Nice diversity among my different Quercus pubescens genotypes from 1) Pfynwald, Switzerland; 2) Crete, Greece; 3) Barcelona, Spain. 4) is Quercus infectoria ssp veneris from Polis, Cyprus (the massive ones next to the pub) which are growing unexpected fast.

After a month of more rain, trees and shrubs are starting to have crispy leaves again. Lets see how far they will dry out during the next few days, and whether there will be enough rain comming next week to make them recover. I doubt that there is a future for most native tree species

Hiking on the Azores is often hiking through novel ecosystems with probably over 90% introduced plant species. Likely the future of many regions until the end of this century due to the expected strong missmatch between the climatic conditions and the bioclimatic envelope of the native species

First signes of early #drought are visible on trees and shrubs in a forest close to my hometown. While the current (~25mm) rain helped for sure, this water will already soon be evapotranspirated based on weather projections. Lets see how severe the drought will hit during the comming months

Only few people know that we have (introduced) wild cacti in Switzerland. Today, I was finally able to visit Opuntia phaeacantha and O. mesacantha in Sion, Valais. I wonder if the native lizarsds are also eating and disperse them as the lizards on the Canary Islands do

Update of my little oak nursery with seedlings of Quercus pubescens from Pfynwald/Switzerland, Barcelona, and Crete, as well as Quercus calliprinos from Crete and Quercus infectoria ssp veneris from Cyprus

A nice variability between the seedlings of Quercus pubescens from Pfynwald/Switzerland, Barcelona/Spain, and Crete/Greece. Looking forward to test how they cope with heat stress above 40°C

I really love to collect seeds of rare and/or species that are often not included in studies, so I can grow them by myself and use them in my future experiments
#plantscience #botany #plantphysiology #oaks #quercus

Look at these amazing Quercus infectoria subsp. veneris with huge acorns, looking similar to the ones of ithaburensis. Closely related to Quercus pubescens and the other roburoids. Likely having important genes for introgressive adaptation of robur and petreae in Central and Western Europe

Despite being in charge to protect the potentially highly damaging effect of a dispersal of the pathogen in southern Europe (Myrtus communis, all Eucalyptus, etc.), they just replied in a conpletely plump and rather useless way. At least we know who will be responsible for a potential outbreak

I finally managed to find Quercus alnifolia, the endemic oak species of Cyprus. Amazing how similar it is to Quercus chrysolepis from California - oaks are the master of convergent evolution and evolve the same traits over and over again!
#botany #quercus #quercisalnifolia #plantscience

Argyranthemum teneriffae from high elevations of Tenerife looking good after the first snow. Fingers crossed it will survive this winter. Will try to hybridize it with Argyranthemum pinnatifidum from Madeira next year
#botany #plantscience #biogeography #plantecophysiology

Collected seeds of Quercus pubescens in south western Switzerland, Crete and Barcelona. Will be cool to see how they grow, and I am looking forward to use them in experiments :)also, I hope the ones from Barcelona are actually Q. pubescens!