Calm before the storm? – The Applied Ecologist

In this week’s blog post, Jostein Gohli and authors discuss their recent research which explores how climatic and management-related factors influence bark beetle population sizes in boreal forests. The European spruce bark beetle The European spruce bark beetle (Ips typographus) is a notorious tree-killer in spruce-dominated forests. The last 5-10 years it has caused enormous […]

Continue Reading

Commission publishes new guide to designing better land-use policies

Our use and management of land is crucial for addressing the global challenge of climate change, both because it functions as a carbon sink that we need to strengthen and as a source of emissions that must be reduced. The EU 27’s net land sink declined by 35% between 2010 and 2021. On 15 May, […]

Continue Reading

Attempted eradication of red swamp crayfish in Malta did not deliver – The Applied Ecologist

Feature image: Invasive Red swamp crayfish (Procambarus clarkii) © Alex Caruana Author Alex Caruana shares learnings from their failed attempts to eradicate invasive crayfish from the Fiddien Valley in Malta. Invasive alien crayfish, like the Red Swamp Crayfish (Procambarus clarkii), are a major threat to freshwater ecosystems all over the world. They have a significant […]

Continue Reading

Joshua Brian explores the link between plant damage and performance

Plant enemies like insect herbivores and fungal pathogens eat or degrade plant tissue. How does this affect performance? Photo: Josh Brian We are invasion biologists, studying how and why species become invasive. One of the biggest hypotheses in our field is the ‘enemy release hypothesis’, which says that species become invasive because they escape from […]

Continue Reading

Achieving functional eradication of invasive snakes to benefit avian conservation – The Applied Ecologist

Melia Nafus summarises how, alongside colleagues, they applied an Adaptive Resource Management process across three field phases of snake removal. This enabled an evaluation of whether eradication was achievable and whether it was necessary to achieve an avian response. Invasive snakes Invasive species, particularly predators, harm natural ecosystems and are a leading driver in global […]

Continue Reading

Enhancing ecosystem restoration with complex systems science – The Applied Ecologist

Sybryn L. Maes explains how they, alongside colleagues, developed an Explore Before You Restore framework, and illustrates how these concepts may impact restoration outcomes by influencing degradation and recovery trajectories. To help restore ecosystems, we, a group of international experts in resilience & restoration, propose using a new framework called Explore Before You Restore (EBYR) […]

Continue Reading

High level dialogue on Climate Change between the EU and Japan – Stepping up cooperation on climate policies

At the High Level Dialogue on Climate Change between the European Union and Japan, senior officials agreed to deepen their bilateral co-operation, work together towards achieving climate neutrality and tackling climate-related challenges. The meeting was co-chaired by Kurt Vandenberghe – Director General at the Directorate General for Climate Action at the European Commission and Yutaka […]

Continue Reading

Passive tree diversity increase after intense forest exploitation? A matter of drought-tolerant and animal-dispersed species – The Applied Ecologist

Miriam Selwyn discusses their latest study’s findings, conducted with colleagues. Results find ca. 30 years of passive tree species diversity increase following intense forest management release. This is largely thought to be led by animal-dispersed and higher drought tolerant species in the context of increasing temperatures and decreasing precipitations. Why does diversity matter? Tree species […]

Continue Reading

Notification by Germany of voluntary cancellation for plants closed in 2022

On 28 December 2023, the Commission received a notification in the sense of Article 12(4) of Directive 2003/87/EC (‘ETS Directive’) from Germany, concerning its intention to voluntarily cancel allowances associated with the closure of electricity generation capacities in two ETS installations in its territory in 2022 due to additional national measures. The notification follows the […]

Continue Reading