Blake Dawson

What better way to finish the week then submitting my PhD thesis and having a few drinks to celebrate 🥳

Can non-floral resources on farms enhance pollinator diversity and abundance, and does this lead to increased yield? In our new paper, we experimentally test this idea with a focus on fly biodiversity sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

It's easy to assume that any insect visiting a flower is a pollinator. But not all visitors are effective pollinators, even if you successfully attract large numbers into fields. @Bio_blake does a great job showing this in his new paper below: 🪰 sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

Happy to announce that today I have started a new position as a postdoctoral research associate at Michigan State University. Looking forward to working on insect IPM and climate change, though it might take me a while to get use to this cold ❄️

New paper out! Does the culling of large herbivores have any indirect impacts on other species? Yes, we found ground-dwelling beetle populations were negatively impacted after the culling of sika deer on Nakajima Island in Japan. academic.oup.com/ee/advance-art…

I'm excited to share that I published a first version of my Statistics 4 Ecologists book with University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing. You can now download a (FREE) pdf version of the book here: conservancy.umn.edu/handle/11299/2…

New paper out! We discuss the need for a multidisciplinary approach to postmortem interval research, and introduce a new conceptual framework that highlights the multiple interdependencies affecting decomposition. link.springer.com/article/10.100…

Our new paper on crop-pollinating flies has been published! We reviewed 431 fly species found globally & compiled their diets and habitat needs into a freely-accessible database. @ESAApplications zenodo.org/record/7827128 doi.org/10.1002/eap.28… @rominatwi @ManuSaunders

@JtdFinch @JPE12328968 @jimpelaJMC @amymariegilpin Great work! Very interesting about M. bengalensis and surrounding landscapes. I also found them on mango flowers in north QLD, but nowhere near as abundant as what you observed.

Did you know that some fruit growers place dead fish in their orchards to encourage blow flies as pollinators? Our new paper, published in @JPE12328968 set out to determine if it actually works! @jimpelaJMC @amymariegilpin pollinationecology.org/index.php/jpe/… a short thread... 1/n

New paper! Invertebrates are the backbone of rainforest ecosystems. But how genetically diverse are their populations? link.springer.com/article/10.100…

What is an ephemeral resource patch? How do their dynamics drive evolution and shape ecosystems? We discuss these questions in our new review! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/br…

Captured some nat geo level footage of Green Tree Ants (Oecophylla smaragdina) creating an ant bridge at Wooroonooran National Park, very cool behavior!

@ElineMarieS We certainly got a good work out from moving it around

@Bio_blake Oh our beloved scaffolding in the bush ;)

Final PhD chapter has just been published! We compared different decomposition metrics on pig and human cadavers. We also devised a unique method to measure mass loss by using a converted scaffold unit. bit.ly/3l3GgeJ

Ch. rufifacies are hairy maggots that often act as facultative predators. Watch as a small mass of Ch. rufifacies maggots feed upon a smooth C. stygia maggot.

New research out! We explored how coexistence is achieved between two blowfly species, Chrysomya rufifacies and Calliphora stygia. We found coexistence was dependent on priority effects and larval densities @Butterworthbugs bit.ly/3MP8oOv

New paper out! I’m very excited about this publication, it’s been a long time coming. We investigated the sublethal impact of two commonly used #pesticides on #CentralBeardedDragons.(1/2) @UOW_CSES @uowresearch @frenchkris007 #newresearch #ecotoxicology #lizards #ecology #phdchat

@alisonhaynes1 The x axis is total body score (TBS), which is a measure of decomposition progress that incorporates time. I made the figure in R so happy to share code or advice!

@Bio_blake OK. So the x axis is time? It's cool visualisation and giving me ideas about my moss establishment studies.

New paper out! We investigated the relationship between insect abundance patterns and carrion resource quality. Our findings show how resource quality may drive competition and variation in carrion insect community succession. link.springer.com/article/10.100…

@alisonhaynes1 Thanks Alison. The squares represent changes in abundance over the course of the decomposition process, with all the carcasses pooled together. The darker the colour, the higher the abundance.

@Bio_blake Nice figures! What does each square represent? Is it a carcus?