Florian Schnabel

Neighbourhood diversity increases tree growth in experimental forests more in wetter climates but not in wetter years - Nature Ecology & Evolution How tree diversity effects on ecosystem functioning vary along climatic gradients is unclear. Here, analysing data from 15 experimental forest sites, the authors show that tree growth responses to nei...

🗞️New publication🗞️

How do neighbourhood diversity effects on tree growth change with climatic conditions?🌳🌲🔆🌧️

We adress this question in our new study in @natecoevo.nature.com led by Liting Zheng.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

/w @liting-zheng.bsky.social, Peter Reich & #TreeDivNet

It was a pleasure to meet and discuss tree trait responses to diversity @idiv-research.bsky.social 🌳🌲

#sTREND rocks🚨/w @juliakoricheva.bsky.social, @ritasousasilva.bsky.social, @habenblondeel.bsky.social, @cavenderg9.bsky.social, @shankothari.bsky.social, @lsachsenmaier.bsky.social, #TreeDivNet

Collection of tree discs for dendroecological analyses in the Sardinilla experiment. This is the 1st harvesting campaign in a planted tree diversity experiment. Now we are exited to share the results! Thx to amazing fieldworkers!!!

Interested in biomass production in diverse planted #forests?🌳🌲

In our new study led by Georgios Skiaderesis, we analyzed the effects of species- and structural diversity on woody biomass production in the #Sardinilla experiment.

#TreeDivNet @uni-freiburg.de

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Great talk by Jürgen Bauhus at the #Integrate Network meeting in Zürich:

The importance of Integrative Forest Management for maintaining social-ecological forest systems.

#TRANSFORMIT, #FutureForests, @uni-freiburg.de

Unbelievable 🎉 - We have a New Cluster of Excellence -
🌳 #FutureForests🌲

Looking forward to working with the amazing interdisciplinary team of #FutureForests on analysing and developing transformation pathways for forest-based social-ecological systems!!!

Great 7 years ahead @uni-freiburg.de!!!

Hi, no I meant the session on the Forest Sciences conference in Freiburg. But the talk by Ana Stritih will certainly be interesting as well.

uni-freiburg.de/fowita2025/p...

🎉Happy 5th Birthday to the Root Economics Space!🌱
This fun blog from our colleagues @joanabergmann.bsky.social and Elsa Matthus at the @zalf.bsky.social celebrates 5 years of the Root Economics Space-a framework that describes the diverse root strategies to grow and survive belowgrond.

#Ecology

Functional traits explain growth response to successive hotter droughts across a wide set of common and future tree species in Europe Functional traits can explain significant tree growth reductions in response to the 2018–2020 drought for a wide set of 71 species including angiosperms and gymnosperms. Moreover, four distinct respo...

We show⁉️

1) growth reductions and legacy effects in response to consecutive hotter #droughts can be explained by functional #traits.

2) High drought tolerance bolsters growth reductions, while acquisitive species suffer more from drought.

We investigated whether tree growth responses can be explained by tree functional #traits related to #drought tolerance, growth and resource acquisition in the research arboretum #ARBOfun.

We measured branch shoot increments and examined gymnosperms🌲 and angiosperms🌳.

Functional traits explain growth response to successive hotter droughts across a wide set of common and future tree species in Europe Functional traits can explain significant tree growth reductions in response to the 2018–2020 drought for a wide set of 71 species including angiosperms and gymnosperms. Moreover, four distinct respo...

🚨Are you interested in functional #traits, hotter #drought and #tree growth?🌳🔆

We studied tree growth responses to the 2018-2020 drought across 71 tree species.

\w Lena Kretz, @agwirthweigelt.bsky.social, @unileipzig.bsky.social ,@uni-freiburg.de, #ARBOfun

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

A topic close 2 my heart:

❓️What are our roles & responsibilities as environmental scientists & of our professional societies in times of crises❓️

Read here👇 about an inspiring & long-lasting workshop & how we tackled this topic.

Read more outcomes:
ecoevorxiv.org/repository/v...

More to come!!

Ecology for a social revolution: Re-defining the role of ecological and environmental science professionals and their responsibilities towards society The sixth mass extinction and the ongoing biodiversity and climate crises demand urgent action from ecologists and environmental scientists (EESs). Despite their critical role in addressing these chal...

An important part of a broader conversation about how we support scientists trying to wrestle with their roles. "Ecology for a social revolution: Re-defining the role of ecological and environmental science professionals and their responsibilities towards society" riojournal.com/articles.php...

Hi! Our forest scientists @uni-freiburg.de use biodiversity data in manifold ways.

One example is ConFoBi which focusses on Conservation of Forest Biodiversity. confobi.uni-freiburg.de/en?set_langu...

In our session, we will hopefully gain many insights into the use of biodiversity data. Join us!

⏰Call for Abstracts - FoWiTa 2025⏰

29.09-02.10 @uni-freiburg.de

We look forward to your contributions to our session👇

🌳 Biodiversity friendly forest management - from concepts to practices.🌳

ℹ️ Session info: shorturl.at/OO2i9
✍Call for abstracts: shorturl.at/qSdj5

Deadline is 20 May.

Was ist der Einfluss des #Waldsterbens während Dürrejahren auf unsere #Trinkwasserqualität?

Wir zeigen dies in unserer interdisziplinäre Zusammenarbeit @uni-freiburg.de aus Hydrologie, Fernerkundung, und Forstwissenschaften 👇
agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/...
@carowinter.bsky.social

Forest Dieback in Drinking Water Protection Areas—A Hidden Threat to Water Quality Forests cover 43% of German drinking water protection areas, making their vitality state critical for safeguarding drinking water quality German drinking water protection areas experienced a 4.8%...

