A joint research proposal between University of Warwick scientists at Warwick HRI and researchers in the University’s Department of Politics and International Studies has won a £316,000 grant from the Research Councils’ Rural Economy and Land Use programme for a project on the science and regulation of bio-pesticides.
Consumers, retailers and environmentalists are calling for reductions in the use of chemical pesticides. One potentially environmentally friendly solution is to use so-cal
Using fire to control the introduced Lehmann lovegrass won’t work, researchers report.
The finding is bad news for land managers seeking a way to control the introduced grass. Fire was thought to be one way to restore native grasses and prevent further spread of the non-native species.
Regardless of the time of year Lehmann lovegrass was burned, the grass grew back and, in some cases, increased in amount, report ecologists from the University of Arizona in Tucson. “We h
As ants roam around on a plant, they can help their leafy companion by killing any herbivores they find. Ants often do just that, because many ants need meat in their diets.
Some species of ants are more aggressive than others, and many plants don’t have any choice about which species visit.
Researchers report for the first time that when plants supply ants with nectar, it boosts the ants’ desire for meat, potentially making them better bodyguards for the plant.
Buffelgrass snatches water away from nearby palo verde trees, ultimately killing them.
Scientists thought deep-rooted plants such as desert trees did not compete with grasses for water. Now researchers from the University of Arizona in Tucson report that buffelgrass, an invasive non-native species, grabs water before foothill palo verde trees can.
The situation does not bode well for the trees, said J. Alex Eilts, a doctoral candidate in UA’s department of ecology and evol
Road density in northern Wisconsin has doubled during the last 60 years, but forest managers have a time window to fight the non-native plants that often come with construction and overwhelm native plant life, according to new research discussed on Thursday, Aug. 5, at the annual Ecological Society of America conference in Portland, Ore.
“Roads disturb the soil, open the forest canopy and allow more light to reach the ground,” explains Todd Hawbaker, a University of Wisconsin-Madison forest
While a rapidly changing climate may alter the composition of northern Wisconsin’s forests, disturbances such as logging also will play a critical role in how these sylvan ecosystems change over time.
Details will be presented on Friday, Aug. 6, at the annual Ecological Society of America conference in Portland, Ore.
University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers used a computer-modeling program to project 200 years of change in a forest in northwestern Wisconsin under t
Rusty crayfish, an invasive species now crawling across the rocky bottoms of lakes and streams throughout the United States and Canada, may not always have a stronghold once they enter these bodies of water.
The findings, part of an ongoing study at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, suggest that the type of interaction among rusty crayfish, fish and aquatic plants may tip the scale, favoring either the invader or native species. This knowledge, the researchers note, may lead to
In their desire to get close to nature by building lakeside cottages and homes in the woods, Americans may very well be hastening the decline of many native bird species that breed in forest habitats.
The development boom in the nation’s rural areas is putting increasing pressure on forest ecosystems, and the resulting decline in native vegetation and the increase in human activity – ranging from all-terrain vehicle use to predatory pets roaming the woods – is putting more and
In a study with implications for how North American trees might respond to a changing climate, molecular information collected by Duke University researchers refutes a widely accepted theory that many of the continent’s tree species migrated rapidly from the deep South as glaciers retreated at the end of the last Ice Age.
“When you put the molecular data together with other lines of evidence, it suggests that maybe they didn’t move as fast as we previously thought,” sai
Events like the great Dust Bowl of the 1930s, immortalized in “The Grapes of Wrath” and remembered as a transforming event for millions of Americans, were regular parts of much-earlier cycles of droughts followed by recoveries in the region, according to new studies by a multi-institutional research team led by Duke University.
Some of those prehistoric droughts in the northern Great Plains of what is now the United States also lasted longer than modern-day dry spells such as the 19
Insects increase biodiversity by munching on dominant trees
A University of Utah experiment conducted in Peru’s Amazon Basin shows insects increase the diversity of the rainforest when they munch on trees. Such seemingly destructive behavior keeps dominant tree species under control but allows other trees to thrive.
“The battle between plants and insects increases the number of habitats in the rainforest,” thus increasing the diversity of trees living there, says biology
Coral reefs and coastal upwelling ecosystems are the subjects of two new Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites awarded funding by the National Science Foundation (NSF). With the addition of the Moorea Coral Reef LTER Site and the California Current Ecosystem LTER Site, there are now 26 NSF-funded sites in the LTER network. The two newest sites will receive approximately $820,000 for the next six years, for a total of about $ 5 million each.
“These two new sites significantly augment th
Recent efforts to improve hurricane tracking and intensity predictions have focused on the effect the ocean has on the movement of hurricanes. University of Rhode Island oceanographers have demonstrated how the roughness of the ocean surface affects the speed and intensity of these powerful storms.
“Hurricanes are very complex weather systems that are affected by any number of parameters in the atmosphere, the ocean, and on land,” said URI Oceanography Professor Isaac Ginis. “The more para
Burning with a core heat approaching 800°C and spreading at up to 100 metres per minute, woodland blazes bring swift, destructive change to landscapes: the resulting devastation can be seen from space. An ESA-shaped service to monitor European forest fire damage will help highlight areas most at risk of future outbreaks.
Last year’s long hot summer was a bumper year for forest fires, with more than half a million hectares of woodland destroyed across Mediterranean Europe. So f
Far fewer animals would be killed on the roads if planners took the findings of new research into account when designing and building new roads.
According to a study published today in the British Ecological Society’s Journal of Applied Ecology, it is possible to predict where most animals will attempt to cross roads, and hence where they are most likely to be killed by vehicles.
Researchers from Madrid University found that 70% of collisions occurred on just 7.7% of
As the government promises an imminent ban on hunting, researchers have produced the first scientifically-based population estimate for foxes living in Britain. Their results show that the number of foxes has remained constant despite changes in culling methods.
The study, published in the British Ecological Society’s Journal of Applied Ecology today and funded by the International Fund For Animal Welfare (IFAW), shows that at the end of winter there are 225,000 adult foxes living in rural
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