Why doesn't tropical forest biomass track increasing productivity with higher soil fertility? Wong et al. @michellewongca.bsky.social @jane-lucas-phd.bsky.social @kaaze7.bsky.social @cushmankc.bsky.social @dallingjim.bsky.social nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

I was interviewed by @science.org for this piece on giant trees and drought resilience. An impressive study, but it doesn't overturn previous work: drought responses depend on the forest, the type of drought, and tree traits www.science.org/content/arti...

Unprecedented Amazonian rainforest damage during the 2023–2024 droughts ... "...these forests are approaching the limits of their preindustrial operating space." 🧪🌾🌐https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.2514066123

Accelerated tree mortality after a half-century of stability in an old-growth forest: Insights from a 72-year study www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

New analysis examines how deforestation in the Amazon affects rainfall and forest stability. Changes to the land surface may feedback strongly on atmospheric exchanges, affecting rainfall conditions in other locations. The study identifies key hotspots of vulnerability. 🧪 1/

⚒️ Article: Natural forest expansion rivals secondary forests, storing more carbon and helping offset tropical deforestation www.nature.com/articles/s41...

New paper from Sruthi Krishna Moorthy and @ymalhi.bsky.social examines 60 years of tropical ecology research 🌍 The study highlights the growing dominance of tropical forest research and persistent global inequities in tropical ecology authorship. doi.org/10.1111/btp....

Liana cutting accelerates the structural recovery of once-logged tropical forests at a fraction of the cost of tree planting: Current Biology www.cell.com/current-biol...

Multidimensional Recovery of Young Secondary Forests in Human‐Modified Tropical Landscapes 🔗 buff.ly/Qg5GzZB

New article by our group in @pnas.org 📄🌳 We often focus on stopping deforestation —but what about forest degradation? Are existing deforestation policies offering any protection against this problem? www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... #Amazon #Deforestation #ClimatePolicy #Conservation

One frequently sees headlines that X is warming faster than the global average. That's true of nearly everywhere that humans live, but only because humans nearly all live on land. The process of global warming will generally warm land faster than the oceans.

Tropical forests can temporarily increase CO₂ uptake as levels rise, but long-term carbon storage may be limited by nutrient constraints, highlighting potential vulnerabilities in these ecosystems. doi.org/hbzp96

What will happen if the Amazon rainforest burns? Although some have predicted a transition to savanna, experimental burns in Mato Grosso, Brazil, suggest tree cover could return in 14 years. However, post-fire forests differ in composition. In PNAS: https://ow.ly/KUt250YP9hz

These Salmon Got High on Cocaine. That Wasn’t the Craziest Part. www.nytimes.com/2026/04/20/s...

Planting more trees will decelerate climate change only if those trees are placed in optimal locations—primarily the tropics and subtropics—suggests new research. Work led by @norafahrenbach.bsky.social, comments from @evilanova.bsky.social eos.org/articles/loc...

Rainforests Can Bounce Back Much Faster Than Thought, Researchers Say www.nytimes.com/2026/04/21/c...

⭐EDITOR'S CHOICE⭐ The Multi-Agency Ground Plot database: a repository for pan-Canadian forest ground plot data [Data Paper] 🍁🌎 ✒️Araya et al.🔗 https://ow.ly/M0eC50YJYxV 📷Araya et al. Fig. 2 #OpenAccess #ForestEcology #Data #🌱

A new Venezuelan mining law is under fire for lacking rigorous protections. Critics argue the policy will accelerate the destruction of the Amazon despite its "ecological" branding. Experts argue that as the government seeks capital, the threat to biodiversity and human rights continues to grow.

Intact #tropical #forests 🌴🌴 can buffer hot and dry extremes 🌞 by >6°C. When do recovering #secondary forests recover this capability? New paper Felicity Newell et al. in Agricult Forest Meteorol #forestecol #restoration #climate @jocotoco.bsky.social www.reassembly.de/news/how-muc...

U.S. Forest Service unveils extensive closures of research facilities | Science | AAAS www.science.org/content/arti...

The US Forest Service. This is madness. Illegal, obviously. But madness even if it weren’t. WTAF morethanjustparks.substack.com/p/breaking-t...

Global Change Biology | Environmental Change Journal | Wiley Online Library onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... 2024 was one of the worst years in history with record-breaking levels of CO2, droughts and high temperatures.

