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

Some people think cities and nature don’t mix, but a new NASA-funded study finds that concrete jungles create warmer conditions that cause plants to stay green longer each year, compared to surrounding rural areas.

Urban areas with high concentrations of buildings, roads and other artificial surfaces retain heat, creating urban heat islands. Satellite data reveal that urban heat islands increase surface temperatures compared to rural surroundings.

Using information

Scientists have pinpointed the source of a meteorite from the moon for the first time. Their unique meteorite records four separate lunar impacts.

They are the first to precisely date Mare Imbrium, the youngest of the large meteorite craters on the moon. That date, 3.9 billion years ago, is a new key date for lunar and even terrestrial stratigraphy, the scientists say, because life on Earth would have evolved only after heavy meteorite bombardment ended.

Geologists who fou

A new study of California’s southern Sierra Nevada range by a University of Colorado at Boulder research team has located a massive body of rock that sank into Earth’s mantle some 3.5 million years ago, allowing the mountains to pop up.

Undertaken with a high-tech suite of instruments designed to probe the geology to roughly 125 miles below Earth’s surface, the study illustrated the mountain building process in the southern Sierras with unprecedented detail.

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

Robert L. Fisher, research geologist emeritus at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego, has been awarded the inaugural Drake Medal by the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO) organization. Fisher received the medal at a reception hosted by the Ocean Studies Board of the National Academies on July 7 in Woods Hole, Mass.

The Drake Medal was created specifically to honor Fisher and is a replica of the medal given to Sir Francis Drake by England’s Qu

BU team shows so-called urban heat island effect influences onset of ’greenup,’ dormancy

Summer can sometimes be a miserably hot time for city dwellers, but new research shows that an urban setting allows plants to bask in a hot-house environment that keeps them greener longer.

Recent NASA-sponsored research from a team of geographers in Boston University’s Center for Remote Sensing shows that the growing season for vegetation in about 70 urban areas in Nort