Hacker News with Generative AI: Ecology

Spruce trees communicate during a solar eclipse (phys.org)
An international study has revealed spruce trees not only respond to a solar eclipse but actively anticipate it by synchronizing their bioelectrical signals hours in advance into a cohesive, forest-wide phenomenon.

Science, Plants, Ecology, Astronomy

8 points by geox 14 days ago | 0 comments

Lianas are taking over the rainforests, and it's visible from space (phys.org)
A pandemic of lianas is sweeping through tropical forests, reducing their ability to store carbon and limiting their role in mitigating climate change.

Tropical Forests, Climate Change, Ecology, Remote Sensing

50 points by stevenjgarner 31 days ago | 41 comments

New study of birds shows citizen science can be trusted (ucdavis.edu)
Platforms such as iNaturalist and eBird encourage people to observe and document nature, but how accurate is the ecological data that they collect?

Citizen Science, Ecology, Birds, Research

48 points by gnabgib 46 days ago | 29 comments

Fun ways of deciding authorship order (2016) (wordpress.com)
Last spring, I did a poll related to authorship order in ecology. I’ve written up a couple of posts presenting the results of that poll (part 1, part 2), and plan on writing more. But, for now, I want to focus on some . . . less standard ways of deciding authorship for ecology and evolutionary biology papers.*

Research, Ecology, Science, Authorship, Academia

72 points by qifzer 53 days ago | 34 comments

Six decades of plankton decline sparks call to protect the marine food web (phys.org)
The decline in plankton abundance in the North East Atlantic over the past six decades should serve as a red flag to policy makers about the need to protect some of the planet's most critical forms of life, a new study has warned.

Marine Biology, Climate Change, Environmental Science, Ecology

6 points by andyjohnson0 55 days ago | 0 comments

Lotka–Volterra Equations (wikipedia.org)
The Lotka–Volterra equations, also known as the Lotka–Volterra predator–prey model, are a pair of first-order nonlinear differential equations, frequently used to describe the dynamics of biological systems in which two species interact, one as a predator and the other as prey.

Mathematics, Biology, Ecology, Differential Equations

53 points by ustad 58 days ago | 22 comments

The Dingo's Fate (noemamag.com)
The dingo forces us to question the coherence of ‘nativeness’ as a meaningful concept.

Australia, Ecology, Philosophy, Identity

40 points by Thevet 70 days ago | 10 comments

The Hole Story: How Woodpeckers Make Homes for the Rest of the Forest (allaboutbirds.org)
Woodpecker nest holes are valuable pieces of real estate that may be used by hundreds of other species over many years. Researchers are using the concept of "nest webs" to understand how this valuable resource passes from one owner to the next.

Wildlife, Ecology, Research, Birds

4 points by hn_acker 71 days ago | 0 comments

Hungry little crabs may help control coral-eating starfish numbers (phys.org)
Small, hidden crabs may be the missing link influencing coral-eating starfish populations, according to a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Marine Biology, Ecology, Coral Reefs, Starfish

3 points by PaulHoule 78 days ago | 0 comments

'Whale Conveyor Belt' Moves Tons of Nutrients Across the Ocean–Through Urine (gizmodo.com)
When whales migrate from their cold feeding grounds to warmer breeding waters, they carry tons of nutrients in their urine.

Marine Biology, Ecology, Animal Migration, Oceanographic Research

4 points by pseudolus 88 days ago | 0 comments

A New, Chemical View of Ecosystems (quantamagazine.org)
Rare and powerful compounds, known as keystone molecules, can build a web of invisible interactions among species.

Ecology, Chemistry, Ecosystems, Biology

31 points by rbanffy 93 days ago | 4 comments

Foraging seals enable scientists to measure fish abundance across the Pacific (phys.org)
Over the past 60 years, marine biologists at UC Santa Cruz have monitored the behavior of northern elephant seals that journey to nearby Año Nuevo Natural Reserve.

Marine Biology, Ecology, Animal Behavior, Research, Pacific Ocean

6 points by PaulHoule 101 days ago | 0 comments

The teeming life of dead trees (knowablemagazine.org)
Though no one may be around to hear when a tree falls in the forest, countless critters take note. Dormant fungi within the tree awaken to feast on it, joined by others that creep up from the soil. Bacteria pitch in, some sliding along strands of fungi to get deeper into the log. Termites alert their colony mates, which gather en masse to gobble up wood. Bit by bit, deadwood is decomposed, feeding new life along the way.

Ecology, Decomposition, Fungi, Insects, Nature

8 points by rntn 112 days ago | 1 comments

High fertiliser use halves numbers of pollinators, longest study finds (theguardian.com)
Using high levels of common fertilisers on grassland halves pollinator numbers and drastically reduces the number of flowers, research from the world’s longest-running ecological experiment has found.

Environment, Science, Agriculture, Pollinators, Ecology

9 points by PaulHoule 113 days ago | 1 comments

Signs Of Life In A Desert (noemamag.com)
In the dry and fiery deserts of Central Asia, among the mythical sites of both the first human and the end of all days, I found evidence that life restores itself even on the bleakest edge of ecological apocalypse.

