Pollinators are essential for ecosystem structure, influencing plant community structure and ecosystem health. Pollinators inhabiting alpine environments face considerable challenges that affect their survival and reproduction. This is because alpine environments are characterized by their cold climate, long periods of snow coverage and highly dynamic weather fluctuations. This presents a fundamental challenge to pollinators present in mountain ecosystems. Pollinator communities in cold environments need to be well adapted to low temperatures, and those species that persist have evolved unique cold-tolerant life history traits enabling their survival and reproductive success in these demanding environments. As a result, alpine pollinators communities are unique and are quite distinct from those found in warmer climates. Alpine environments offer the perfect study system to study the impact of temperature on pollinator activity, due to dynamic weather fluctuations and changes in climate across elevation gradients. Unfortunately, alpine environments are also especially at risk from climate change. We’re already seeing evidence of increasing temperatures, reduced periods of snow coverage and earlier onset of snow melt. Now more than ever, it’s important to understand how pollinators respond to changes in temperature in these cold environments. My research explores how these small, highly mobile organisms persist in Australia's mountain by studying how temperature affects pollinators across multiple scales—from long-term climatic trends to daily weather fluctuations to the fine-scale microclimates within individual flowers.

About the Speaker

Josh is a pollination ecologist with a passion for the often-overlooked animals that live in hard to reach places. Whether flipping logs, chasing bees, or peering into flowers, his research explores the hidden lives of invertebrates. With a lifelong interest in critters, he’s dedicated to fostering appreciation for insects and helping others see the beauty in the small and the strange.