𝗥𝗲𝗰𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗰𝗹𝗮𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗳𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲𝘀 𝘁𝗼 "𝗛𝗮𝗽𝗹𝗼𝗰𝗵𝗿𝗼𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗲" 𝗰𝗶𝗰𝗵𝗹𝗶𝗱𝘀 The largest tribe of African cichlids are the "Haplochromines." Alas, as I recently showed (doi.org/10.3897/BDJ....), "Haplochromini" is a junior synonym of the correct name, 𝗣𝘀𝗲𝘂𝗱𝗼𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗶𝗹𝗮𝗯𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗶. I made new subtribes within it too: - A 🧵

Photo shows a plesiomorphic "haplochromine" cichlid, 𝘖𝘳𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘤𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘮𝘪𝘴 𝘭𝘶𝘪𝘤𝘩𝘦𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘴, from Tanzania. This fish is rather elongate and appears about 4" (10 cm) long. It is being held by a hand against the front glass of a photographic cell. Cropped from a photo by Cethuyghe on Wikimedia Creative Commons with Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en).

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 02/12/2024

Excellent review of anti-slavery efforts by a few 19th century British clerics in what is now Malawi. The lands around Lake Malawi were the chief areas raided for slaves from the East coast by Arabs and their African collaborators. thecritic.co.uk/in-search-of...

thecritic.co.uk

In search of forgotten heroes | Alexander Chula | The Critic Magazine

The grave was buried in dry silt and foliage, and it took an hour of hacking and digging in the stifling midday heat before steel chinked on stone.

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Reposted by Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D.

Kai The Fish Guy @kaithefishguy.bsky.social · 30/11/2024

Ok I’m gonna need you all to repost today’s #EtymologyEpithet far and wide because this is one of my fav fishes I’ve ever described.

A bright aquamarine blue fish with a red and yellow head.

Photo by Fenton Walsh.

A bright aquamarine blue fish with a red and yellow head.

Photo by Mark Rosenstein.

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Michael K. Oliver, Ph.D. @mkocichlid.bsky.social · 27/11/2024

1/4: My recent cichlid paper is open-access: doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.... It presents the first survey of variation in much of the cichlid skeleton behind the head. My data cover species in all but one of the 166 genera of African cichlids. …🧵

Skeleton of a cichlid, annotated to illustrate the structures and counts reported in my paper.

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