This week, after full three years, we finished an independent project of Jan Kollross. The size of the saplings and the length of the experiment reminded me, that many of the students are heading towards final years of their PhD. In this experiment, Honza was surveying top-down and bottom up forces via removal of predators and fertilization. Now, as the leaves started to drop, we surveyed the final herbivory damage and moved all the saplings back to campus. Big thanks got to all who helped to carry all the saplings in buckets, clean up the forest and make thus a final dot after this experiment. We hope the paper will be out for submission before the end of the year.

In the mean time, we are still managing our larger experiments in Papua. Namely, Cassey manages our drought plots for a year already, and he is getting ready for next resurvey of its effect. At the same time, Kore got permits to travel to country so he will kick out the final sampling of our ERC BABE project there. Just after he finished the three weeks of compulsory quarantine, during which he has to submit his first manuscript.