A single tropical tree can create as much cooling as several air conditioners, and across forests can cool a whole region.

The thermophilisation rate of plant communities in response to global warming is 5 times faster on alpine summits than in forests or grasslands across 🇪🇺 This finding corroborates former findings on the greater likelihood for upslope than poleward range shifts of plants 🌳🌲☘️🌾🪻🌼 shorturl.at/gc0TJ

Climate models may be underestimating the impact of deforestation on Amazon rainfall. New research indicates that since 1980, forest clearing has led to an 11% decline in precipitation, potentially allowing critical rainfall thresholds to be crossed much sooner than current climate models predict.👇️

The Amazon rainforest was hit with two severe droughts during 2023–2024. Models suggest that just over half the forest will not recover within seven years, which is the maximum time between droughts in recent decades. In PNAS: https://ow.ly/BKQ150YySOw

‘Continuity over novelty’: why environmental science needs to rethink its focus www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Satellite data and AI analysis indicate that Amazon wildfire carbon emissions in 2024 may be up to three times higher than previous estimates, impacting climate models and carbon budgets. doi.org/hbttb3

New paper in PNAS that came out today: Unprecedented Amazonian rainforests damage during the 2023–2024 droughts. Read our paper for details: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

El Niño is coming, and it is shaping up to be a big one. Over at The Climate Brink I've put together a compilation of the latest forecasts by different modeling groups. They suggest that we might see an event comparable in strength to what we saw in 2016: www.theclimatebrink....

Over four decades, tree richness across the Andes and Amazon has shifted unevenly. Some regions are losing species while others, like the northern Andes, are gaining. Researchers say precipitation and forest fragmentation drive the trend, and limiting deforestation could help protect diversity.

Global Warming Has Accelerated Significantly - Foster - 2026 - Geophysical Research Letters - Wiley Online Library agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

The future of Europe’s forest disturbance regimes– a thread. Tl, dr: Disturbances from wildfire, bark beetles & wind will continue to increase in the coming decades. Under unabated climate change disturbances could more than double by 2100. New paper out in @science.org doi.org/10.1126/scie...

An international team led by researchers at TUM has calculated how disturbances could transform Europe’s forests by 2100: www.tum.de/en/news-and-...

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... Liana cutting accelerates tropical forest recovery at a fraction of the cost of tree planting

landcarbonlab.org/insights/agr... "...the world lost as much as 95 million ha of non-forest natural ecosystems, including grasslands, savannas and wetlands, to annual crops between 2005-2020, roughly four times the amount of forest that was lost to annual crops and pasture over the same period..."

Fabaceae emerge as amongst the most embolism-resistant tree families in Amazonia. Forests in the Brazilian and Guiana Shield regions, where Fabaceae abundance is high, are expected to have greater drought resistance than Western Amazon forests.

Large-scale patterns of tropical forest embolism resistance mapped across space and angiosperm phylogeny. Combining measurements across the Amazon with 100s of floristic samples, Julia Tavares & colleagues report remarkable variation in vulnerability to drought. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Intact tropical forests are seeing mysterious bird declines. Is another “silent spring” brewing? Learn more: https://scim.ag/4aCs0Er

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.... "...Our results show signals of an early-stage forest functional transformation that could reduce forest productivity and carbon uptake, increase vulnerability to fire, and diminish biodiversity..."

Ecophysiology for climate-smart forest management #TansleyReview by Gessler et al. @wslresearch.bsky.social @arthurobuntspecht.bsky.social @annekempel.bsky.social @josegruenzweig.bsky.social nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... #plantscience

🌳💧The Brazilian Legal Amazon region delivers rainfall generation worth US$20 ± 7 billion annually, with each meter squared of forest contributing 300 L of water per year. @universityofleeds.bsky.social 👉Read more here: www.nature.com/articles/s43...

Why long-term science is needed in a short term world. www.nature.com/articles/s44...

New study shows that historical #deforestation has substantially altered regional #precipitation over the southern #Amazon basin, with #climate models underestimating this effect. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Increasing tree mortality over time in Australian forests www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Climate warming is generally making trees grow faster, but the greater effect is that tree growth is becoming more unpredictable, creating a threat to the stability of forests. New paper by Li & He (2026). 🧪🌏🌐🌲🌳