Water stress and harmful insects in agri-forest ecosystems

Fire and insects in northern and boreal forest ecosystems of North America.

Fire and insects are natural disturbance agents in many forest ecosystems, often interacting to affect succession, nutrient cycling, and forest species composition. We review literature pertaining to effects of fire-insect interactions on ecological succession, use of prescribed fire for insect pest control, and effects of fire on insect diversity from northern and boreal forests in North Ameri...

Controlling cyanobacterial harmful blooms in freshwater ecosystems

Cyanobacteria's long evolutionary history has enabled them to adapt to geochemical and climatic changes, and more recent human and climatic modifications of aquatic ecosystems, including nutrient over-enrichment, hydrologic modifications, and global warming. Harmful (toxic, hypoxia-generating, food web altering) cyanobacterial bloom (CyanoHAB) genera are controlled by the synergistic effects of...

Invasive Forest Insects, Introduced Forest Trees, and Altered Ecosystems Ecological Pest Management in Global Forests of a Changing World

Deadwood in Forest Ecosystems

Until recently, deadwood was perceived as a negative element of forest ecosystems, that indicates “mismanagement, negligence, and wastefulness” of the applied forest management (Stachura et al., 2007). It was regarded as a potential source of biotic pests, mainly insects (Bütler, 2003; Marage & Lemperiere, 2005), to remaining trees in a forest as well as to adjacent stands (Pasierbek et al., 20...

Water Stress Strengthens Mutualism Among Ants, Trees, and Scale Insects

Abiotic environmental variables strongly affect the outcomes of species interactions. For example, mutualistic interactions between species are often stronger when resources are limited. The effect might be indirect: water stress on plants can lead to carbon stress, which could alter carbon-mediated plant mutualisms. In mutualistic ant-plant symbioses, plants host ant colonies that defend them ...