Prof. Matthew Heard

Matthew is a terrestrial ecologist with wide-ranging interests and a detailed knowledge of population and community ecology — applied ecology, plant-animal interactions, ecological theory — coupled with field and analytical skills. The broad focus of his research is to understand what the key drivers causing declines in wildlife are, and to develop and evaluate actions to halt or reverse these declines. 

He studies a range of taxa from plants, microbes, invertebrates — especially insects — to small mammals and birds and tackles these questions through experimentation, fieldwork, molecular methods, analyses of large datasets, and modelling. 

Matthew's current research themes are: interactions between agriculture and biodiversity; pollination ecology; ecosystem function; restoration ecology and conservation; plant community dynamics; and, the application of molecular analyses for ecological research — microbiomes, plant outcrossing, population genetic structure.