Tom Pugh

Aerial view of the experimental forest near Hartheim with the 30-metre-high crown access tower in September 2023. Dead Scots pines and gaps in the canopy are visible throughout the forest. Photo: Fabio Scarpa

Years of drought turn forest into source of CO₂ - Press release on our research with @simonhaber.bsky.social and @chriswernerlab.bsky.social at @icos-ri.eu site DE-Har, showing tree mortality following droughts has fundamentally shifted forest structure & functioning uni-freiburg.de/en/years-of-...

Wondering where to submit your abstract for #AGU25
@agu.org annual meeting? Consider our cross-scale "Forest Physiological and Ecological Processes from Molecules to Ecosystems" organized session (#246685)! #EcoPhys

Need to update your data? Follow these five tips Researchers engaged in long-term projects often need to update their data sets over time. Here’s how to do it while maintaining reproducibility.

Good practices for data archiving www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Global evidence for a positive relationship between tree species richness and ecosystem photosynthesis - Nature Plants Forests with higher tree species richness show greater photosynthesis by capturing more sunlight, highlighting the essential role of biodiversity in enhancing carbon uptake and supporting the global carbon sink.

Global evidence for a positive relationship between tree species richness and ecosystem photosynthesis - Nature Plants

Taylor’s law predicts unprecedented pulses of forest disturbance under global change - Nature Communications Large pulses of disturbance have been observed globally in response to climate change. Using Taylor’s Law, the authors show that those pulses were not unpredictable but expected given a strong scaling...

As the mean rate of forest disturbance is increasing, so does its temporal variance. Proof that Taylor's law also applies to disturbance ecology, and a warning of more severe future extremes. Paper led by @corneliussenf.bsky.social w/ @tommaso-jucker.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Timing of peat initiation across the central Congo Basin. - IOPscience Timing of peat initiation across the central Congo Basin., Dargie, Greta, Gulliver, Pauline, Lawson, Ian T, Morris, Paul J, Crezee, Bart, Bola, Pierre, Emba Botuli, Ovide, Girkin, Nicholas, Kanyama, Joseph, Biddulph, George, Hawthorne, Donna, Boukono, Déo R. V., Louvouandou, Lisa F., Milandou Matoko, Jodrhy P., Milongo, Brice, Kibongui, Gloire J., Schefuß, Enno, Garcin, Yannick, Bocko, Yannick, Young, Dylan M, Baird, Andy J, Boom, Arnoud, Ewango, Corneille E. N., Averti Ifo, Suspense, Kiahtipes, Chris, Mitchard, Edward T.A., Page, Susan, Sjoegersten, Sofie, Schneider, Ralph R., Tshimanga, Raphael, Trigg, Mark A, Lewis, Simon

Our new paper in ERL, led by Dr. Greta Dargie, shows peatlands of central Congo Basin are twice as old as previously believed. The oldest peat initiated at least 42,000 years ago and persisted through the Last Glacial Maximum dry phase. Open access and free to all iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...

Stability and transferability of broadly trained phenology models in a changing climate A variety of phenology process-based models have been developed to simulate environmental influences on the timing of spring and autumn phenophases. S…

#Phenology #models: leaf emergence models are robust and stable; senescence models still need more refinement: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Study authors Katharine Napora, Ph.D., and Craig Jacobs, stand on the base on an ancient Bald Cypress tree hauled up from the Altamaha Wildlife Management Area on the Georgia coast. Credit: Florida Atlantic University

Does climate play a role in tree longevity?

A paleo study in Georgia suggests that might be a possibility: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

New PhD position on large mammals and land-use change in Europe | Conservation Biogeography Lab We are excited to invite applications for a new PhD position on large mammals and land-use change in Europe. Join us at the Conservation and Biogeography Lab at Humboldt University Berlin!

Come join us at the Conservation Biogeography Lab @biogeoberlin.bsky.social @humboldtuni.bsky.social and carry out work on megafauna in Europe

pages.cms.hu-berlin.de/biogeo/websi...

World‐wide impacts of climate change and nitrogen deposition on vegetation structure, composition, and functioning of shrublands Environmental changes and their effects are among the most pressing topics of today's ecological research. Shrublands, although widespread across the globe, remain understudied in this respect. We co...

New paper published New Phytologist. We quantified globl shrubland sensitivity to climate change and nitrogen addition. @globalecounit.bsky.social @tompugh.bsky.social @n-acil.bsky.social @xdomene.bsky.social @franzessl1.bsky.social @newphyt.bsky.social

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

On the quest to develop a drought atlas for Africa:

www.science.org/doi/pdf/10.1...

This is a fantastic resource!