Science, Nature, Environmentalism, Ecology

69 points by mindingnever 128 days ago | 12 comments

In 1859, 24 Rabbits 'Colonized' a New Continent–A Biologist Tells the Story (forbes.com)
Introduced for the sake of sport, the entry of these rabbits to Australia marked the beginning of an infestation that would continue to plague the ecosystem over 150 years later.

Australia, Ecology, History, Invasive Species

5 points by xbmcuser 131 days ago | 1 comments

Invasive Plants Are Fueling California's Wildfire Crisis (wired.com)
Fire has always shaped the landscape in California. But today it burns hotter, more frequently, and spreads farther than ever before—a shift driven by human development, climate change, and the prevalence of invasive species, which are non-native plants that have negative effects on local ecosystems. Grasses and trees brought to California for agriculture, landscaping, or by accident, have transformed the state’s fire dynamics.

Invasive Species, Wildfires, California, Climate Change, Ecology

11 points by pseudolus 137 days ago | 2 comments

Fears of 'rogue rewilding' in Scottish Highlands after further lynx sightings (theguardian.com)
For a brief moment this week, lynx have been roaming the Scottish Highlands once again. But this was not the way conservationists had hoped to end their 1,000-year absence.

Wildlife Conservation, Scotland, Lynx, Ecology, Environmentalism

4 points by rntn 147 days ago | 0 comments

A new way to determine whether a species will successfully invade an ecosystem (news.mit.edu)
When a new species is introduced into an ecosystem, it may succeed in establishing itself, or it may fail to gain a foothold and die out. Physicists at MIT have now devised a formula that can predict which of those outcomes is most likely.

Ecology, Biology, Science, Prediction, Ecosystems

3 points by gnabgib 152 days ago | 0 comments

What happened to the American chestnut tree? (npr.org)
In the early 20th century, a blight fungus wiped out most of the 4 billion American chestnut trees on the eastern seaboard. The loss was ecologically devastating.

Environmental Issues, Ecology, History, Forestry, Disease

6 points by rbanffy 162 days ago | 0 comments

Ethiopian wolves reported to feed on nectar (ox.ac.uk)
New findings, published in the journal Ecology, describe a previously undocumented behaviour of Ethiopian wolves (Canis simensis). For the first time, these have been reported to feed on the nectar of Ethiopian red hot poker flowers (Kniphofia foliosa) – the first large carnivore species ever to be documented feeding on nectar.

Zoology, Ecology, Carnivores, Ethiopia

78 points by thunderbong 195 days ago | 23 comments

Pioneer Species (wikipedia.org)
Pioneer species are resilient species that are the first to colonize barren environments, or to repopulate disrupted biodiverse steady-state ecosystems as part of ecological succession.

Ecology, Biology, Environmental Science, Succession, Resilience

19 points by skibz 202 days ago | 1 comments

Making waves through the Wallace Line (weatherzone.com.au)
The islands of Bali and Lombok may only be separated by a distance of about 20 kilometres through the Lombok Strait, but an insurmountable depth has kept the Indonesian Archipelago ecologically disjoint for millions of years.

Indonesia, Geography, Ecology, Biology

17 points by kuhewa 202 days ago | 3 comments

Microbial community structure in recovering forests of Mount St. Helens (frontiersin.org)
The 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens had devastating effects above and belowground in forested montane ecosystems, including the burial and destruction of soil microbes.

Environmental Science, Ecology, Microbiology, Volcanic Eruptions, Forest Regeneration

3 points by gnabgib 208 days ago | 0 comments

How gophers brought Mount St. Helens back to life in one day (phys.org)
When Mount St. Helens erupted in 1980, lava incinerated anything living for miles around. As an experiment, scientists later dropped gophers onto parts of the scorched mountain for only 24 hours. The benefits from that single day were undeniable—and still visible 40 years later.

Science, Biology, Ecology, Environmental Science

96 points by pseudolus 208 days ago | 55 comments

Railroad Ecology (wikipedia.org)
Railroad ecology or railway ecology is a term used to refer to the study of the ecological community growing along railroad or railway tracks and the effects of railroads on natural ecosystems.

Ecology, Biology, Transportation, Environmental Science

8 points by downboots 212 days ago | 1 comments

Islands of the Feral Pigs (hakaimagazine.com)
In Hawai‘i, people, pigs, and ecosystems only have so much room to coexist, and the pigs exist a little too much.

Hawaii, Ecology, Animals, Environmentalism

3 points by Thevet 215 days ago | 0 comments

Dumped orange peel transformed a barren pasture (2017) (sciencealert.com)
An experimental conservation project that was abandoned and almost forgotten about, has ended up producing an amazing ecological win nearly two decades after it was dreamt up.

Conservation, Ecology, Environmental Science, Science, Agriculture

221 points by metadat 257 days ago | 148 comments

Dropped Cheetos Could Have Triggered Ecosystem Chaos in Largest US Cave Chamber (iflscience.com)