Pieter Zuidema

Long‐Term Cambial Phenology Reveals Diverging Growth Responses of Two Tree Species in a Mixed Forest Under Climate Change We studied how climate change affects tree growth by monitoring wood formation in Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris) and Pyrenean oak (Quercus pyrenaica) over 11 years. We found that warmer winters lead t...

Climate change is reshaping forest growth 🌳🌡️💧
Water and temperature control growth timing.
Warmer winters make some species start growing earlier.
Hot, dry summers may shorten growing seasons.

New paper out @globalchangebio.bsky.social led by a former PhD student @csic.es shorturl.at/5Gn8a

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences: Vol 380, No 1917

A must-read special issue: “Bending the curve towards nature recovery: building on Georgina Mace’s legacy”
royalsocietypublishing.org/toc/rstb/202...
I: Determinants of diversity & resilience.
II: Measuring the state of biodiversity
III: Biodiversity & natural capital
IV: Future scenarios for nature

Shifts in vegetation activity of terrestrial ecosystems attributable to climate trends - Nature Geoscience An analysis fusing satellite data with a process-based model of plant growth attributes changes in vegetation activity across terrestrial ecosystems to climatic changes.

Attribution of vegetation change to climate change: here we compared vegetation time series to simulations from a process model forced with observed and counterfactual (detrended) climate data. Trends in climate necessary for the model to emulate vegetation trends www.nature.com/articles/s41... 1/3

Yesterday, Bo Zhou successfully defended his PhD thesis at @w-u-r.bsky.social on carbon & water dynamics in a montane forest in subtropical China. Bo studied tree growth rythms & transpiration fluxes.
🎉Congrats 🎓 Dr Bo!
▶️ Defense: wur.yuja.com/V/Watch?v=93...
📙Thesis: research.wur.nl/en/publicati...

Plant species–habitat networks in a mosaic landscape of restored and fragmented tropical forests 🌲🌏

Highlights the role of species interactions and their correlated traits such as dispersal syndromes in promoting landscape-scale connectivity 📊🧪

🔗 doi.org/10.1111/1365...

Good news for a change: Background mortality in unmanaged forests of Europe has not increased over past decades. Great work from the European Forest Reserve Initiative EuFoRIa, out in @journalofecology.bsky.social doi.org/10.1111/1365...

🌱 Study in the tropical–subtropical zone shows slope and species diversity shape carbon sequestration!
Leaf nutrients + soil N and P = key drivers of soil organic carbon.
Random Forest and SEM offer restoration insights.
🔗https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11676-025-01895-y
🧪🌏🌐🍁🌺🌱🌿🦤

FINAL VERSION PUBLISHED @forestecosyst.bsky.social
📰Tree competition in West African tropical forests mediated by the functional attributes of species and variation in soil moisture www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Biomass production of tropical trees across space and time: The shifting roles of diameter growth and wood density Diameter growth is an important and good indicator of forest carbon production. However, size-related changes in wood density, which are usually neglected, are critical for accurate short- and long-t...

#Tree stems accumulate biomass by adding volume of certain density. Which factor is more important?

Using tropical #treering data we found: diameter increment explains biomass growth at short term; wood density at long term.🌎🌐🍁
#dendrochronology
besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

⛰️🌳New study examines wood density variation across an elevational gradient from the Andean tree line to the Amazon basin, finding a decline from low to middle elevations, followed by an increase near the tree line. Species composition and disturbances influenced this pattern. 👉 buff.ly/ujConkt

Impact of emerging compound droughts on forests: A water supply and demand perspective This review examines the physiological and ecological responses of trees to emerging compound droughts from a water demand and supply perspective, as well as the role of acclimation and consequences ...

🌳🔥Out now: Our review on compound droughts and forest responses - from leaf to ecosystem. Featuring a stunning 20-yr map of canopy temperatures variation across European forests. @chriswernerlab.bsky.social @simonhaber.bsky.social @vallicrosah.bsky.social onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Amazonian and Andean tree communities are not tracking current climate warming | PNAS Climate change is shifting species distributions, leading to changes in community composition and novel species assemblages worldwide. However, the...

A big congratulations to William Farhan-Rios on this paper in @pnas.org, featuring a study of tropical-forest change over four decades along the Amazon-to-Andes elevational gradient in Bolivia and Peru 🌴 ⛰️ 🌐

@mobotgarden.bsky.social @livingearthcollab.bsky.social

1/3

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Parameterization of the 3-PG model for Quercus mongolica by using tree-ring data and Bayesian calibration - Journal of Forestry Research Although Quercus mongolica is a widely distributed, economically and ecologically important deciduous tree in northern China, models to accurately predict stand growth at a regional scale are limited....

🌳 Forests of the future are growing fast!
By 2100, Quercus mongolica stands could see +145% volume and +80% productivity under RCP8.5.
3-PG + Bayesian calibration = sharper growth predictions.

👉 Explore the findings: link.springer.com/article/10.1...

#Forestry #ClimateChange #TreeGrowth
🌏🌐🍁🌺🌱🌿🦤

A diverse and distinct microbiome inside living trees - Nature Microbiome analyses of living trees show that a single tree can host approximately one trillion bacteria, with microbial communities distinctly partitioned between heartwood and sapwood and with minim...

#NatMicroPicks

Hidden microbial world in trees🌳

Living wood hosts trillions of bacteria making trees a complex ecosystems with major roles in forest health and function.