🗞️New paper in Earth's Future🗞️

🌳🌲🍂💧🍂🌲🌳

#Forest dieback in drinking #water protection areas - a hidden threat to water quality

🌳🌲🍂💧🍂🌲🌳

Paper👉 doi.org/10.1029/2025...
Press release👉 uni-freiburg.de/waldsterben-...

@uni-freiburg.de @hydrofreiburg.bsky.social @mixedforests.bsky.social

We are very happy to announce that the next Microclimate Ecology & Biogeography (MEB) conference will happen in Montpellier (FRANCE), 1 - 5 June 2026 ☀️
meb-network.com/meb-2026/
Microclimate scientists: save the date in your agenda!!

The gates of Harvard University. The text reads: "Harvard Says It Will Not Comply With Trump Administration's Demands." Photo by Sophie Park for The New York Times.

“No government — regardless of which party is in power — should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue,” Alan Garber, Harvard’s president, said about President Trump's demands. nyti.ms/4jzSS9W

Elevated tree mortality as a regeneration niche for oak? Testing different management approaches in a meliorated floodplain forest Pedunculate Oak (Quercus robur L.), a keystone species in European temperate floodplain forests, faces regeneration challenges due to dense canopies c…

New paper by our PhD student Annalena Lenk in #Forest #Ecology and Management: #Climate change-induced tree mortality can promote #oak regeneration in #floodplain forests – if flood-intolerant maple species are selectively removed. #Biodiversity #Research
sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

My first paper is out! We investigated how #photosynthetic and #respiratory #thermal #acclimation 🌡️ and #canopy size 🌳 shape tree net #carbon uptake under prolonged warming and drought. Check it out: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/share/author...

@charlottegrossiord.bsky.social
@wslresearch.bsky.social

Lena Sachsenmaier: Forest growth resistance and resilience to the 2018–2020 drought depend on tree diversity and mycorrhizal type 2024 HARPER PRIZE SHORTLIST: For the next two weeks, we are featuring the articles shortlisted for the 2024 Harper Prize. The Harper Prize is an annual award for the best early career research pape…

Interested in how #forest #resilience to #drought depended on tree diversity and #mycorrhiza?

The study by @lsachsenmaier.bsky.social in @journalofecology.bsky.social was just shortlisted for the Harper Prize🚨👏 Read more on the paper here👇

jecologyblog.com/2025/04/04/l...

Bodenfeuchte Daten für Europa im März 2025

🌾Is a new drought coming to parts of Europe? ZALF and @dwdderwetterdienst.bsky.social warn:
Soils in Eastern Europe and some parts of Germany are very dry. An extremely dry winter has not been able to replenish water reserves. www.zalf.de/en/aktue... #agriculture #climate change 🧪

Congrats @juliakoricheva.bsky.social and colleagues on this well-deserved achievement!

⁉️We can also explain how #tree diversity affected temperature buffering.

Tree diversity increased #forest temperature buffering by increasing canopy density and structural diversity.

For a brief overview of our study check out our press release here:

uni-freiburg.de/en/tree-dive...

We worked in the #BEF-China experiment, the largest planted #tree diversity experiment in the world and part of #TreeDivNet.

We found: A forest with high tree species diversity 🌳🌲 is better at buffering heat peaks 🌡️ in summer and cold peaks ❄️ in winter than a forest with fewer tree species.

Tree Diversity Increases Forest Temperature Buffering via Enhancing Canopy Density and Structural Diversity Making use of 6 years of microclimate measurements in a large-scale tree diversity experiment covering a species richness gradient ranging from 1 to 24 tree species, we demonstrate that tree species ....

Are you interested in #forest microclimate, biodiversity and ecosystem functioning? 🌲🌳🌡️

🗞️In our new study we show: Tree diversity increases #forest temperature buffering🗞️

doi.org/10.1111/ele....

/w @remybeugnon.bsky.social, @uni-freiburg.de, @unileipzig.bsky.social, @agwirthweigelt.bsky.social

Widespread slow growth of acquisitive tree species Nature - Under field conditions, acquisitive tree species generally grow slowly, whereas conservative species show generally higher realized growth, owing to their ability to tolerate unfavourable...

Very pleased that data from the Satakunta forest diversity experiments have contributed to this @nature.com paper led by Laurent Augusto & Marie Charru @inrae-france.bsky.social which shows that tree species with conservative traits often outperform acquisitive species #TreeDivNet rdcu.be/eeeA8

Tree growth is better explained by absorptive fine root traits than by transport fine root traits - Communications Biology Tree growth is better explained by absorptive root traits than by transport root traits, highlighting that variation in absorptive roots affects the uptake of soil resources like nutrients and water, ...

In our recent paper, Anvar Sanaei shows that root traits of 'absorptive fine roots' relate to tree growth! In fact, they are better predictors than traits of 'transport fine roots'.
www.nature.com/articles/s42...
But there is more to it... 🧵

Plant species richness promotes the decoupling of leaf and root defence traits while species‐specific responses in physical and chemical defences are rare The increased positive impact of plant diversity on ecosystem functioning is often attributed to the accumulation of mutualists and dilution of antagonists in diverse plant communities. While increa...

How does #biodiversity affect plant #defence investment?

We found that while overall defence investment remains stable, plant species richness decouples leaf and root defences.

For more details, check out our paper: nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....
@newphyt.bsky.social

Screenshot of text from a Nature Ecology & Evolution Editorial entitled "Deep cuts"

In our latest Editorial we discuss the continuing damage being done to US science, and its impact on researchers and the environment 👇

Deep cuts: www.nature.com/articles/s41...