Special Feature: Grass–woodland transitions

Grasslands, woodlands and savannas occupy large portions of the Earth´s surface, but are particularly prevalent in dryland, temperate and tropical/subtropical regions. These vegetation types play a key role in the functioning of the biosphere and in supporting the needs of human population through the provision of multiple ecosystem services. An important part of the world’s…

Happy #OAWeek2014

In celebration of Open Access week 2014 each of the British Ecological Society’s journals, including Journal of Ecology, have each published a Virtual Issue of recently published OA papers. Click on the covers below to access each journal’s Virtual Issue.               All of the papers included in the Virtual…

Editor’s Choice 102:4

The Editor’s Choice for the next issue of Journal of Ecology is “An ideal free distribution explains the root production of plants that do not engage in a tragedy of the commons game” by McNickle and Brown. Read the below commentary on the paper written by Journal of Ecology Editor Mark Rees. Author Gordon McNickle…

Editor’s Choice 102:1

The Editor’s Choice paper from issue 102:1 of the Journal is The phenology–substrate-match hypothesis explains decomposition rates of evergreen and deciduous oak leaves by Pearse, Cobb & Karban. Read Associate Editor Rien Aerts’ commentary on the paper below. Editor’s Choice 102:1 Litter decomposition is the major pathway of energy and biomass transfer in most terrestrial ecosystems and…

Ecological Inspirations: John Philip Grime

This post represents the first entry of our Eminent Ecologist series. Read more blog posts from our Eminent Ecologists: http://bit.ly/eminentecologist Blog commentary by J.P. Grime on a set of papers (1965-2007) from the Journal of Ecology reproduced online in December 2013 Thank you, Editors, for this opportunity to reflect on the circumstances, motivating forces and memorable…

Amicus curiae and allowing the posting of preprints

The Journal of Ecology along with the other British Ecological Society journals will now allow submission of manuscripts that have been previously posted on recognized preprint archives such as arXiv and PeerJ PrePrints and the new bioRχiv. We still won’t publish work that’s already been published, you have to tell us where a manuscript has…

Editor’s Choice 101:6

Issue 101:6 of Journal of Ecology is now online. The Editor’s Choice paper from the final issue of 2013 is “Waiting for Gajah: an elephant mutualist’s contingency plan for an endangered megafaunal disperser” by Sekar & Sukumar. Read Associate Editor Michelle Leishman’s commentary on the paper below. Editor’s Choice 101:6 What are the flow-on effects to ecosystems…