Patterns in the pond: the role of colour, pattern and texture in species delimitation of polymorphic froglet species of south-western Australia doi.org/10.1071/ZO25...

New paper showing that oblong turtles hybridise with eastern long-necked turtles in southwestern Australia! doi.org/10.1007/s105...

Oblong turtles hybridise with an introduced congener and display a size-heterozygosity relationship - Conservation Genetics

Freshwater turtles are among the most imperilled vertebrate groups globally, facing compounding threats from habitat loss, climate change, and invasive species. We conducted the first comprehensive range-wide genomic assessment of the oblong turtle (Chelodina oblonga; Indigenous Noongar: Yaakan and Booyi), a species endemic to the rapidly drying biodiversity hotspot of southwestern Australia. To evaluate individual and population genomic structure and diversity, we used reduced representation sequencing to genotype 466 individuals from 60 sites across the species’ distribution. Our results reveal the first evidence of hybridisation in the wild between C. oblonga and the introduced eastern snake-necked turtle (C. longicollis). The detection of putative backcrossed individuals implies that introgression may be actively occurring. Population structure analyses of C. oblonga identified a distinct latitudinal gradient with hierarchical substructure, while genomic diversity was lowest at the northern and southeastern range extremities, consistent with range-edge effects. We also identified a significant positive relationship between linear carapace length and individual heterozygosity. Larger individuals exhibited higher diversity than smaller individuals, suggestive of a heterozygosity-fitness correlation. These findings provide critical genomic data for the oblong turtle as well as highlight a need to monitor the impacts of invasive species in increasingly modified aquatic ecosystems.

doi.org

Best student paper of 2024 winner Kate Rick, along with Brenton Von Takach and Kym Ottewell, discuss the use of genomics in Australian conservation efforts, and their study on the golden bandicoot Find the episode wherever you usually get your podcasts.

🚨 New research out today from my PhD exploring population genetics of 3 lizard species across fragmented and continuous habitat. link.springer.com/article/10.1...

🌳🌳🌳 We have a new paper in @pnas.org showing climate warming leads to growth decline in beech because it drives trees to reproduce more frequently. Climate change can cause growth decline even when drought isn’t increasing by shifting where trees allocate resources doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2423181122

The last paper from my PhD, on how historically stable climates have allowed divergent lineages of pygmy perches 🐟🧬(including cryptic species) to persist, was published this week in Heredity: www.nature.com/articles/s41.... Also includes some pretty bleak projections under climate change!

Long-term climatic stability drives accumulation and maintenance of divergent freshwater fish lineages in a temperate biodiversity hotspot - Heredity

Heredity - Long-term climatic stability drives accumulation and maintenance of divergent freshwater fish lineages in a temperate biodiversity hotspot

nature.com

Check out our new article in Nature Ecology and Evolution rdcu.be/dISZk After repurposing genetic and genomic data, we found several shortcomings with current archiving practices. In this paper we discuss file format standards, key metadata, and more, that could improve genetic data reuse-ability

Thrilled to share our research on a community-driven reintroduction of southern pygmy perch in @theconversation.bsky.social: a great example of how collaborations between government, community, managers and researchers can drive positive conservation outcomes! theconversation.com/how-a-long-l...

How a long-lost fish species was brought back to Bendigo

Reintroducing locally extinct species is a challenging affair, but with the right partnerships everyone can help make it happen.

theconversation.com

First detection of rat poisons in wild amphibians... authors.elsevier.com/a/1i-sK_17Gg...

Many Australian forests had open understoreys when British invaders first saw them, but our study shows that some like the tall Mountain Ash were dense and felt impenetrable to many. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

We found a stripe-faced dunnart well outside of its known range in WA. Short paper here --> www.publish.csiro.au/ZO/ZO23045. Photo by Josh Keen

If you know someone interested in reptiles - please let them know about this opportunity!

Dr. Sean Buckley@congensean.bsky.social · 2y ago

Are you a herper 🦎🧪student looking for a postgrad research project? Well boy do I have a project for you! Join @pezoporus.bsky.social, @certhionyx.bsky.social and I in Perth for a Masters project on connectivity and genetic diversity of two urban reptile species! May include fieldwork if desired.

