Glacier forelands reveal fundamental plant and microbial controls on short-term ecosystem nitrogen retention

Author Franciska de Vries gives her insight into newly published Journal of Ecology article: Glacier forelands reveal fundamental plant and microbial controls on short-term ecosystem nitrogen retention. Franciska and her co-authors investigated how ecosystem nitrogen retention changed with succession across glacier forelands, in a project that was funded by a British Ecological Society research grant.…

How is litter decomposition affected by climate change in Mediterranean forests? Soil fauna has the key

Lead author Pablo Homet discusses recently published article: Soil fauna modulates the effect of experimental drought on litter decomposition in forests invaded by an exotic pathogen. Find out more about how litter mesofauna plays an important role in litter decomposition in a Mediterranean forest. Decomposition processes of dead organic matter are fundamental for life cycling.…

Editor’s Choice: Volume 109 Issue 5

The Editor’s Choice for our May issue is “Herbivore dung stoichiometry drives competition between savanna trees and grasses” by Judith Sitters & Harry Olde Venterink. This article shows that browsing and grazing herbivores potentially help maintain the tree‐grass balance in African savanna, through variation in the nitrogen (N) to phosphorus (P) ratio of their dung! Here the…

Inaugural Sprent Review: Explaining the evolutionary and biogeographical success of nodulated legumes compared with actinorhizal plants

Today our inaugural Sprent Review was published in the March issue of Journal of Ecology. The first Sprent Review is “Evolution and biogeography of actinorhizal plants and legumes: A comparison” by Julie Ardley and Janet Sprent. Here Julie and Janet discuss Janet’s illustrious career in ecology and provide details about their new review paper. You…

Sprent Reviews

We are delighted to announce the publication of our first Sprent Review in Journal of Ecology, by Julie Ardley and Janet Sprent on the “Evolution and biogeography of actinorhizal plants and legumes.” Here our Senior Editors, Richard Bardgett and David Gibson, introduce the Sprent Reviews series, discusses the career of Janet Sprent and highlights the…

Editor’s Choice: Volume 108 Issue 4

How Will Climate Change Affect Community Stability? There’s a great deal of concern and uncertainty over the patterns and causal mechanisms that underlie community grassland change in response to climate change (Ratajczak & Ladwig 2019). Experimental work is needed to better understand the potentially synergistic effects of global change stressors on stability of grasslands. In…

Cover Stories: Issue 107 Volume 6

The cover image for Journal of Ecology’s latest issue was taken by Johan Martinelli. Here Johan retells the story behind capturing this incredible reindeer photograph. This photo relates to recently published research article “Experimental evidence of the long‐term effects of reindeer on Arctic vegetation greenness and species richness at a larger landscape scale” by Sundqvist et al. I…

Effects of nitrogen deposition on masting tree reproduction

Michał Bogdziewicz is a PhD student at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, supervised by Rafał Zwolak (AMU, as well) and Elizabeth Crone (Tufts University, USA). Michal’s work involves the study of different aspects of mast seeding consequences on ecosystems: the connection between masting and Lyme disease and the effects of masting on animal populations. The main goal…