Current Research

I am a plant ecologist with an interest in freshwater and invasion ecology - from both an applied and theoretical perspective. I'm working with Brendan Wintle and Peter Vesk on a project that aims to predict hotspots (and coldspots) of exotic plant invasion. Funded by AEDA and the Australian Weeds Research Council, we're assessing whether propagule pressure and abiotic characteristics can be used to predict habitats and areas susceptible to plant invasion using Victoria as the first case study. I'm also involved with the National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility (NCCARF) Water Resources and Freshwater Biodiversity network (Victorian node) that assess climate change impacts on aquatic biodiversity and ecosystem health.

I finished my PhD in 2008 and was supervised by Barbara Downes in the Geography department, University of Melbourne. I examined factors that influence plant community composition and exotic invasion in floodplain wetlands along the regulated Murray River, south-eastern Australia. My project was supported by CSIRO Land and Water and the CRC for Australian Weed Management. In 2006, I spent three months in Sweden working with Christer Nilsson's research group at Umea University. Before my PhD, I worked as an environmental consultant on freshwater-based projects (Ecological Engineering Pty Ltd). As an undergraduate student, I worked for the CRC for Catchment Hydrology, the CRC for Freshwater Ecology and at the Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies (CRES) and Integrated Catchment and Management at the Australian National University. I completed a BA, BSc (Hons) from Monash University in 2003.

My background is rivers-based. I have worked in rural and urban environments, on regulated and unregulated river systems in Australia and internationally. I remain interested in freshwater and water resource management, but am also fascinated by invasion ecology (and the two certainly aren't mutually exclusive!). By altering community composition, invasion operates as a real-life, uncontrolled experiment in community assembly. As such, it can offer insight into landscape, succession and community ecology, and conservation biology. Invasion also poses a major threat to the integrity of ecosystems - better understanding will hopefully lead to more effective management.

I have acted as a reviewer for: Journal of Ecology; Journal of Applied Ecology; Austral Ecology; Biological Conservation; Perspectives in Plant Ecology, Evolution and Systematics; Diversity & Distributions; Health Promotion International.

Publications

Catford, J.A., Jansson, R. & Nilsson, C. (2009) Reducing redundancy in invasion ecology by integrating hypotheses into a single theoretical framework. Diversity and Distributions 15: 22-40.

Catford, J.A. (2008) Plant community composition and exotic invasion in Murray River wetlands: the effect of river regulation, propagule pressure and abiotic conditions, PhD thesis, University of Melbourne.

Catford, J.A., Walsh, C.J. & Beardall, J. (2007) Catchment urbanization increases benthic microalgal biomass in streams under controlled light conditions. Aquatic Sciences 69: 511-522.

Catford, J. (2006) Ecohydrology: Vegetation Function, Water and Resource Management [Book review]. Austral Ecology 31: 1028-1029.

Catford, J.A. (2002) The effect of urbanization and irradiance on stream microphytobenthos, Honours thesis, Monash University.

In preparation:

Kyle, G., Catford, J.A. & Leishman, M. (in prep.) ''Invasive species'' in Vegetation of Australia's Riverine Landscapes: Biology, Ecology & Management, Eds. Capon, S.J., James, C. & Reid, M., CSIRO Publishing.

Catford, J.A., Downes, B.J. & Gippel, C. (in prep.) ''River regulation and human introduction facilitates exotic plant invasion in Murray River wetlands'' for submission to Journal of Applied Ecology.

Catford, J.A. & Downes, B.J. (in prep.) ''Multi-scale studies can suggest drivers of exotic plant invasion'' for submission to Diversity and Distributions.

Conference proceedings:

Catford, J.A., Jansson, R. & Nilsson, C. (2008) ''Reducing redundancy in invasion ecology by integrating hypotheses into a single theoretical framework.'' 33^rd Ecological Society of Australia Annual Conference, Sydney, Australia.

Catford, J.A., Jansson, R. & Nilsson, C. (2008) ''Integrating hypotheses of invasion ecology into a single framework reduces theoretical redundancy and can guide research''. 51^st Annual Symposium of the International Association for Vegetation Science, Stellenbosch, South Africa.

Catford, J.A. (2007) ''Arrowhead: Biology and Ecology.'' Arrowhead Symposium, Murray Darling Basin Commission, Albury, Australia.

Catford, J.A. & Downes, B.J. (2007) ''Weed invasion in ephemeral floodplain wetlands along the Murray River, south-eastern Australia: a consequence of river regulation?'' 9^th International Conference on the Ecology and Management of Alien Plant Invasions, Perth, Australia.

Catford, J.A. & Downes, B.J. (2007) ''Weed invasion in ephemeral floodplain wetlands along the Murray River, south-eastern Australia: a consequence of river regulation?'' Third International Symposium on Riverine Landscape, South Stradbroke Island, Australia.

Catford, J.A. & Downes, B.J. (2006) ''Response of native and exotic plant species to changes in flooding regimes of wetlands along the Murray River, Australia.'' International Conference on Riverine Hydroecology: Advances in Research and Applications, Stirling, Scotland.