Degradation of ecosystems and introductions of invasive species pose a threat to global biodiversity. Ecosystem restoration and revegetation actions are important for amending habitat loss and for the protection of species of plants and animals. Iceland ...

Pollinator communities have an integral role in facilitating sexual reproduction within and between flowering plant populations. Declines in abundance and diversity of pollinating insects are widely documented throughout Europe, primarily the result ...

Bumblebees (Bombus spp.) are pollinators of especially high conservation interest. They have behaviours (pollen-gathering, buzz pollination), morphological structures (branched body hairs well-adapted for retaining pollen), and endothermic capabilities, ...

Barley is of great importance in modern agriculture and is currently the fourth most important cereal after wheat, maize, and rice. It is well adapted to a range of climatic and day-length conditions, with a distribution from Ethiopia to northern ...

Genetic parameters for carcass conformation, carcass fat, ultrasound eye muscle depth and ultrasound fat depth over eye muscle were estimated with data from Icelandic farms during three periods, 2001-2003, 2006-2008 and 2011-2013. Heritability ranged ...

Particulate matter mass concentrations and size fractions of PM1, PM2.5, PM4, PM10, and PM15 measured in transversal horizontal profile of two dust storms in southwestern Iceland are presented. Images from a camera network were used to estimate the ...

In the last decades, several endangered breeds of livestock species have been re-established effectively. However, the successful revival of the Dutch and Danish Landrace goats involved crossing with exotic breeds and the ancestry of the current ...

The Icelandic goat is an indigenous breed, descendant of goats brought to Iceland by Nordic and Celtic settlers in the 9th century (Adalsteinsson 1981). The population is estimated to have been below 1000 individuals for centuries and critically ...

Past volcanic eruptions in Iceland have sometimes led to long-distance distribution of fine volcanic tephra (volcanic ash). Evidence for volcanic ash from, for example, the ca. 4250 BP eruption in Hekla (H4) and the 1783-1784 AD Laki eruption in southern ...

Iceland has the largest area of volcaniclastic sandy desert on Earth or 22,000 km2. The sand has been mostly produced by glacio-fluvial processes, leaving behind fine-grained unstable sediments which are later re-distributed by repeated aeolian events. ...