Category: Guest post

#StoryBehindThePaper, Guest post

How butterflies keep their cool: taking butterfly temperatures to understand the impacts of climate change.

This blog post is provided by Dr. Andrew Bladon and tells the  #StoryBehindThePaper for the article “How butterflies keep their cool: Physical and ecological traits influence thermoregulatory ability and population trends“, which was recently published in Journal of Animal Ecology. They say that only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun. Perhaps we should add lepidopterists – people who study butterflies – to … Continue reading How butterflies keep their cool: taking butterfly temperatures to understand the impacts of climate change.

Unknown's avatarJulie Sheard1 Comment
#StoryBehindThePaper, Guest post

Up silt creek without a niche: how do stream food webs respond to sedimentation?

This blog post is provided by Francis J. Burdon, Angus McIntosh, and Jon Harding and tells the #StoryBehindThePaper for their article ”Mechanisms of landscape disturbance: evidence from landscape disturbance”. Food webs represent a holistic systems approach to characterizing patterns of biodiversity and energy flow by describing trophic interactions between consumers and resources. However, how these ecological networks respond to natural and anthropogenic perturbations remains poorly … Continue reading Up silt creek without a niche: how do stream food webs respond to sedimentation?

Unknown's avatarJulie SheardLeave a comment
Guest post

When the world burns, how do predators respond?

This blog post is provided by William Geary, Tim Doherty, Dale Nimmo, Ayesha Tulloch and Euan Ritchie and tells the  #StoryBehindThePaper for their article Predator responses to fire: A global systematic review and meta‐analysis, which has been shortlisted for the 2020 Sidnie Manton Award. Over the past year, many regions of the world have experienced extensive and severe fires. More than ten million hectares across … Continue reading When the world burns, how do predators respond?

Unknown's avatarJournal of Animal EcologyLeave a comment
Guest post

Characterizing the “landscape of immunity” across wildlife systems

How does animal susceptibility to pathogens vary across landscapes? In this shortlisted paper for the Sidnie Manton Award “Macroimmunology: The drivers and consequences of spatial patterns in wildlife immune defence“, Daniel Becker and colleagues discuss the expanding efforts to apply large-scale approaches to ecological immunology. Daniel is a postdoctoral fellow at Indiana University and will be starting as an Assistant Professor at the University of … Continue reading Characterizing the “landscape of immunity” across wildlife systems

Unknown's avatarJournal of Animal EcologyLeave a comment
Guest post

There are no second acts in animal life cycles

This blog post has been provided by Mike Moore, a post-doctoral fellow with the Living Earth Collaborative in St. Louis, USA. It tells the #StoryBehindThePaper for “On the evolution of carry-over effects”, a review that was short-listed for the Sidnie Manton Award.  Simply put, the things that animals need to do in one part of the life cycle are almost always different from the things … Continue reading There are no second acts in animal life cycles

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Guest post

Large mammals at Mt. Kilimanjaro: the importance of resource availability and protected areas

This blog post is provided by Friederike Gebert from the University of Würzburg and tells the #StoryBehindThePaper for her article  Primary productivity and habitat protection predict elevational species richness and community biomass of large mammals on Mt. Kilimanjaro which has been shortlisted for the 2019 Elton Prize. Mountains are biodiversity hotspots and prior areas for conservation. Even though elevational gradients belong to the best described … Continue reading Large mammals at Mt. Kilimanjaro: the importance of resource availability and protected areas

Unknown's avatarJournal of Animal Ecology1 Comment
Guest post

How good are we at identifying cues for breeding?

This blog post is provided by Emily Simmonds from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) and tells the #StoryBehindThePaper for her article  Cue identification in phenology: A case study of the predictive performance of current statistical tools which has been shortlisted for the 2019 Elton Prize. How do individuals decide when to start breeding, come out of hibernation, drop their leaves, or migrate? … Continue reading How good are we at identifying cues for breeding?

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Guest post

Showcasing developments in biologging and related methods in applied ecology

Originally posted on The Applied Ecologist:
Following the recent Journal of Animal Ecology Special Feature on biologging, Associate Editor, Steph Januchowski-Hartley takes a look at how research in this and similar methods are affecting the field of applied ecology today. Advances in technology have allowed for small electronic loggers and transmitters to be developed not only for biomedical monitoring for humans (think of the tech… Continue reading Showcasing developments in biologging and related methods in applied ecology

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Guest post

Persistence (and a bit of luck) pays off: Costs of reproduction in mountain ungulates

Fitness costs of reproduction are expected when resources are limited. This can drive the evolution of life‐history strategies and can affect population dynamics, particularly if females change their allocation of resources to reproduction. Dr Marco Festa-Bianchet (Université de Sherbrooke) explains the value of long-term studies for understanding such trade-offs and gives the #StoryBehindThePaper for his recent synthesis article in the Journal of Animal Ecology. Long-term studies … Continue reading Persistence (and a bit of luck) pays off: Costs of reproduction in mountain ungulates

Unknown's avatarSarah MarleyLeave a comment
Guest post

Navigating through the R packages for movement

In the biologging Special Issue of the journal, we have new Review paper lead by Rocío Joo on Navigating through the r packages for movement. Rocío is a movement statistician based at the University of Florida and the blog tells the story behind the paper and a brief overview of the paper. Behind the scenes Two years ago, if someone would have asked me about … Continue reading Navigating through the R packages for movement

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