New paper! My current favourite: "Water Limits Radial Tree Growth More Than Light in an Everwet Subtropical Forest" -> with 3500 mm of rain and no distinct dry season, trees in Puerto Rico still grew more under wet conditions. @globalchangebio.bsky.social onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

PhD position available: Predicting impacts of extreme heat on Australian forests The world is heating up and forests are starting to show the effects. Like maths? Love trees? Apply your skills to help understand and adapt vegetation to heat extremes! www.westernsydney.edu.au/schools/grs/...

📢 New publication 'Evidence for a trade-off between growth rate and xylem #embolism resistance in 22 #Eucalyptus species' by Tiantian Pan et al. in @newphyt.bsky.social 🧪 #drought doi.org/10.1111/nph....

Evidence for a trade‐off between growth rate and xylem embolism resistance in 22 Eucalyptus species

Examples of cross-sectional images of branchlets at 4× and 40×.

doi.org

📰Published📰Wood anatomical trait correlations with hydraulic efficiency and safety in an a seasonal wet tropical forest🌳 buff.ly/FF5YuqR 🧪🌍️

Wood anatomical trait correlations with hydraulic efficiency and safety in an a seasonal wet tropical forest

Julia Valentim Tavares, Samuel L. Farrar, Chris M. Smith-Martin, Silvia Bibbo, Kasia Ziemińska, Farah Brenda Solis Petz, María Uriarte, Jess K. Zimmerman, Robert Muscarella This is a plain language…

buff.ly

New paper on sampling for vessel traits in wood anatomical studies! A short 🧵... Wood anatomical traits can provide great info on ecophysiology, ecology, and evolution but it takes a lot of painstaking work to quantify them! academic.oup.com/aob/advance-... @juliavtavares.bsky.social

How much cross-sectional area is needed to estimate vessel traits in tropical tree branches?

AbstractBackground and Aims. Wood anatomical traits provide key insights to plant physiology, ecology, and evolution but their quantification is time-consu

academic.oup.com

PhD Scholarship to work in the beautiful Blue Mountains! Drought and heat stress responses of temperate forest trees growing across a broad environmental gradient Applications close June 30 Must be Australian citizen, permanent resident, or NZ citizen to be eligible. PS2026_034_CS0791892_HIE

New paper out today @currentbiology.bsky.social led by Toby Jackson and Lucy Beese shows the profound impact that liana cutting has on the structural recovery of logged tropical forests 📜 doi.org/10.1016/j.cu...

Rainfall intensity matters as much as how much rain falls. New in Nature: Corey Lesk and I show that daily-scale concentration of precipitation dries the land over the long-run, an effect as strong as total precipitation is climatological wetting. Paper here: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

More concentrated precipitation decreases terrestrial water storage - Nature

Concentration of precipitation in large events decreases land water availability, and this effect will further increase with a future warming climate.

nature.com

The first paper from my PhD is now out in the world 🌲📖 Modelling forest dynamics using IPMs and repeat lidar doi.org/10.1002/rse2...

Sheesh, our place is gonna be worthless in 10 years…but it’ll be cooler than most, store a bunch of carbon and be teeming with critters. www.abc.net.au/news/2026-04...

How one extra tree too close to your house could cost you thousands

Tree canopy coverage is being boosted in every capital city, but one micro-level analysis has found a link between property prices and the proximity of trees to houses.

abc.net.au

Millennium Park, Childers QLD. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Clean facilities, interesting architecture, and one of Australia’s rarest trees, Alectryon ramiflorus (Isis Tamarind; Sapindaceae).

Out in @science.org this week. Soils drive convergence in the regulation of vascular tension in land plants. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... #plantscience #ecophysiology

Soils drive convergence in the regulation of vascular tension in land plants

Terrestrial vascular plants operate under negative water potential, which results in hydraulic tension in the vascular system. Vascular tension varies with transpiration and soil drying and is regulat...

science.org

New #plantandsoil #ecology #PhDposition available at the #ANU #FennerSchool led by the great Claire Foster. fennerschool.anu.edu.au/research/res...

The guru behind Trump's Iran war is blissing out

New paper out in @methodsinecoevol.bsky.social led by @westobymark.bsky.social and others The term ecosystem condition can imply an objective benchmark for what a “good” ecosystem state is. We argue for ecosystem valuation instead: it makes clear that assessing ecosystems involves value judgments.

Ecosystem valuation: Concept, criteria and terminology

Furlaud et al. (2025) discussed how to measure ‘ecosystem condition’. Here, we argue that the term ‘ecosystem valuation’ should be preferred. ‘Valuation’ signals clearly that a social or political...

besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

The Titicaca water frog (Telmatobius culeus) - the largest truly aquatic frogs in the world. They're found at 3,920m above sea level, in Lake Titicaca. These frogs are famous for their loose, baggy skin folds, which allow them to absorb oxygen directly from the water. #giantfrog #Titicaca

🚨 New podcast episode available now! 🌳 We speak to recently published People and Nature author Marilisa Herchet about the mental health benefits of urban green 🏙️ 🎙️ Listen on Soundcloud ➡️ buff.ly/eK1rfVy 🎙️ Listen on Spotify ➡️ buff.ly/3hWpQn7

Exciting position at The School of Natural Sciences at Macquarie University. We are looking for an Associate Lecturer in Plant Ecology. A great opportunity to teach, mentor students and contribute to plant ecology research on the Wallumattagal Campus in Sydney.

