News and Opinion - British Ecological Society

Celebrating Pride Month 2024!

To celebrate this year’s pride month, our journals have invited contributors for a series of blog posts. This series aims to promote the visibility and inclusion of LGBTQIA+ researchers, with posts promoting them and their research.

<i>Functional Ecology</i> now a fully open access journal

Functional Ecology now a fully open access journal

Today we're pleased to announce that our journal, Functional Ecology, is moving to a fully open access publication.

Marine Protected Areas don’t line up with core habitats of rare migratory fish, finds new research

Nearly two thirds of Marine Protected Areas designated to protect rare migratory fish are outside of their core habitats.

British Ecological Society announces journal prize winners

ECR Prize Winners: Announcing the 2023 recipients of the Early Career Researcher (ECR) prizes, awarded for the best papers by early career researchers in seven BES journals.

International Day of Forests 2024

Celebrating the UN’s International Day of Forests! Let’s take a deep dive into the significance of forests to our planet and communities, and highlight some innovative new methods being used to conserve these important environments.

Livestock guardian dogs create landscape of fear for predators

Livestock Guardian Dogs change predator behaviour in ways that both protect livestock and support conservation efforts.

Diverse forests are best at standing up to storms

Forests that are most resilient to storms have a greater diversity of tree species and are dominated by slow growing species.

AI tool helps ecologists monitor rare birds through their songs

Researchers have developed a new deep learning AI tool that generates life-like birdsongs to train bird identification tools, helping ecologists to monitor rare species in the wild.

Research on coral reefs is biased, according to new study

How is academic colonialism affecting publishing about coral reefs?

Loud music festivals could reduce bat activity in some species by nearly 50%

Loud music playback alone at UK music festivals is enough to cause significant disturbance to bats.

New coral reef restoration approach utilises common investment strategy

Just like forest restoration, coral reef restoration requires more than just fast growing species.

Warming climate could turn ocean plankton microbes into carbon emitters

New research finds that a warming climate could flip globally abundant microbial communities from carbon sinks to carbon emitters, potentially triggering climate change tipping points.

Welcoming our new BES journal Associate Editors

The British Ecological Society journals are delighted to announce 148 new Associate Editors who have joined the Editorial Boards following our latest open call.

Cambridge wildflower meadow boosts biodiversity, says new study

Examining the effects of planting a wildflower meadow in the historic grounds of King’s College, Cambridge

Lockdowns revealed the British wildlife most at risk of becoming roadkill

Researchers find that badgers, foxes and pheasants benefitted the most from reduced traffic traffic UK lockdowns.