Zoe Xirocostas

Three researchers walking through dense fog on an alpine herbfield, one carrying a 1x1m gridded quadrat.

Two researchers conducting fieldwork on an alpine grassland under a blue sky, with mountain ranges visible in the background.

Four researchers setting up experimental equipment on an alpine grassland, with mountain ranges and an overcast sky in the background.

🔥🌿We simulated heatwaves on alpine plant communities at Mt Hotham, Australia, and found no effect on survival, diversity, or reproduction. Heat alone might not be the main threat, as high rainfall may have helped plants tolerate heat stress.
📄 doi.org/10.1016/j.ec...

Finally, standardised protocols for measuring reproductive plant traits! This handbook covers 58 traits across flowers, fruits, seeds & seedlings. Designed for global applicability across diverse ecosystems and enables large-scale research 🌼
📖 buff.ly/TcagpiT

A Christmas lesson from plant ecology: why plants like holly and mistletoe may not be as well defended as we think Christmas is a time of expectations, when we assume that familiar traditions will work as they always have. Some traditions are associated with plants such as holly and mistletoe. In ecology, we ma…

A Christmas lesson from plant ecology: why plants like holly and mistletoe may not be as well defended as we think:

jeffollerton.co.uk/2025/12/24/a...

Merry Christmas everyone!

#ecology #biodiversity #Christmas

In poor taste: leaf palatability traits are not correlated with aboveground enemy release - Oecologia Many species experience less pressure from herbivores, predators, or pathogens in their introduced range than in their native range. This phenomenon, known as enemy release, is one explanation for the...

Nice way to wrap up 2025 🎓🌱 Published the final paper from my PhD!

Across Europe & Australia, we found that common leaf defence traits don’t predict enemy release in introduced plants. A reminder that invasion success may hinge on factors we’re still missing.

📄 link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Excited to be in Edinburgh for #BES2025 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

If you’re around please come say hi tonight at my poster A4.21 👋

It was a big week for team AJB at #ESA2025! From the @csiropublishing.bsky.social stall to dinner tables, Social Media Editors/Guest Editors/Co-Editors in Chief caught up with colleagues to discuss all things ecology and publishing 🌱

Bundanon - An art museum embedded in the landscape Bundanon is a place for research, creativity and connection to living cultures.

So excited to hear that Olivia De La Mare, an MSc student in my research group, has won the 2026 Bundanon Ecological Researcher in Residence award. Science meets art, well done Liv!
www.bundanon.com.au

Excited for the week ahead in Adelaide at #ESA2025! Started off slightly earlier than most as the Board got together to strategise at our annual Planning Day yesterday. Love working with such amazing and passionate people 💚

Currently listening to: the snap, crackle and pop of ballistic seed dispersal 🎶 💥

A large green caterpillar with yellow stripe-like markings and small spikes covering its body. It is perched upside down on a stem and its tail appears like a second head.

Look at this monstrous beauty!!! Double headed hawk moth caterpillar 🐛 .. good luck with the metamorphosis buddy

Me too :)

Thanks Issy :)

A person amongst grass-like vegetation putting small bags on plants to collect seeds.

An image of a mesh bag placed over a shrub with spiky leaves. A label on the bag reads “DO NOT REMOVE - RESEARCH”.

A flannel flower with white petals and a small beetle sitting in the middle of the inflorescence.

Two brown hemipterans mating with their abdomens touching. They are standing on top of a bright green leaf.

Some snaps from the field today in Heathcote National Park on Dharawal land 🌱

A striking orchid flower with green and burgundy petals and a distinctive dark red-brown labellum (lip) covered in fine, hair-like projections. The flower grows on a slender green stem among tall grass-like foliage, with a soft, blurred natural background.

Saw a red beardie yesterday (YES that's really one of its common names!!!) - or for the scientifically inclined, Calochilus paludosus🧔‍♂️❗

Ahh thanks for letting me know Ros!

Spotted this big fella while teaching in the Blue Mountains with @ecologybrad.bsky.social

Awesome! Congrats Suz and team!

You nailed it Inna! Thanks for sharing your research with us. Our students wouldn’t stop raving about your seminar afterward :)

🐝🌸 With climate change, many organisms are shifting their ranges, but some are shifting in the opposite direction to what we expect.
Insightful and entertaining seminar by Inna Osmolovsky @innaosmol.bsky.social on "Climate Change and Shifting Interactions: Where Do Species Go from Here?"

It was such an honour to present my research at UTS! Thank you to @zoexiro.bsky.social and @ecologybrad.bsky.social for the invitation and to everyone who came to listen to my talk 🌿

🌱 New research from The Australian PlantBank reveals how 4 threatened Australian Grevillea species respond to temperature changes. Good news, 3 species show resilience to future warming, but G. iaspicula prefers cooler conditions & may struggle with climate change.

Read more 🔗 buff.ly/b4pbbgv

The "living fossil" Wollemi pine🌲can self-fertilise! New research from #CharlesSturtUni shows this critically endangered conifer produces viable seeds without cross-pollination - which helps explain their low genetic diversity in natural systems 🧬

Open access paper 🔗 buff.ly/l3yG5Rt

Spent the past month in Greece 🇬🇷 on holiday and visiting family. But surprised to see so many reminders of Aus (Eucalypts) planted on so many islands! (could they be contributing to the wildfires Greece is being ravaged by? So many questions!)

Images of the chamber and active heating system. (a) Annotated detail image of the heating system, electrical components, and chambers (not to scale). Field photos from Mt. Hotham, VIC, Australia (Case study 1): (b) two polycarbonate chambers attached via black ducting to one heating system under a tarpaulin for protection from the weather; and (c) side view of a chamber with its semi-enclosed, overhanging lid with adjustable portholes, circulating fans, and Stevenson screen housing thermocouples. (d) Field photo from Perisher Valley, NSW, Australia (Case study 2). The heating system attached to three chambers showing improved insulative ducting and open tent protecting and ventilating the heating system. Note that chamber lids are transparent like the chamber sides but appear grey due to reflections of cloud cover.

📖Published📖

Arnold et al. propose a design that will allow ecologists to simulate more realistic heat events in the field by combining a controllable convection heater system with a semi-enclosed chamber with adjustable vents 🌍 🧪

buff.ly/k2GJSA2

A HIDDEN SABOTEUR: Pilostyles hamiltoniorum is a parasitic plant that lives INSIDE its host, only revealing itself through tiny flowers on the stems.
New research shows this endoparasite slashes flower production by 52% in its host plants, despite being almost invisible!
OA paper ➡️ buff.ly/gArS9tO

Hot off the press 🌱🔥

A fire in dry sclerophyll forest in the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney (New South Wales, Australia).

🔥🌱 From the #AJB Special Issue: “Understanding novel #fire regimes using plant trait‐based approaches" 🌱🔥

Toward a macroevolutionary understanding of live-leaf flammability in plant species of fire-prone #forests

By @ecologybrad.bsky.social, @zoexiro.bsky.social, et al.

doi.org/10.1002/ajb2...

Congrats Inna! and thank you for the invitation to collaborate :)

Counterintuitive Range Shifts May Be Explained by Climate Induced Changes in Biotic Interactions Climate change is expected to drive species uphill, poleward or into deeper waters. Yet many are shifting in toward the equator, downhill or to shallower waters, which is opposite to the expected dir...

🌎 My first paper is out in @globalchangebio.bsky.social ! We propose the Interaction Opportunists Hypothesis: changes in biotic interactions may drive species downhill, equatorward, or to shallower waters under #ClimateChange. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... #RangeShifts #Ecology

This title 🤌