iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

And another one. 😁 My PhD thesis received the distinction of best dissertation at the agricultural faculty of the Humboldt University Berlin. I'm very honored by this prize, and yet again say thank you to all the people involved in my research over the years! You all rock! 😚

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

My thanks go out to all the wonderful people who made this project happen, my colleagues at IGB Berlin, and all the angling guides, fishers and conservationists who used their knowledge and skills to help me make this project into something special. And of course thanks to my friends and family! ❤️🐟🎣

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

I had the great honor to be awarded with the dissertation award of the Baltic Sea Research Foundation for my PhD thesis on northern pike niche use and growth in coastal waters. I´m very happy about the prize, and thank the organizers for a wonderful ceremony in the Maritime Museum Stralsund. 🐟🎣🧪

deutsches-meeresmuseum.de

„Forschungsstiftung Ostsee“ vergibt Preise an herausragende Nachwuchswissenschaftler*innen

Im MEERESMUSEUM Stralsund erhielten am 14. April Dr. Timo Rittweg für seine Doktorarbeit und Juliane Ewald für ihre Masterarbeit die Förderpreise der „Forschungsstiftung Ostsee“. Erstmals wurde auch e...

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British Ecological Society @britishecologicalsociety.org · 08/04/2026

Ecological Solutions and Evidence is accepting proposals for their latest Special Feature! They invite scientists and practitioners to share experiences from management projects that didn't turn out as expected, but still provided important insights into how best to manage ecosystems and species 🌱

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 22/12/2025

These tiny amounts of otolith material represent the last few weeks of growth in an individual fish's life. Measuring oxygen and carbon isotope ratios from the powder will hopefully allow us to reconstruct their wintering grounds at sea 🌅🐟

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 22/12/2025

Which is why I spent two weeks at the National Oceanography Centre (NOCS) in Southampton, extracting tiny amounts of powder from twaite shad (Alosa fallax) and smelt (Osmerus eperlanus) otoliths with a diamond drill 👨🏻‍🔬🔬

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 22/12/2025

Otoliths (calcium carbonate stones that form in the inner ear of most fishes) reflect the elemental signature of the surrounding water in sequential year rings, offering a unique opportunity to reconstruct fish movements back in time.

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 22/12/2025

One week of otolith drilling later... Working on a project investigating the distribution and ecology of non-commercial migratory fish, one part of the project aims at reconstructing marine movements. Our first idea was looking at otoliths! 🐟🐠🐡 🧪 Image: twaite shad (Alosa fallax) otolith

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 19/12/2025

The chronology can now also be used for other fishes in the Baltic, and hopefully contribute to improving and ground-truthing established aging protocols!

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 19/12/2025

Turns out, these tiny pelagic can get OLD 👴🏻 herring otoliths were validated up to an age of 22 years, and sprat otoliths up to 18 years! 🐟

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 19/12/2025

We used 1+ cod for multiple decades to establish a chronology of 14C decay rates for the Baltic Sea, and aligned high-confidence herring and sprat otolith reads to validate it's use

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 19/12/2025

New paper out, led by Allen Andrews, establishing a bomb radiocarbon chronology of the Baltic sea, and validating some Baltic fish aging protocols in the process --> doi.org/10.1093/ices... 🧪

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Dr Phoebe Griffith @crocodiledunphd.bsky.social · 31/03/2025

To extend everyone’s little sturgeon break… very chill baby sturgeons sturgeoning.

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 31/03/2025

Otolith cake pudding to finish the post (also made by @crocodiledunphd.bsky.social)☺️

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 31/03/2025

But just as important, a supportive family and frinds. Big shoutout also to @crocodiledunphd.bsky.social for proof-reading the thesis, listening to my ramblings (i.e. my defense talk),and being allround supportive and wonderful!

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 31/03/2025

Impossible without a great team! (goes for a lot of things, not just PhD theses) 😅

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 31/03/2025

Convinced them in the end it seems 🤓

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 31/03/2025

PhDone! Huge thanks to an amazing team, the Boddenpike gang, my inspiring supervisors & mentors, and everyone else involved in the project. Couldn´t have done this without any of you! Looking forward to many more exciting years of fishy research! 🧪🐟#PhDone #FishSci #Researcher

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 11/03/2025

Little milestones which don´t mean a lot in the grand scheme of things, but I´m chuffed to have crossed 100 citations on my google scholar & RG profiles! Testimony to the fact there´s some people out there reading my stuff, thinking "well, that seems to make sense"! 😆🐟🧪

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Dr Phoebe Griffith @crocodiledunphd.bsky.social · 07/03/2025

Hi #fishsky - calling all fans of the fish Lota lota or #burbot. What common names do you know for this species (in any language) and why is it called that? I have heard some very funny common names in US English and German for the species and would LOVE to know some more! #fishtaxonomy

Phoebe wearing a white fluffy jacket (it’s night time, it is clearly very cold) is holding a gorgeous fish in front of her. It is mottled yellow and black and has a long tail and has inspired many folk names.

