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skwinnicki.bsky.social
SK Winnicki, PhD 🏳️‍⚧️
@skwinnicki.bsky.social
29K followers 7.9K following 20K posts
Evolutionary ecologist & ornithologist, postdoc Ohio State | PhD UIUC, MSc Kansas State | SciComm, birding, and nature photography | certified Lawn Hater, Cowbird Apologist, Stress Physiology Enthusiast, Typo Lover | they/them 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈 | skwinnicki.com
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skwinnicki.bsky.social
SK Winnicki, PhD 🏳️‍⚧️ @skwinnicki.bsky.social · Feb 12
Hi new followers, I’m SK!

Do you know that trope where a character is eaten alive by a dark secret and is forced to publicly confess it? That’s how I feel about every cool fact I learn, and until I can get back to teaching again they’re all coming out here, so buckle up!

Thread of fave posts:
Picture of SK, a pale person with blond hair in a messy braid—a poorly constructed braid not an intentionally messy one, hidden below a ballcap and sunglasses reflecting the Allegheny Plateau forest around me. I'm dressed in a tie-dyed tshirt that says Konza Crew 2017, from my Master's work on grassland sparrows; the shirt includes outlines of a Grasshopper Sparrow, Dickcissel, and Eastern Meadowlark that I drew. I am holding a towhee, a large species of sparrow, in my hand before the bird was released back into the forest. It is hard to tell in the photo but the bird is possibly a bilateral gynandromorph, with black male-type plumage on one side of the body, and brown female-type plumage on the other side of the body.
skwinnicki.bsky.social
y'all stop talking about Gay Cardinal Season, if too many people know about it they'll stop making gay cardinal decorations and those are the only thing that gets me through the 2.5 month Christmas season
December 1, 2025 at 7:04 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Not the iNaturalist Year in Review calling me out on my intense taxa biases

Of my 1,133 observations submitted in the last year:
-78% were vertebrates
-69% of the total were bird observations (vs., like, 12% plants)
-and 25% of those bird observations were of New World Warblers haha
Screenshot of a portion of the iNaturalist Year in Review charts, showing pie charts arranged as a ring with totals in the middle. On the left is a chart showing that the majority of my 1,133 observations were research-grade, which means that they have confirmed identifications by other users and are available data for researchers. On the right is a chart of the 449 species I have submitted, with the majority being the blue vertebrate colors, mostly birds, and a small portion being oranges for insects and mollucks, green for plants, and pink for fungi.
December 1, 2025 at 5:24 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
We moved up our 13 hour drive home from South Carolina to Cleveland Ohio by a day to try to beat as much of this snow as we could.

Almost home and we’ve had no snow yet, but if we were like 1 hour later we would’ve had 5 straight hours of snow 😳
Screenshot of a radar app showing us in Canton Ohio with a clear shot north to Cleveland and blue snow over the route we just drove, up north from Parkersburg.
November 30, 2025 at 2:07 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Before I was hired at Ohio State: “Ryan Day can manage to win a bunch of games but not beat Michigan”

After I was hired at Ohio State: the team has been undefeated, winning the National Championship and Ryan Day’s Buckeyes finally manage to beat Michigan

Just sayin’
skwinnicki.bsky.social SK Winnicki, PhD 🏳️‍⚧️ @skwinnicki.bsky.social · Aug 30
This team still hasn't lost a game since I was hired as a postdoc at Ohio State, and we all know correlation absolutely implies causation.

If your team needs a boost, hear me out: you could offer a tenure track position to Dr. SK Winnicki
skwinnicki.bsky.social SK Winnicki, PhD 🏳️‍⚧️ @skwinnicki.bsky.social · Jan 1
“This team doesn’t look like the team that lost to Michigan”

What happened? I’ve got a scientific theory:

Loss to Michigan: Dr. SK Winnicki was not an OSU employee
Win against Tennessee and winning against Oregon: Dr. SK Winnicki was an OSU employee
November 29, 2025 at 8:32 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
We used to visit a beachfront place in Cherry Grove (SC), I was sad to not have quick beach access on this trip.

