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Although climate change is warming many lakes around the world, there are big variations in their rate of temperature increase. This variability is thought to be partly due to the fact that lakes differ widely in terms of water clarity, which is affected by factors such as land management, rainfall and changes in dissolved organic […]
September 25, 2017
Comments Off on Recognising uncertainty in hydro modelling
Because climate warming is thought to be a major cause of long-term shifts in storm runoff and the frequency of extreme floods and droughts, reliable projections of future hydrological changes are essential for the informed management of water resources. However, hydrological modelling involves dealing with a wide range of uncertainties, and so far these uncertainties […]
June 19, 2017
Comments Off on Human impacts on ecological connectivity
Ecological connectivity – the exchange of organisms between habitat patches or subpopulations – has an influence on many key processes, including population dynamics, nutrient flux, disease transmission, species invasions, food-web interactions, genetic isolation and the maintenance of biodiversity. A recent study reviewed ways in which graph theory has been used to investigate how human activities […]
March 27, 2017
Comments Off on Unravelling trends in stream nitrogen
Oxides of nitrogen derived from agriculture, industry and emissions from the burning of fossil fuels fall out from the atmosphere and enter terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems. Over the last century the deposition of reactive nitrogen has increased three to five times, and this is reflected in a general global increase in stream nitrogen concentrations. However, at […]
December 13, 2016
Comments Off on Factoring history into threat assessments
Genetic variation allows populations to adapt to environmental changes, and it’s often the case that threatened species exhibit low genetic diversity. Human-produced habitat fragmentation is a well-recognised cause of genetic bottlenecks, but the additional effects of larger-scale biogeographic factors are rarely considered. As an example of such biogeographic impacts, populations that have managed to survive […]
December 13, 2016
Comments Off on Emergent wetland plants as conduits for methane
Wetlands release more methane to the atmosphere than other any other type of ecosystem and wetland plants, especially those in the shallow fringing zones, play an important role in methane dynamics. However, aquatic plants can be damaged by the grazing activities of herbivorous animals. To examine the impacts of grazing damage on the release of […]
December 21, 2017
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