Dr. Oliver L. Pescott

My research currently focuses on the design of a new national plant monitoring scheme (see also https://www.npms.org.uk) that will fill the gap between professional wider countryside surveys and the ‘Atlas’-style information on plant distributions collected by volunteer recorders. This recent paper provides more background on the philosophy and practice of 'citizen science' plant recording in Britain and Ireland to date. I am also interested in the use of novel analytical methods that allow disparate types of information on plant abundances and distributions at different scales to be combined into a predictive framework for predicting plant abundances across unsurveyed sites.

I also work within the Biological Records Centre where I support the use of plant species occurrence data in ecological research. Linked to this, I am currently joint-Recording Secretary of the British Bryological Society (BBS) recording scheme. In this role I promote the use of BBS records for research and conservation. 

My other work at CEH includes supporting various field monitoring or experimental work involving plants, a project on invasive alien species in Cyprus, and urban plants. I am also closely involved with the LIFE-funded project Mitigating the threat of Invasive Alien Plants (IAP) in the EU through pest risk analysis to support the EU Regulation 1143/2014 (IAP-RISK). The IAP-RISK project will produce 16 pest risk analyses for potential future IAPs.

Full publication lists are available on Google Scholar and NERC NORA. I am also on ResearchGate and ORCID, and a record of my peer reviewing activities is on Publons. I am gradually learning to put some of my code on github.

Feel free to contact me if you are a PhD student or researcher and would be interested in a self-funded placement in our group.