But there is a lagoon behind this rental so I got to watch an Anhinga every day, and it was here all morning as we packed up to drive back to Ohio, so that’s nice!
Dark waterbird sunning itself up in a shrub over the water, an Anhinga, also called a darter or water turkey. It has a long snake-like neck and long tail, plus a long stabby yellow beak. Its wings have big silvery white patches.
November 29, 2025 at 2:42 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
This (Hilton Head Island) is a tourist town, so strangers kept recommending that we check out various bars for happy hour and a nightlife scene

I didn’t bother to mention our plans were sitting quietly on a freezing boardwalk, waiting for Clapper Rails to sneak out after sunset

#birds
Two photos a mud-colored brown-gray chicken-like waterbird with a white tail and a long orange beak, walking in water in a dark saltmarsh. Same bird, now stretching a little bit as it steps.
November 28, 2025 at 11:00 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
I had to switch to video because they’re just too fast for my autofocus after sunset haha
Very blurry photo of a chicken-like Clapper Rail stepping through water in a dark saltmarsh.
November 28, 2025 at 10:45 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Making my family freeze at a smelly tidal saltmarsh at sunset for fleeting glimpses of Clapper Rails, but if paid off so…

#birds
November 28, 2025 at 10:42 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Holiday weeks can be busy and stressful on your body, even if you’re having fun.

This Piping Plover is here to remind you that rest is a critical part of life for all living things, including you!
Small round shorebird, light gray brown on its back and head, like the color of the sand, and white bellow. It had yellow-orange legs and a short black beak. It is sitting on the sand with its eyes closed.
November 28, 2025 at 8:53 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
In addition to the hundreds of birds and handful of shark teeth I found while stuck on a sandbar for five hours, I also found the remains of this little dear.

Rest easy, little horseshoe crab!
Dead tiny horseshoe crab, a strange alien looking sea animal with a spiky armored front in the shape of a horseshoe and a long pointy tail. My hand holding the dead horseshoe crab upside down, so you can see its legs and tiny pinchers underneath the shell.
November 28, 2025 at 5:53 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
If you see this in a store and you find yourself wondering “who would eat this for Thanksgiving dinner?” know the answer is my family

and they said it’s delicious
Frozen DiGiorno brand pizza box, for a deep dish Thanksgiving pizza, limited edition. It’s advertised as roasted turkey with green beans, crispy onions, dried cranberries & a gravy drizzle on Detroit style crust.
November 28, 2025 at 5:37 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Least Sandpipers are the smallest sandpiper in North America, about the size of a sparrow. They're easy to miss on a big beach because they are so small! I love them so much.
November 28, 2025 at 5:17 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
And if you want a sense of just how many hundreds of shorebirds surrounded me as I sat (stranded) on a sandbar for hours today, check out this rough pan!

youtu.be/lutXz31RRzM
November 28, 2025 at 5:01 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Too tired to clip these clips for Bluesky (sorry), but if you want to see a Wilson's Plover bullying some Semipalmated Plovers, a Sanderling, and some Least Sandpipers you can watch them on YouTube! (it's unedited footage though)

#birds

youtu.be/0GJnUa0tKbk
Wilson's Plover harassing other shorebirds
YouTube video by SK Winnicki
youtu.be
November 28, 2025 at 4:58 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
If you want to see the details of the incredible #birds I saw while stranded on a sandbar for hours, I put them all in this eBird list

26 species, 19 of which had good enough photos to share (or I included the photos in case someone can help me with the ID), 137 photos 😂

ebird.org/checklist/S2...
November 28, 2025 at 4:02 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
I'm getting on the statewide rare bird alert for South Carolina with this one, and more importantly it's a lifer for me (a species I've never seen before)-- a Sandwich Tern! They should be farther south by now, but luckily this one is holding on for me :D

#birds
Slender silvery-gray and white tern, a gull-like shorebird. It has a stripe of black behind its eye, and a thin black beak with a little yellow tip. It is flying over water.
November 28, 2025 at 1:36 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
How many types of plovers can you count in this photo?

(answer in alt text)

#birds
There are three types of plovers in this photo. The vast majority, about 50 individuals, are small birds with brown backs, black and white stripes on the neck, a brown head, white on the chin and on the belly, short orange legs and beaks; these are Semipalmated Plovers. On the far left of the frame, about halfway up, is a slightly larger brown bird, with a longer thicker black bill; this is a Wilson's Plover. On the right of the frame, about two-thirds of the way over, is a much lighter bird, like a bleached version of the Semipalmated Plovers and a little plumper; this is a Piping Plover.
November 28, 2025 at 1:15 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Nope, no Piping Plover here, just sand, sand that would not be yummy for a predator to eat

#birds
Large field of white sand with scattered shells and organic debris. In the center of the frame is a Piping Plover, a small shorebird, its back and head perfectly sand-colored, with a white stripe on the neck, white belly, short black bill, and yellow-orange legs.
November 28, 2025 at 1:08 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Sorting through over 2000 photos that look like this. Just indescribably magical!

