Sarah K. French

York University

The matrix, an environment in the landscape that individuals move through but do not reside in, can affect species dispersal and the arrival of individuals at habitat patches. Elements around this matrix that provide refuge or resources may shape the arrival of animals at habitat patches, even when those patches are equivalent in quality. Adult dra...

• The land cover between habitats (i.e. matrix environment) can affect connectivity by impacting organismal movement. Many animals, however, have preferences for specific matrix environments, which can affect their movement through the landscape. • We examined how different terrestrial matrix environments impacted the fine‐scale movement of adult d...

The mechanisms structuring aquatic communities across environmental gradients are often difficult to distinguish from one another and can produce similar patterns of species distributions. In freshwater systems, the amount of canopy cover from surrounding trees is often associated with transitions in local community structure. These community chang...

The factors influencing the habitat requirements and dispersal of juvenile Unionidae (unionids) between post-larval detachment from a fish host and burrowing into the substratum are largely unknown, although bed shear stress (τw) has been proposed as a critical factor. We used a laboratory wall jet apparatus to manipulate τw experimentally to exami...