Adaptive capacity of small mammals of western North America

Climate change vulnerability assessments have to-date focused primarily on exposure and sensitivity, with adaptive capacity relatively overlooked. In a new paper, an army of mammalogists (and Adam) completed an assessment of the adaptive capacity of several iconic mammals of western North America. Of note, the American pika (Ochotona princeps) has reduced adaptive capacity at the …
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How should we model rare species’ niches and distributions?

Constructing species distribution models (SDMs) and ecological niche models (ENMs) for very rare species is a very hard challenge–and these are the species for which knowing their distributions and niches would help the most! Recently, Kelley Erickson and I completed an assessment of state-of-the-art methods for modeling rare species in community contexts. In this analysis, …
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Matthew Austin’s phenology work featured in multiple news outlets, including USA Today!

Matt’s findings that climate change has induced not only a change in phenology but also a change in reproductive strategy from more to less selfing in the common blue violet, Viola sororia, has been featured by not only USA Today, but also St. Louis’s FOX2 TV and Washington University in Saint Louis’s Climate Change Program! …
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Call for grad student/postdoc applicants for expense-paid Biosphere2 Biogeography Workshop

Please note the deadline for this has passed. Are you a graduate student or postdoc interested in networking with biogeographers and writing synthesis papers?  We will be convening the “Biosphere2 Biogeography” (B2) workshop to be held at Biosphere2, near Tucson, Arizona USA, from April 13-16th, 2023.  We have funds to support up to 3 additional …
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Using imprecisely located presences in SDMs

We’ve developed a new, simple, common-sensical method for using imprecisely georeferenced occurrence data in species distribution modeling and other biogeographic analyses! Collectively, imprecise records reflect thousands of years of person-work in collection, curation, and digitization, and yet they are routinely discarded by biogeographers before analysis because of the fear that their error will propagate through …
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enmSdmX on CRAN

I’m pleased as punch to announce that enmSdmX, a set of tools in R for implementing species distribution models (SDMs) and ecological niche models (ENMs), is now available on CRAN! The package includes functions found (nearly?) nowhere else for bias correction, spatial cross-validation, model evaluation, raster interpolation, biotic “velocity” (speed and direction of movement of …
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Goodbye (for now) to our summer REUs!

We have been honored to serve as the summer home for three wonderful undergraduates in the Garden’s Research Experience for Undergraduates program! Marina, Catherine, and Evelyn explored illegal trade in vulnerable plants, the role of phenology in invasions, and how bees respond to urban environments, respectively. Thank you to all of you an engaging experience, …
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Climate change alters plant mating systems

Matthew Austin‘s new open access paper in the American Journal of Botany on how climate has affected plant mating systems is making waves! Using herbarium specimens, Matt found that over the last 100 years, the rate of cleistogamy (asexual flowering) has decreased among Viola sororia, the common blue violet. This change was predicted by increases …
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In search of refuge

From outlaw bandit Jesse James to microclimate–please enjoy a mini-documentary on our microrefugia project! Update: This mini-documentary won a Regional Emmy from the Mid-America Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, plus a Bronze in the Council for Advancement and Support of Education’s Circle of Excellence competition!

Battle or synergy of the changes? Land use/land cover change versus climate change

UPDATE: Our article received Honorable Mention for Landscape Ecology‘s Best Article of 2021! Historically, climate change vulnerability assessments have been just that–assessments of how species are expected to be affected by climate change. Nonetheless, even if anthropogenic climate were not occurring, Earth would still be in the throes of a human-generated mass extinction, mostly due …
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Paid college / undergraduate research internships for the summer of 2022!

Please note the deadline for this has passed. We’re excited to have four summer research opportunities open for college students! These are 8-week paid internships with housing (if in person), and part of the Missouri Botanical Garden’s Research Experience for Undergraduates Program. If you are interested in any of these opportunities, please contact Adam or …
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What can community ecologists learn from species distribution models?

Stephen Murphy and Adam Smith are happy to see their article on how community ecologists can employ species distribution models to crack hard questions in community ecology! What can community ecology learn from species distribution models? [open access]Murphy, S.J. and Smith, A.B. 2021. Ecosphere 12:e03864. doi: 10.1002/ecs2.3864