#PlantMicro #MicroSky

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

Few weeks left to apply for a fully funded PhD studentship in my lab @rhulbiology.bsky.social as part of new EU project Trees4Adapt
🌲🌳 Fieldwork in forest diversity experiments in Finland www.sataforestdiversity.org
📆 Apply by Sept 8th, start date - Jan 2026
👉 www.findaphd.com/phds/project...
🍁🌍🧪

🌲 How does thinning influence the #carbon balance in upland vs peatland forests?
Thanks to @holisoils.bsky.social for shedding light on how #ForestManagement affects different soil types.

#ForestryResearch #ClimateAction #SoilScience #JFR
🧪🌏🌐🍁🌺🌱🌿🦤

Fig. 1 from Holvoet et al. (2025). TLS and MLS scan setup, point cloud segmentation, and pre-processing.

Terrestrial laser scanning can transform national forest inventories by adding new measurements and a 3D perspective. In our new paper we provide a pathway for implementing 3D forest surveys. 1/6 🧪🌎🌳🌲 www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Reassembly dynamics of tropical secondary succession: Evidence from Atlantic forests

🌴Researchers compared 2749 tree species using 497 Atlantic Forest surveys varying in successional stage to classify them into four disturbance-sensitivity group and found that turnover applies to a small fraction of species, and reassembly varies across time and space🌍🧪
buff.ly/Uv4aQ8d

Six field researchers in Yosemite National Park celebrating a fun day of work in the Mariposa Grove

Hey #ESA2025 #Baltimore! I'm seeking a #PhDstudent interested in #ForestEcology to join my lab, fall 2026. More here: www.landscapesofchangelab.com/join-us

DM me if you'd like to chat in person. Would love to connect and learn about your interests. Non-traditional backgrounds welcome! 🧪🌏🌐🍁🌺🌱🌿🔥

Fig. 1: Extreme regional fire years across forested areas during 2002–2023.

The results of a study in Nature Communications show that climate change is raising the odds of extreme fire years and the number of large forest fires, necessitating proactive measures to mitigate risks and adapt to extreme fire years. go.nature.com/4m8fTSA 🧪

Job opening: lecturership (research & teaching) in forestry or agroforestry at Bangor University. This is probably the best forestry programme in the UK and a great place to work. Deadline 1 Sep. More here: 🌳🌲🌏

Tropical Tree-ring Network Website Visit the post for more.

Where did we get the data? Where can you find them?

150 scientists contributed 1000s tree-ring data through Tropical Tree-Ring Network. This network unites tree-ring scientists & data. To fill tropical data gap all data are uploaded to International Tree-ring Databank.
tropicaltreeringnetwork.org

What does this mean for the future?

The past drought #resilience will very likely diminish. Stronger drought impacts in hotter & drier regions (see Fig) give a glimpse of aggravated drought responses in future. Also, droughts increase tree death, causing lasting carbon losses from forests.

What happened after the droughts? And during wet years?

Growth bounced back quickly after droughts. During the 1st post-drought year, pantropical average tree growth was similar to that of pre-drought year. Growth increase during wet years partially compensated for drought impacts.

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Pantropical tree rings show small effects of drought on stem growth Increasing drought pressure under anthropogenic climate change may jeopardize the potential of tropical forests to capture carbon in woody biomass and act as a long-term carbon dioxide sink. To evalua...

How do tropical #trees deal with droughts? The answer is published today in @science.org

Our pantropical #treering analysis revealed 2.5% growth reduction during #drought years. Yet, growth declined by >10% in 1/4 of 500 study sites, and in hotter & drier regions.

doi.org/10.1126/scie...
🌍🍁🌐
(1/4)

Senior Editor for Journal of Applied Ecology - British Ecological Society Join the editorial board on Journal of Applied Ecology! Apply by 07 Sep 2025.

We're seeking a new Senior Editor! ⏰

Are you...
👉intrigued by the interface between ecology & biological resource management? 🌎
👉a clear communicator who enjoys working as part of a team? 💬
👉committed to maintaining high editorial standards? 🧪

More info 👇
bit.ly/4lPzaIx

Happy to virtually present a keynote on #treerings in the tropics tomorrow at the WorldDendro conference.

Main message: now that potential & applications of tropical #dendrochronology have been amply shown, it s time to synthesize & scale up to pantropical studies

sites.google.com/view/african...

Tropical Central African bomb radiocarbon reveals antiphase air-mass atmospheric fluxes and vegetation-growth relationships To achieve more accurate Earth system model projections of diverse climate scenarios, researchers need observation-based data on the movement of carbo…

What tree rings tell us about large-scale air movements. 14C records from Cameroonian trees (growing on the Northern Hemisphere) reveal that CO2 they absorb originates from other side of equator. Study lead Guaciara Santos; tree rings @petergroen.bsky.social.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Postdoctoral Fellow, Global Science in Sao Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil | Science at The Nature Conservancy Apply for Postdoctoral Fellow, Global Science job with The Nature Conservancy in Sao Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil. Science at The Nature Conservancy

Two open postdoc positions to work on synergies/trade-offs of cocoa & coffee agroforestry for people, biodiversity and carbon.

The Nature Conservancy Brazil:
careers.tnc.org/us/en/job/JR...

Smithsonian Institute US: trustcareers.si.edu/en/postings/...

New paper on tropical #timber #tracing! We tested the use of wood oxygen stable isotopes (δ18O ) for tracing. We produced #isoscapes for 5 major tropical timbers. These isoscapes alone had limited utility. Combinations with other techniques may help. #timtrace
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...