Stuart Allison
@stuarta.bsky.social
restoration ecologist, wandering walker, occasional writer, constant dog lover, author of Ecological Restoration and Environmental Change, professor at Knox College
@nytopinion.nytimes.com, @DouthatNYT - Ross Douthat's recent column on living in an age of extinction is well worth reading and I think he is spot on about how the digital age is leading to extinctions of many human institutions. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/19/o...
Opinion | An Age of Extinction Is Coming. Here’s How to Survive.
Everything is under threat. What you care about can make it to the other side.
nytimes.com
Species communicate many ways in nature, often across large differences in taxa. There is so much we need to learn to better understand and preserve the world. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Embedding information flows within ecological networks - Nature Ecology & Evolution
Ecological network research has typically focused on flows of matter and energy, but species also exchange information signals and cues that influence behaviour and movement. This Perspective argues t...
nature.com
Mary Elizabeth Banning, a 19th century mycologist, finally gets her due recognition. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/25/s...
A Fungi Pioneer’s Lifelong Work on Exhibit (Gift Article)
Mushrooms in 19th-century watercolors: The paintings of a self-taught female mycologist are featured at the New York State Museum.
nytimes.com
If correct, this data on microplastics in plants is really bad news. www.theguardian.com/environment/...
Microplastics hinder plant photosynthesis, study finds, threatening millions with starvation
Researchers say problem could increase number of people at risk of starvation by 400m in next two decades
theguardian.com
Rephotography helps to document our rapidly changing environment. And it is changing a lot - even in 24 years. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/05/t...
150 Years of Change: How Old Photos, Recaptured, Reveal a Shifting Climate
In the heart of Utah’s Uinta Mountains, a team of scientists is re-creating historical pictures to study how much, and how quickly, ecosystems are changing.
nytimes.com
Sea otter's role as keystone species varies with location due to different suites of species in the two locations. Sea Otters are always important actors, but some places they are more important than others. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
This article has beautiful video of fungal networks expanding and moving material within their bodies. It is incredible stuff. So much of our world depends on the actions of fungi. Watch and be amazed. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/01/s...
How Fungi Move Among Us (Gift Article)
Underground fungal networks are “living algorithms” that quietly help regulate Earth’s climate. Now scientists know what makes them so efficient.
nytimes.com
Non-migratory bird reproductive strategies are related to annual climatic variability. Lots of annual variation - reproduce quickly with lots of offspring. Little annual variation - reproduce more slower. Climate change might mess up those strategies. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....
Environmental Variability Shapes Life History of the World's Birds
Theory suggests life history plays a key role in the ability of organisms to persist under fluctuating environmental conditions. Synthesising a collection of global data resources, we demonstrate a l...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
The good news - rainfall in the Amazon basin may be more robust to deforestation than originally thought. So perhaps rainforest can become re-established following deforestation. agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/...
Muted Amazon Rainfall Response to Deforestation in a Global Storm‐Resolving Model
This study is the first to explore the response of Amazon precipitation to complete deforestation using a global storm-resolving model Despite a strong decrease in evapotranspiration, mean Amazon...
agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com
Science writer Ed Yong reflects on the complexities of life and understanding the world we live in. And he provides a beautiful quotation to help us carry on - "Hope is a discipline." www.nytimes.com/2025/02/22/m...
‘The Interview’: Ed Yong Wants to Show You the Hidden Reality of the World (Gift Article)
The Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer talks about burnout from covering the pandemic and how bird-watching gave him a new sense of hope.
nytimes.com
Orchids are fascinating. This species can parasitize wood decomposing fungi to gain nutrition while remaining photosynthetic and thus growing more vigorously. Cool stuff. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
Subterranean morphology underpins the degree of mycoheterotrophy, mycorrhizal associations, and plant vigor in a green orchid Oreorchis patens
The evolution of full heterotrophy from photosynthetic ancestors is a longstanding question in evolutionary ecology. Our study demonstrates that coralloid rhizomes in a photosynthetic orchid p...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
While not a surprise, this is a valuable study that reveals urban tree health and potential benefits vary with conditions in urban areas. Those closer to water and green spaces do better than those more surrounded by hard-scaping. agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/...
Canopy Temperature Reveals Disparities in Urban Tree Benefits
Using canopy temperature as a proxy, we show that urban tree health and function varies across Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN Trees in more urbanized areas and areas further from blue/green spaces exhi...
agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com
You just never know what may surface from the deep ocean. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/12/s...
A Deep-Sea Fish of Nightmares Strays Into Shallow Waters
A scary-looking creature with “devil” in its name was spotted close to the surface off Tenerife, a Spanish island.
nytimes.com
Keep going researchers and writers! We need the National Nature Assessment to be published. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/10/c...