🎇Population Biology & Genomics at Curtin hosted the 'Cost and Feasibility of Eradication' workshop this week. Thanks presenters Dr Dave Ramsey, Dr Michael, Scroggie, Dr Dean Anderson, and thanks our attendees for participating!🎇@benflips.bsky.social @certhionyx.bsky.social @thescrogster.bsky.social

📢 New paper out! Ever wondered what's going on with the random patch of grass behind your house? Wanted to know how much vegetation is hiding beside railways? Our method identifies & maps these informal green spaces! 🌿🗺️ 🌏🧪 #urban #urbanNature #urbanPlanning www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Pitcher plant traps have evolved at least six times, with two types found in Australia: the southwestern Cephalotus, which contains just a single species, and the tropical genus Nepenthes, which is represented by a few species (3000 km away!) in far north Queensland

📝 New quoll paper is out! 🧬 Declining populations of northern quolls will lose genetic diversity through time. If we strategically conserve at least eight populations across Australia, we can prevent the loss of > 90 % of that diversity! doi.org/10.1016/j.bi...

I have a funded PhD project for someone! It's a good mix of landscape ecology and biology with cool fieldwork, and will build skills in genomics and data analysis. Focal species are native and invasive invertebrates. Please tell anyone who might be interested! popbiolgenomics.org/opportunitie...

First day of new role seems as good as any for a proper introduction, so here goes: I'm Sean, and I'm a lecturer in Molecular Ecology at Edith Cowan University! My research focuses on the application of genetics to conservation management, with a big focus on genetic rescue/mixing.

Pōhutukawa (Metrosideros excelsa, Myrtaceae) flowers around Christmas in Aotearoa (New Zealand). Pollinated by birds and bats, and enthusiastically visited by bees.

For 2024, I'm going to use this flow-chart to prioritise requests to review papers. At the end of the year I'll let you know the numbers in each category. I thought of adding an "am I being paid?" question, but what's the point?

ecoevoevoeco.blogspot.com/2022/01/the-... A blog post based on feedback from many new faculty o things we wished we had known when we started.

The things we wished we had known

Becoming a new professor is exciting. You are at last the captain of your own research. You pick who you want to work with, what you want t...

ecoevoevoeco.blogspot.com

Recent CA mega-fires killed ~15% of all monarch Giant Sequoias (>4ft diam). Monitoring GS ecosystems helps us to better understand how fire severity, intensity, scale, and our changing climate will affect the continued existence of these pre-historic beings. 🧵(1-4) briefly discusses GS & wildfire 🌎

New paper building on the @ipbes.bsky.social #InvasiveAlienSpecies Report is now out on Springer Nature. Discover more about biological invasions & the Report's findings: link.springer.com/article/10.1... 🧪🌏

🐍 📝 Check out our latest article on the snakes of Darwin, Northern Australia! Here we investigate the extent to which the colubrid and python species are observed in different environments at different times of the year! link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Analysing spatiotemporal patterns of snake occurrence in an Australian city to help manage human-wil...

Analysis of the spatial and temporal patterns of animal occurrence data can provide insight into the distribution, abundance, and dynamics of populations. Snakes may exhibit seasonal changes in their ...

link.springer.com

save the date #ConservationGenetics 2024 conference in Lausanne/CH 28-30.8. - "How can research support pragmatic conservation policies?" 🧬 🦤 Mark your calendars for this event! more details about the program and for registration will be circulated in early 2024.

A new report by International Pollutants Elimination Network and Beyond Plastics scrutinizes the chemical recycling industry that's on the rise in the U.S. and other parts of the world, including several European countries. My latest for @mongabay.bsky.social news.mongabay.com/2023/11/chem...

Chemical recycling of plastic not so fantastic, report finds

In today’s industrialized world, avoiding plastic is virtually impossible. Every trip to the grocery store likely means coming home with food and household items packaged in plastic bottles, tubs an...

news.mongabay.com

We are hiring! Postdoc in population biology. In Western Australia. Starting next year. Applications close late December 2023: staff.curtin.edu.au/job-vacancie...

Not good. Fire ants detected in NSW for the first time #invasivespecies #biosecurity 🧪🌏 www.abc.net.au/news/2023-11...

'Worst of the worst': Fire ant nests detected in NSW for the first time

The NSW Department of Primary Industries (DPI) have confirmed the detection of three red imported fire ant nests in South Murwillumbah in north-eastern NSW.

abc.net.au

Never stops making me mad every time I see it: if we had begun the process of eliminating fossil fuels in the 1990s, it would've been a relatively shallow curve. Climate deniers and delayers have put us in a position where the same temp limits require a cliff-like drop in emissions.