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Category: Ecosystems

  • Saltmarsh Restoration: Cost-Effective Strategy To Cope With Sea Level Rise

    The restoration of currently occupied saltmarshes in temperate zones with an abundant input of sediments could be put forward as a strategy of cost-effective adaptation to counteract the effects of the rise in sea level. (Click on title for full story.)

  • Tree Planting In Flood Plains Can Reduce Flooding Down Stream

    Planting trees on the flood plain and increasing the number of logjams across just 10-5% of the total river length was found to be able to reduce the peak height of a potential flood in the town by 6% once the trees had grown for 25 years. More extensive river restoration, for example in 20-25% of the total river length, resulted in a reduction in flood peak height of up to 20%. (Click on title for full story)

  • There Is No Pristine Wilderness. It’s Been Gone For Millennia

    These findings suggest that we need to move away from a conservation paradigm of protecting the earth from change to a design paradigm of positively and proactively shaping the types of changes that are taking place. This sounds scary, and it sounds very self-serving. But the reality is that there are 7 billion people living on an already heavily altered planet. It is a pipe dream to think that we can go back to some sort of pristine past. (Click on title for full story.)

  • Higher Deer Populations Increase Invasive Plant Populations

    After having observed firsthand how the presence of deer enables invasive exotic plants to spread in their Virginia study plots, the authors conclude too many deer may be boosting the invasion of exotic plants in similar forests across the Mid-Atlantic region. (Click on title for full story.)

  • Ice Cores Reveal 54million Years Of Antarctic Vegetation Transitions: From Palms To Ice

    Antarctica was once covered with tropical forests. Now researchers have fully charted the slow transition from tropical paradise to icy wasteland, thanks to a single marine sediment core. (Click on title for full story.)

  • A Redwood Is A Community, Not Only A Tree

    All told, the survey found that redwoods contain more diversity — 282 epiphytes in and directly beneath the trees — than other tree species that researchers had previously sampled, including the Douglas fir and the Sitka spruce. This study also uncovered a species new to science — a lichen as diminutive as its redwood host is towering. (Click on title for full story.)

  • Madagascar’s Lemur Extinction And The Death Of The Forests

    Sizeable fruit may once have conferred an evolutionary advantage for many trees, but it has now become a liability. The larger lemur species have died out and the seeds are too big for surviving lemurs to eat, the team reports. With the big lemurs gone, some plants are already doomed. Others are in a precarious position – many trees are now entirely dependent on the two largest surviving lemur species, the black-and-white ruffed lemur (Varecia variegata) and the red-ruffed lemur (Varecia rubra). (Click on title for full story.)

  • How Invasive Plants Can Make Forest Fires Worse

    Biotic invasions have impacted ecosystems worldwide, and one of the greatest current challenges facing forest ecosystem management in the southern U.S. is the control of range expansions by invasive plant species. Among the more worrisome concerns related to invasive shrubs is their role as ‘ladder fuels,’ which increase the risk of crown fires. (Click on title for full story)

  • Planting Trees In Arid Areas Actually Increases Ground Water Reserves

    In arid places where water is scarce, the planting of trees is often discouraged out of the belief that trees always reduce the availability of much-needed water. Yet scientists working in Burkina Faso found that when a certain number of trees are present, the amount of groundwater recharge is actually maximized. (Click on title for full story.)

  • Tropical Countries Mortgaging Ecosystems For Short Term Gains

    Deforestation is supported under the assumption that the countries are better off by engaging in agricultural activities. However, our findings show that this is not necessarily the case. This points to the urgency for tropical countries to rethink their land-use strategies. Without incorporating the environmental costs into international trade, deforestation beyond optimal levels will continue and may lead to serious environmental consequences. (Click on title for full story.)