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 06/03/2025

As everywhere, it´s not great... 😅 I do have high-res maps on obstructions, however, and will measure species-specific passage efficiency in due time. Thanks for the feedback!

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 06/03/2025

Hey James, it´s a mix of occurence data and abundance. But mostly it´s abundance of fish species at locations (with effort measure) across German river systems over the last two decades. Constraints are that sampling wasn´t constant throughout the year, and methods were poorly standardized.

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 06/03/2025

Question for any ecology peeps that might read my tweets (blues? Do we have a new word for this by now? 😅): Do you know of any courses teaching species distribution modelling techniques (correlative/causative) that you can recommend? Grateful for any advice (baby pike pic for attention) 🙏🧪

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Tim Heidecker @timheidecker.bsky.social · 28/02/2025

Opt out tomorrow!

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Thünen Fisheries and Survey Technology @thuenenfishtech.bsky.social · 28/02/2025

🎬 Lights, camera, action! 🌊 Last week, our new design pearls were in the spotlight. Part of our team was onboard our research vessel, testing its underwater visibility under the frequency of harbor porpoise clicks. Using an echosounder, we simulated these signals—and the results? Very promising! 🦑

Harbour of Rostock in the back, in the front you see a fishing line with one of our new pearls.

two people stand onboard of RV Solea in the harbour of Rostock preparing the setup for echo sound tests.

three people working on the bow of RV Solea to test the new pearls with the echo sounder.

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Fredrik Jutfelt 🐠 @jutfelt.bsky.social · 24/02/2025

Interested in automated length and morphological measurements? Check out our new app and preprint! 🧪🐟🦑 ecoevorxiv.org/repository/v...

A zebrafish on white background and a closeup of the zebrafish eye and face

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Greg Britton @gmbritton.bsky.social · 24/02/2025

Hey, higher ed leaders, this is what acting with courage looks like. Give it a try! We’ll support you.

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 24/02/2025

Great piece about archival tissues by @otolithgirl.bsky.social. If you haven´t already, give it a read! 🐟🐢🦉🐋🧪

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Benjamin Hlina, PhD @benjaminhlina.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

Trophic ecologists who work with stable isotopes I bring you a{nichetools} - a complementary package to {SIBER} and {nicheROVER} that allows you to work with data objects created by either pkg. Check it out! benjaminhlina.github.io/nichetools/ #rstats #stableisotopes #foodwebs

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Zoe Doubleday @zoedoubleday.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

Congrats Erica Durante for publishing amazing research (+ your 4th PhD paper!). Erica developed methods to extract estrogen & progesterone from cephalopod beaks. Now we can get lifetime reproductive data from species we know little about! @aslo.org aslopubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Zoe (author of post) is holding a beak of a giant octopus squid, a mysterious species we know little about.

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

Yes, more love for the "rough" fish! As soon as someone starts caring, that´s the first step! :)

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Jonathan C Slaght @jonathanslaght.com · 07/02/2025

It's #SuberbOwl weekend and yes, this account will bring the owls 🦉

Bearded man clutches an owl, with a fish in its mouth.

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The FSBI @thefsbi.bsky.social · 31/01/2025

#JFB: Native and non-native species response to the colonization and subsequent suppression of northern pike 𝘌𝘴𝘰𝘹 𝘭𝘶𝘤𝘪𝘶𝘴 doi.org/10.1111/jfb.15968 #FishSci

doi.org

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David Shiffman, Ph.D. 🦈 @whysharksmatter.bsky.social · 30/01/2025

I am an editor at a scientific journal that's global in scope, with papers from all over the world. Until my EIC tells me otherwise, I will respond to any sections of papers referring to the "Gulf of America" with: "LOL. LMAO. No."

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koemle.bsky.social @koemle.bsky.social · 16/01/2025

Happy to share that our paper "How quota cuts, recreational fishing, and predator conservation can shape coastal commercial fishery efforts" is finally published in CJFAS, with @rarlinghausfish.bsky.social, Sean Pascoe, Birgit Gassler and Simon Weltersbach cdnsciencepub.com/doi/full/10....

cdnsciencepub.com

Canadian Science Publishing

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 21/01/2025

Fish scientist from northern Germany here, would love to be added! 😊

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 21/01/2025

Fish scientist from northern Germany here, would love to be added! 😁

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 21/01/2025

Fish scientist from northern Germany here, would love to be added 😀

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Timo Rittweg @otolitimo.bsky.social · 21/01/2025

Hi Gina, could you add me to that pack please? 😊

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