Welcome!
We are a plant community ecology lab at the Department of Biological Sciences, at the University of Alberta, Canada.
We aim to understand why habitats become susceptible to invasive non-native plants and how management
actions, human pressure and environmental factors affect their biological components.
In the era of global change, we try to illuminate the biodiversity and functions of rare habitats that have been poorly studied.
We work across different habitat types but much of our work focuses on grasslands. These ecosystems cover a quarter of the
global terrestrial surface but face unprecedented and enormous pressure by farming,
non-native species, a disruption of natural disturbance regimes, and climate change.
Our research centres on western Canada, the adjacent US states, Europe and Central Asia and
we tackle our research questions through a comparative framework and data mining, field observations, and experiments.
Contact us
viktoria.wagner[at]ualberta[dot]ca
University of Alberta
Department of Biological Sciences
Biological Sciences Building
Edmonton, AB, T6G 2E9
Phone: 780 492-1208
Lab news
16 February 2024
Congratulations to Raytha for the acceptance of her PhD paper in the Journal of Applied Ecology!
15 February 2024
We are looking for a full-time, undergraduate summer field technician to help us with a field survey in southern Alberta (July 1 - Aug 15). Please send you application to Viktoria Wagner.
13 January 2024
Welcome to Danielle, our new BIOL 298 undergraduate research student this semester! Danielle will work on a seed project with Elk Island National Park.
19 December 2023
We are looking for an MSc student to join our Caragana project in September 2024. Apply by January 10, 2024. For more details see here
19 December 2023
Cedric's and Kateri's paper on the invasiveness of grasses was accepted in Oikos! Read it here
24 August 2023
Kaitlin received a Graduate Student Teaching Award! Well done, Kaitlin!
21 August 2023
Congratulations to Raytha for securing a McAfee Estate Scholarship Botany!
17 August 2023
Viktoria taught a new Field Botany course at our department. Thanks to: Shelby (Vinebrook lab) for TA support, City of Edmonton and Edmonton & Area Land Trust, Leduc county, Alberta Native Plant Council for permissions, Patsy Cotterill (plant lists, discussions), and the course participants for being awesome students!
31 August 2023
Martin, Tia and Jake finished their Caragana field sampling season. Stay tuned for future publications from our lab on Caragana invasiveness! Great work, team!