Associate Lecturer in Plant Ecology

PRIMARY DETAIL - Salary package: $123,435 FTE (Level B.1) plus 17% employer's superannuation contribution and annual leave loading. - Full-time- 35 hours per week, fixed term for 36 months - Based at ...

mq.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com

If you’re interested in modelling community turnover and/or community uniqueness (i.e. LCBD: local contribution to beta diversity), make sure you check it out. Paper: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

Accounting for the Influence of Community Turnover Along Environmental Gradients on Compositional Uniqueness

Compositional uniqueness is commonly quantified using the Local Contribution to Beta Diversity (LCBD), which is typically regressed against environmental predictors. However, LCBD–environment relatio...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

PhD Chap1 done! With an all-star cast, I built a reproductive phenology dataset by integrating flowering and fruiting observations from as many sources as possible. The dataset covers: 255yrs, most Subtropical rainforests in Aus, and 915 species. doi.org/10.1002/ecog...

Americans: we live in a fallen state—embroiled by sin, cheating, lying, and evil. You cannot trust anyone, not even those who claim to know you best Canadians: I love my neighbors and my friends!

How do you age a tree that won't give up its rings? 🌳 Brigalow trees don't form annual rings — so researchers used radiocarbon dating to unlock their age. The result? These trees take ~150 years to mature, growing just 1.3 mm per year, informing the need for careful management. 📄 buff.ly/t4ZgpCA

The hot in the west was hotter than the cold in the east was cold. #climatechange

Graminoids had the best heat tolerance, but plant growth form did not predict response to active warming in a #heatwave experiment led by @scienceanu.bsky.social PhD student Tom Hanley using @tern-aus.bsky.social AMRF infrastructure. doi.org/10.1111/jvs.70109 🧪 #ecology #ecophysiology #wildOz

Journal of Vegetation & Applied Vegetation Science@jvs-avs.bsky.social · 6mo ago

How do alpine plants cope with multiday heat? Hanley et al. report that photosystem heat tolerance acclimated during field warming, but recovery was slow and strongly species-specific. These differences may shape future alpine community responses to heatwaves.

Proud of @biologyanu.bsky.social PhD student Tom Hanley's first paper. Huge effort in the field! @tern-aus.bsky.social AMRF infrastructure enabled us to simulate heatwaves while Tom followed the effect of the heat load on heat tolerance acclimation of photosystems over time doi.org/10.1111/jvs.70109

Effective heating chamber design to simulate acute heatwaves and night‐time warming for ecological communities under natural field conditions

Heatwaves are increasing in intensity, duration and frequency. The impacts of such events can be extensive for natural ecosystems, but studying heatwaves in field conditions (in situ) remains chal...

doi.org

Dr. Hilary Rose Dawson@hilaryrosed.bsky.social · 6mo ago

Graminoids had the best heat tolerance, but plant growth form did not predict response to active warming in a #heatwave experiment led by @scienceanu.bsky.social PhD student Tom Hanley using @tern-aus.bsky.social AMRF infrastructure. doi.org/10.1111/jvs.70109 🧪 #ecology #ecophysiology #wildOz

A study I led came out in Nature Cities yesterday! We used radar to study the role that urban landscapes play in migratory bird stopover. Spoiler: birds use cities a lot, and the patterns of their use reflect social processes and the inequities embedded in them. www.nature.com/articles/s44...

Migratory bird stopover patterns linked to urbanization and social landscapes - Nature Cities

Urban ecology traditionally focuses on single cities, yet cities play key roles in ecological processes such as migration. Radar analysis across the continental USA reveals that nearly half of stopove...

nature.com

So proud! Our brilliant PhD student Camille Sicangco's new paper just out in @newphyt.bsky.social : Testing stomatal optimisation models at high temperatures nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Weighing the options: a test of alternative stomatal optimisation models at high temperatures

Stomatal optimisation models centre upon a fundamental tradeoff for plants: opening stomata promotes carbon uptake, but closing stomata prevents water loss. However, stomatal opening can occur at hi...

nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Global variation in the ratio of sapwood to leaf area explained by optimality principles Xu et al. @huiyingxu.bsky.social @lemontree-uofr.bsky.social nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/share/QQQWKU...

don’t even have words for this one

bronte lee@brontelee.bsky.social · 7mo ago

you think i’m joking when i say tasmania is awful never come here

We've just created an exciting new Phylogenomics Botanist role to join our vibrant team at Botanic Gardens of Sydney and help us build the NSW Plant Tree of Life! Applications close 26 Jan 2026: iworkfor.nsw.gov.au/job/phylogen... #botanicgardens #nswflora #nswptol #phylogenomics