Trump Killed a Major Report on Nature. They’re Trying to Publish It Anyway.
The first full draft of the assessment, on the state of America’s land, water and wildlife, was weeks from completion. The project leader called the study “too important to die.”
nytimes.com
Coordinated responses by experienced professionals can help limit the extent of disastrous wildfires. However, the current group in Washington would prefer to fire as many experience professionals as possible. How will they respond then? www.nytimes.com/2025/02/05/m...
The L.A. Fire Where Something Went Right
While some Angelenos cast around for someone to blame, a whole cooperative emergency-response system whirred to life.
nytimes.com
Centipede shape - or perhaps dendritic - in the ice on a driveway after yesterday's freezing rain.
Northern boreal forests will probably experience significant changes in the next century - moving further north and increasing in density in colder areas. The southern edge of the forests will become less dense. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
PNAS
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...
pnas.org
Excellent bubbles in the ice on Lake Sharvy at the Green Oaks Field Research Center. You can't tell in the photo but the shallow bubbles are about 6 inches down, the deepest bubbles about 10 inches down.
Bad news for biodiversity - there is evidence for widespread declines in genetic diversity even in species that do not appear to be experiencing population decline. www.science.org/content/arti...
Wide range of Earth’s species are showing a decline in diversity
The loss of genetic variation means species may be less resilient to climate change and other stressors
science.org
It is amazing how tiny birds survive harsh winter weather. I'm always glad to see them flock to my bird feeders. www.nytimes.com/2025/01/29/r...
How Birds Survive Winter Cold: Adaptations and Behavioral Strategies (Gift Article)
Their feathers, roosting behaviors and adaptability help birds survive the cold, “nature’s proving ground.”
nytimes.com
In the Andes, vicuna dung and microbial activity speed post-glacial succession. Can their activity keep with accelerating rates of glacial melt? www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Wild Andean camelids promote rapid ecosystem development after glacier retreat - Scientific Reports
Scientific Reports - Wild Andean camelids promote rapid ecosystem development after glacier retreat
nature.com
When the political meets the scientific and ethical, let's hope scientific and ethical win. www.nytimes.com/2025/01/28/c...
Could Trump Use the ‘God Squad’ to Override Environmental Law?
The president wants to convene the rarely used panel, which has the power to carve out exemptions to the Endangered Species Act. Here’s what to know.
nytimes.com
Two new truffle species described in North America. I especially like that taxonomic/ecological research was aided by truffle dogs. I need to train my dog to help me find truffles. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
Tuber cumberlandense and T. canirevelatum, two new edible Tuber species from eastern North America discovered by truffle-hunting dogs
Ectomycorrhizal fungi in the genus Tuber form hypogeous fruiting bodies called truffles. Many Tuber species are highly prized due to their edible and aromatic ascomata. Historically, there has been...
tandfonline.com
On a day when it is -17 C here, it is hard to imagine outdoor ice rinks and skating could disappear in the future. That is why our short term memories are so faulty. We need to look at long term trends in the data. www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/...
Canada's beloved outdoor ice rinks are melting away
Over the past 50 years, the length of skating season in some parts of Canada decreased by a third. By 2050, some regions may not see one at all.
nationalgeographic.com
We learn so many new things everyday. Bird migrations may be facilitated by social interactions between birds of different species but similar size and flight speed. That is fascinating. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Social associations across species during nocturnal bird migration
An emerging frontier in ecology explores how organisms integrate social information into movement behavior and the extent to which information exchang…
sciencedirect.com
Fascinating study of feral domestic dogs living around the Chernobyl exclusion zone. They are a genetically distinct population but their uniqueness does not appear to be due to mutations caused by exposure to radiation. www.science.org/doi/full/10....
The dogs of Chernobyl: Demographic insights into populations inhabiting the nuclear exclusion zone
Characterization of free-breeding dogs in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone establishes a mechanism for genetic mapping studies.
science.org
A belated birthday recognition to Aldo Leopold who would have celebrated his 138th birthday on Jan. 11. Long may his ideas and writing continue to inspire conservationists and environmentalists everywhere.
Move evidence of species evolving in response to human domination of our ecosystems - www.theguardian.com/environment/...
Shrinking trees and tuskless elephants: the strange ways species are adapting to humans
As people have shaped the natural world, so wildlife – from mahoganies to magpies – has had to evolve to survive
theguardian.com
More bad news about climate change and food production. Climate change is already having negative impacts on apple production in areas of the US the produce large numbers of apples. There are some measures that may help mitigate those impacts. iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...
Changing climate risks for high-value tree fruit production across the United States - IOPscienceSearch
Changing climate risks for high-value tree fruit production across the United States, Shawn Preston, Kirti Rajagopalan, Matthew Yourek, Lee Kalcsits, Deepti Singh
iopscience.iop.org
