Holly Vuong, from CSIRO in Canberra, Australia, recently had a paper published in Journal of Ecology entitled “Host species and environmental variation can influence rhizobial community composition”. Below, Holly presents the context of her study on plant-microbes interactions in nutrient and water limited Australian soils and summarizes the findings of her experiment. Out of about 1,350 Acacia species in…
For our next Invasive Species Week blog post, Rebecca Bunn and Ylva Lekberg have contributed a piece about their paper, which is included in our special Invasive Species Virtual Issue. Read their full paper here, free to access for a limited time. For an exotic plant to become invasive it must outcompete native plants. One of the…
Dean Pearson is a Research Ecologist based at the Rocky Mountain Research Station, USDA Forest Service. In this blog post, he gives some background to his recent Journal of Ecology paper; The tortoise and the hare: reducing resource availability shifts competitive balance between plant species. This week is Invasive Species Week – Dean’s paper was chosen to…
In this blog post, Pieter De Frenne (Ghent University) talks about his recently published Biological Flora of the British Isles paper on the perennial grass, Milium effusum… The choice of our study species was not easy. It is the year 2007. I have just graduated and started my PhD. I am at a meeting with my supervisors…
Today we celebrate International Day for Forests. Organised by the UN, International Day for Forests raises awareness of the importance of all types of woodlands and trees, and celebrates the ways in which they sustain and protect us. In order to highlight the importance of wood energy, sustainable development and climate change, the theme for 2017…
To mark the Savanna Science Network Meeting 2017 in South Africa, Deron Burkpile has written a blog about his recent study based in Kruger National Park. His paper, based on African savanna herbivores and plant richness, will also have a commentary paper about it in the next issue, so keep an eye out for that! Keep up with…
Alistair Auffret (Stockholm University) recently had an Essay Review published in Journal of Ecology titled; Plant functional connectivity – integrating landscape structure and effective dispersal. Below, Alistair gives us a background to his paper and more information on the functional connectivity of plants…
Nina Farwig was one of the contributors to the dispersal special feature published in issue 105.1 of Journal of Ecology. Read more about her paper below… When thinking about forests, the average European citizen will picture an ecosystem that has been shaped by human activity for hundreds of years. In fact, today, more than 70%…
To celebrate World Wetlands Day 2017, Helen Moor of Stockholm University has given a background to her recent essay review published in Journal of Ecology; Towards a trait-based ecology of wetland vegetation. Wetland ecosystems, from marshes to bogs, can provide numerous benefits to society. They can act as water reservoirs and attenuate floods, filter…
Connor Fitzpatrick is a graduate student based at the University of Toronto Mississauga. The article below gives us a background into his work and recent Journal of Ecology paper; Phylogenetic relatedness, phenotypic similarity and plant–soil feedbacks. This project started from the simple idea that closely related organisms will interact more strongly due to their similarity…
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