These photos include Black Skimmers, Semipalmated Plovers, Piping Plovers, and some distant Least Sandpipers, Dunlin, Marbled Godwit, and Ring-billed Gull.

#birds
A flock of Black Skimmers lifting off into the air in front of a blue sea. They are black and white tern-like shorebirds with long wings, black on top and white below, and orange and black long beaks. There are more birds in this photo than space without birds. A huge flock of little brown birds on the beach, probably 500 or so, mostly blurry with the distance. Up front there are mostly Semipalmated Sandpipers and Dunlins, with four smaller Least Sandpipers in the bottom left corner with two lighter colored, almost white, birds-- Piping Plovers. Close-up on the plover flock. Most of the birds are brown on their wings and back and white below, with black and white stripes on the neck, and brown heads with short orange beaks with a black tip. In the center of the photo there is also a Piping Plover, a much paler bird that looks like a bleached version of the Semipalmated Plovers, white and light gray-brown, with orange legs. Close-up on a flock of Black Skimmers on the shore, strange tern-like sea birds that are mostly black when they are sitting, with white on their face, necks, and bellies. They have short orange legs and a very long beak that is orange at the base, near the face, and black at the tip. The top half of the beak is about half as long as the bottom half of the beak. Behind them, blurred out, are a Marbled Godwit and a Ring-billed Gull.
November 28, 2025 at 12:13 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
I’ve never worked this hard for five tiny shark teeth, nor been so grateful to find any that I could cry. Trip has been saved and my heart is full!

Also found something rarer for me— the fragile white “dove” from the inside of a sand dollar! Only the second I’ve ever found in my life!
Hand holding five tiny black fossilized shark teeth, plus a small white bone-like structure in the shape of a flying bird.
November 27, 2025 at 8:21 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Did I get stuck by the high tide on a sandbar when I left my family on the holiday to go birding “for a few hours”? Sure

Will it go down as one of the best moments of my life? Also yes

There are thousands of birds here, letting me lay among them. Like, Piping Plovers and Black Skimmers! Phone vid:
November 27, 2025 at 6:27 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
The Anhinga in the lagoon behind this rental seems to go somewhere else to feed during the day, it leaves by 9AM most mornings.

I slept in today so I assumed I’d missed it, but it stayed an extra 15 minutes and flew over to my side so I could take water turkey photos from the porch on turkey day!
Four photos of an Anhinga, a waterbird also known as a darter, snakebird, or water turkey. It is black and brown, with a long snake-like neck and long tail, which sort of resembles the tail of a wild turkey. Its wings and black with silvery patches. The beak is yellow and stabby. In this photo the Anhinga is perched in the bushes across the lake. Now the Anhinga is closer, on the leaf-covered beach on this side of the lagoon, so you can see more details, like the silvery white long feathers on its back. The Anhinga has its wings half raised and its neck stretched out. The Anhinga is bending its neck back and inflating the gular skin pouch under its beak, making its head look fatter.
November 27, 2025 at 3:41 PM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Got another nictitating membrane photo today! This one on a Northern Mockingbird. I think it makes them look wise, like it is sending me on a quest.
A stately thin gray robin-sized bird on an ornamental shrub. It is clean gray on the top and whiter on the belly. Its wings and tail are darker gray, and it has two white wing-bars. A dark line runs from its eye to its beak, like cool eyeliner. In this photo the third eyelid is not visible, so its eye looks clear and lively. Same bird in the same pose, but in those photo the clear nictitating membrane is across the eye, making it look milky and gray.
November 26, 2025 at 1:45 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
"We're not going birding this morning, we're going to the pickleball courts"

joke's on you, if I'm outside I'm birding

Northern Mockingbird and Palm Warbler
A gray bird with a lighter belly, darker gray wings with white spots, a thin slightly curved gray bill, and a black line through the eye. I think the light is extra weird here, which is why the bird looks more brown than gray. The bird is perched on the top of a fence around a pickleball court. A small gray-brown warbler with stripes on its head and a lemon yellow butt is perched in a hole in a fence at the edge of a pickleball court.
November 26, 2025 at 1:42 AM
skwinnicki.bsky.social
Back on my bullshit for a second day in a row
Another Gulf Fritillary butterfly, on a small white flower in dried grass. The butterfly is deep orange, almost red, with black spots and wing-edges, and three white spots on each wing near the leading edge.
November 26, 2025 at 1:39 AM