It seems surprising to me that as you glance over the current issues of the most popular science journals, very little is done about plants in general, let alone plant ecology. Of course, I look through the Journal of Plant Ecology and that’s all it is. But, very few of those experiments are natural experiments. There is such a heavy focus on manipulations and complex experimental designs the natural experiments seem to get lost in them.
For about 8 months, there have been three issues of Bioscience sitting on the coffee table in our lab. I was feeling very “blog-uninspired” today and thought –what the heck, I might as well flip through these and see if there is anything I could use. The first article I came across had to do with Biodiversity losses and ecosystem function in freshwaters. My first thought was- nope and I turned the page. But what I found right in the middle of this article was a beautiful chart that outlined my whole entire idea for starting a blog about natural experiments. Needless to say I read this paper, and have some interesting things to report!
