Old Field Succession

Old fields are particularly useful study systems, especially when their history is well known. They are also becoming increasingly abundant as agricultural areas and pastures are abandoned in North America. A portion of my master's thesis involved assessing changes in relative abundance of native and exotic species in an old field experiment in Southern Illinois. I used data collected over a span of approximately 20 years to assess how fertilization and mowing affected an old field. I remain broadly interested in how plant communities develop and change over time.

Martinez KA, Gibson DJ, Middleton BA (2015) Core-satellite species hypothesis and native versus exotic species in secondary succession. Plant Ecology, 216: 419-427.
Martinez et al. 2015