16 August - 1pm - Zoology Museum
José V. Roces-Díaz (Swansea University, UK)
Native or introduced by humans? Using species distribution modelling to analyze Sweet chestnut dynamics in Western Europe
My main research topics are a mixture of landscape and forest ecology, and I find interesting to analyze how the forests and their ecosystem services area distributed, and how we can use this information on landscape planning and natural resources management. In this sense, Sweet Chestnut (Castanea sativa: one of the most relevant forests trees of my home country region Asturias, NW Spain) is often classified as a “non-native species” and its origin discussed between scientific community, foresters, etc. For this reasons, we use a “species distribution modelling” approach to analyze its suitable areas in Europe since the Last Glacial Maximum until today. We have tried to confirm (or reject) if, as some authors found (based on pollen and genetic data), this tree had (glacial) refugia in Western Europe and can be classified a native species in this area.
Jessica Minett (Swansea University, UK)
Brown trout in the Falkland Islands: ecology, population structure and genetic diversity.
Brown trout (Salmo trutta) were introduced to the Falkland Islands on several occasions during the 1940-50’s, mainly for recreational fishing. Since, there has been a marked decline in the native freshwater fish fauna, which consists of only three species of galaxiid fishes, endemic to the Southern Hemisphere (zebra trout Aplochiton zebra, Aplochiton taeniatus, and the Falklands minnow Galaxias maculatus). Given the threats to the long-term conservation of the native galaxiids, detailed knowledge about the life history, movement ecology of brown trout and their overlap and interactions with the native species is urgently needed.