**Join Our Team! 🚀**
🌟 **Exciting Postdoc Opportunity!** @econovoau.bsky.social 🌍
Dive into groundbreaking research that explores how rising ecological novelty transforms #biodiversity and #vegetation! 🌿 —apply now! 👉 shorturl.at/t45JT #ecology #ecologyjob #macroecology

Why has woody plant density been increasing in dryland ecosystems? In a new paper in @pnas.org we show that increasing tree density in pinyon-juniper woodlands could largely be a result of long-term population growth, rather than recent anthropogenic effects. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Do trait–growth relationships vary with plant age in fire‐prone heathland shrubs? We demonstrate that key functional traits undergo shifts in their relationship with growth as plants mature. Therefore, it will be valuable to shift our understanding of plant strategies away from th...

📢 New publication 'Do trait–growth relationships vary with plant age in fire-prone heathland #shrubs?' by Lily Dun, Elizabeth Wenk, Daniel Falster, Mark Westoby and Ian Wright in Journal of Ecology 🧪

doi.org/10.1111/1365...

White House Proposal Could Gut Climate Modeling the World Depends On Potential funding cuts for NOAA and its research partners threaten irreparable harm not only to climate research but to American safety, competitiveness, and national security.

Another attack on a pillar of climate science in America

www.propublica.org/article/trum...

The most comprehensive GHG budget for North America to date, covering CO2, CH4, N2O.

Led by Ben Poulter, it reconciles the differences between the National GHG Inventories, atmospheric inversions, and estimates from modeling individual fluxes.

agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Our colleagues measure thousands of tropical plots to discover species, measure carbon, and get the truth about climate change impacts.

Data don't come easy...

Central Brazil October 2023: It's very hot and the bees are swarming. Thank you Edmar Almeida de Oliveira, Beatriz Marimon and colleagues!

Forest productivity response to elevated CO2 in free‐air CO2 enrichment experiments: the 23 percent solution, revisited A synthesis of free-air CO2 enrichment (FACE) experiments describing the response of forest net primary productivity (NPP) to elevated atmospheric CO2 published in 2005 has provided a valuable benchm...

Forest productivity response to elevated CO2 in free‐air CO2 enrichment experiments: the 23 percent solution, revisited

We used #ARALAB climate chambers to mimic future #climate conditions and studied how arctic plants respond to a warmer future with more frequent extremes. We will have a few more papers from this large experiment, including setting the observed responses in ecosystem model #LPJGUESS. Stay tuned.

Come work with us on hydraulics and the mortality of giant trees!

YouTube video by Evan Gora How some trees benefit from being struck by lightning

⚡⚡Did you know that some trees WANT to be struck by lightning?⚡⚡ Well, trees don't "want" anything, but if they did, then Dipteryx oleifera trees would want to be struck by lightning. Just published yesterday (tinyurl.com/ltbnft) and described in this video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwX_... (1/5)

We are hiring! forestinvasion.cz/en
Three postdoc positions in the field of biological invasions are open at the Czech University of Life Sciences in Prague, funded through Horizon Europe:
forestinvasion.cz/en/r-20693-n...

forestinvasion.cz/en/r-20693-n...

forestinvasion.cz/en/r-20693-n...

Acclimation to High Vapor Pressure Deficit in Warmer Air Can Reduce Tree Vulnerability to Drought‐Induced Mortality Trees of the European tree species Prunus mahaleb, Quercus robur, and Populus nigra demonstrated both favourable and unfavourable acclimation mechanisms to high vapour pressure deficit and temperatur...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

📢 Job Alert! 🌳
Looking for a 2-yr postdoc (ext. up to 3 yrs) to join me at U. of Gothenburg to study links between environmental drivers, tree conditions (e.g., #treedamage), and physiological processes leading to #tropical #treemortality.

Apply by: April 17th

Details below

Shocker: This tropical tree thrives after being struck by lightning The almendro withstands thunderbolts that blast away parasitic vines

How getting struck by lightning actually benefits a tropical tree species. "Fascinating and wonderfully counterintuitive," says @tommaso-jucker.bsky.social.

www.science.org/content/arti...

The next seminar is lined-up.
Now it’s time to register and catch a free spot.

Setting aside areas for conservation does not increase disturbances in temperate forests We found no evidence that setting aside forests for biodiversity conservation amplifies disturbances in temperate forests of Central Europe. Conversely, we found that strict forest reserves had lower...

Setting forests aside doesn’t stir up more trouble—in fact, it calms the chaos 🌳
Happy to see my first PhD chapter out! 📝
Setting aside forests for biodiversity conservation does NOT amplify disturbances in temperate forests of Central Europe.

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

Leaf minimum conductance dynamics during and after heat stress: Implications for plant survival under hotter droughts (Viviane de Araújo Brito Fernandes, Fernanda Santos Farnese, Brenner Ryan Arantes, et. al.) https://doi.org/10.1093/plphys/kiaf026 @ASPB #PlantScience

Don’t miss our next online tree mortality seminar by Kauane Bordin on: “The role of disturbance in shaping demographic trade-offs in temperate trees”

1st April
18:00 CEST 12:00 EDT

Register here:

zoom.us/webinar/regi...