Dr Chris Preston

Dr Chris Preston

Botanist, Biological Records Centre

Centre for Ecology & Hydrology
Maclean Building
Benson Lane
Crowmarsh Gifford
Wallingford
Oxfordshire
OX10 8BB
T: +44 (0)1491 838800
F: +44 (0)1491 692424
E-mail: Dr Chris Preston
 

Research background

My research interests have been shaped by my job as botanist at the Biological Records Centre since 1980, and my professional and personal involvement with the recording activities of the Botanical Society of the British Isles and the British Bryological Society. Much of my work has been done in collaboration with these societies, and with colleagues such as Mark Hill (BRC), Richard Gornall (University of Leicester) and David Pearman (BSBI).

Current research interests

  • Biogeography of British and Irish vascular plants and bryophytes
  • Changes in the distribution of British vascular plants and bryophytes in historical and recent times
  • Developing plant attribute databases for use in ecological analyses
  • Taxonomy and distribution of aquatic plants in Europe
  • The genus Potamogeton in Europe (especially Britain, Ireland and Norden): taxonomy, molecular systematics, population genetics and ecology
  • Alien plants: their spread, their effects and our perceptions of them
  • Distribution and ecology of arable bryophyes

 

 

Selected publications

Please see the NERC Open Research Archive for recent publications.

2004 and earlier

BATES, J.W., ROY, D.B. & PRESTON, C.D. (2004). Occurrence of epiphytic bryophytes in a 'tetrad' transect across southern Britain. 2. Analysis and modelling of epiphyte-environment relationships. Journal of Bryology, 26, 181-197.

CHURCH, J.M., HODGETTS, N.G., PRESTON, C.D. & STEWART, N.F. (2001). British Red Data Books: mosses and liverworts. Peterborough: Joint Nature Conservation Committee.

FANT, J.B. & PRESTON, C.D. (2004). Genetic structure and morphological variation of British populations of the hybrid Potamogeton x salicfolius. Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society, 144, 99-111.

FANT, J.B., KAMAU, E.M. & PRESTON, C.D. (2003). Chloroplast evidence for the multiple origins of the hybrid Potamogeton x sudermanicus Hagstr. Aquatic Botany, 75, 531-356.

HILL, M.O., PRESTON, C.D. & ROY, D.B. (2004) PLANTATT - attributes of British and Irish Plants: status, size, life history, geography and habitats. Huntingdon: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology.

KING, R.A., GORNALL, R.J., PRESTON, C.D. & CROFT, J.M. (2002). Population differentiation of Potamogeton pectinatus in the Baltic Sea with reference to waterfowl dispersal. Molecular Ecology, 11, 1947-1956.

PRESTON, C.D. (2000). Engulfed by suburbia or destroyed by the plough: the ecology of extinction in Middlesex and Cambridgeshire. Watsonia, 23, 59-81.

PRESTON, C.D. (2002). 'Babingtonia pestifera' - the explosive spread of Elodea canadensis and its intellectual reverberations. Nature in Cambridgeshire, 44, 40-49.

PRESTON, C.D. (2002). Approaches to native and alien species. Transactions of the Suffolk Naturalists Society, 38, 37-48.

PRESTON, C.D. (2003). Perceptions of change in English county floras, 1660-1960. Watsonia, 24, 287-304.

PRESTON, C.D. & HILL, M.O. (2000). The geographical relationships of the British and Irish flora: a comparison of pteridophytes, flowering plants, liverworts and mosses. Journal of Biogeography, 26, 629-642.

PRESTON, C.D., PEARMAN, D.A. & DINES, T.D. (2002). New atlas of the British and Irish flora. Oxford: University Press.

PRESTON, C.D., PEARMAN, D.A. & HALL, A.R. (2004). Archaeophytes in Britain. Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society, 145, 257-294.

PRESTON, C.D., SHEAIL, J., ARMITAGE, P.D. & DAVY-BOWKER, J. (2003). The long-term impact of urbanisation on aquatic plants: Cambridge and the River Cam. Science of the Total Environment, 314-316, 67-87.

PRESTON, C.D., TELFER, M.G., ARNOLD, H.R., CAREY, P.D., COOPER, J.M., DINES, T.D., HILL, M.O., PEARMAN, D.A., ROY, D.B. & SMART, S.M. (2002). The changing flora of the UK. London: DEFRA.

TELFER, M.G., PRESTON, C.D. & ROTHERY, P. (2002). A general method for the calculation of relative change in range size from biological atlas data. Biological Conservation, 107, 99-109.