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Author: Matthew E. Hopton Publisher: ISBN: Category : Languages : en Pages : 300
Book Description
A major goal of ecological research is to determine causes for patterns of biodiversity. Establishing a connection between environmental variables and patterns of species richness provides a foundation for modeling species-habitat relationships. In general, a more heterogeneous environment provides more ecological opportunities for more species than a less heterogeneous environment. The relationship between environmental heterogeneity and species richness is dependent on the spatial scale at which analyses are conducted and on the taxonomic group studied. Often, researchers use indicator groups or species when assessing biodiversity. However, a single taxonomic group (e.g., mammals) or a cluster of species (e.g., small mammals) may respond to environmental variables differently from groups excluded from the analysis, and may not be a good indicator of overall biodiversity. Furthermore, much of the research has been conducted at small- or large- spatial scales, and relatively few studies have been conducted at meso-scales. This study investigated the role of environmental heterogeneity in determining patterns of biodiversity of different terrestrial vertebrate groups, and examined the consistency of the results across three commonly used spatial meso-scales of analysis. Relationships between environmental heterogeneity and species richness were analyzed using multiple regression. All measured categories of environmental heterogeneity were important predictors to model patterns of species richness, explaining 40% to> 99% of the variation in species richness. However, the relationship between the different types of heterogeneity and patterns of species richness varied with the grouping of species and the spatial scale. In general, at all three meso-scales, the variables selected to represent environmental heterogeneity were not as good at explaining the variation in species richness for reptiles as they were for other taxonomic groups. In addition, mammal species richness was the most dissimilar of all taxonomic groups, both within and between spatial scales. These results suggest that all spatial scales need to be examined thoroughly and must be considered when examining relationships between environmental variables and biodiversity. Furthermore, the use of indicator groups may not provide an adequate description of environmental variables responsible for patterns of species richness, especially for small groups in need of conservation.
Author: Matthew E. Hopton Publisher: ISBN: Category : Languages : en Pages : 300
Book Description
A major goal of ecological research is to determine causes for patterns of biodiversity. Establishing a connection between environmental variables and patterns of species richness provides a foundation for modeling species-habitat relationships. In general, a more heterogeneous environment provides more ecological opportunities for more species than a less heterogeneous environment. The relationship between environmental heterogeneity and species richness is dependent on the spatial scale at which analyses are conducted and on the taxonomic group studied. Often, researchers use indicator groups or species when assessing biodiversity. However, a single taxonomic group (e.g., mammals) or a cluster of species (e.g., small mammals) may respond to environmental variables differently from groups excluded from the analysis, and may not be a good indicator of overall biodiversity. Furthermore, much of the research has been conducted at small- or large- spatial scales, and relatively few studies have been conducted at meso-scales. This study investigated the role of environmental heterogeneity in determining patterns of biodiversity of different terrestrial vertebrate groups, and examined the consistency of the results across three commonly used spatial meso-scales of analysis. Relationships between environmental heterogeneity and species richness were analyzed using multiple regression. All measured categories of environmental heterogeneity were important predictors to model patterns of species richness, explaining 40% to> 99% of the variation in species richness. However, the relationship between the different types of heterogeneity and patterns of species richness varied with the grouping of species and the spatial scale. In general, at all three meso-scales, the variables selected to represent environmental heterogeneity were not as good at explaining the variation in species richness for reptiles as they were for other taxonomic groups. In addition, mammal species richness was the most dissimilar of all taxonomic groups, both within and between spatial scales. These results suggest that all spatial scales need to be examined thoroughly and must be considered when examining relationships between environmental variables and biodiversity. Furthermore, the use of indicator groups may not provide an adequate description of environmental variables responsible for patterns of species richness, especially for small groups in need of conservation.
Author: Matthew Adam Whalen Publisher: ISBN: 9780355450941 Category : Languages : en Pages :
Book Description
From global-scale variation in the distribution of light reaching the Earth’s surface to the smallest chemical gradients, environmental heterogeneity, or variation in environmental conditions over space and time, is critical to explain process and pattern in nature. Environmental heterogeneity has long been hypothesized to promote species coexistence by allowing niche partitioning. Organisms respond to heterogeneity in abiotic environmental conditions at several scales, interactions between organisms can be mediated by heterogeneity, and organisms themselves can generate additional heterogeneity that may be important for the structure of communities. Importantly, how environmental heterogeneity interacts with biodiversity remains an important challenge to predicting the ecosystem functioning. Moreover, given that environmental conditions and ecological process change across scales of space and time, investigating how heterogeneity influences ecological communities – both directly by modifying habitat quality and indirectly by modifying interactions – across a range of scales is necessary if we want to make predictions in community ecology. Ecologists often observe and measure communities at a single scale, which often not the scale at which processes take place, so defining appropriate scales for inquiry can be challenging. If a single scale is chosen, ecologists must consider the natural history of their systems that relate to the patterns and processes being investigated. However, the ability of ecologists to view systems at several scales at once is improving with technological advances. My goal with this dissertation was to take what we already know about biodiversity maintenance and ecosystem functioning and extend it to multiple trophic levels, habitats, and scales of observation, all of which are important to our general understanding of community ecology. The real world is messy, which makes the job of a community ecologist simultaneous fascinating and frustrating. However, by considering some of the complexities inherent in natural systems (including how they might change across scale) I aim to help in pushing biodiversity science into the 21st Century. All of the following chapters explore some aspect of environmental heterogeneity and how it either influences biodiversity or interacts with it to determine some important ecological process. Chapter 1 explores temporal variation in a major environmental gradient in marine habitats, water flow, and how it interacts with species diversity of suspension feeding invertebrates to predict community-wide water filtration. I manipulated species diversity of suspension feeders and the presence of water flow directly in the lab and allowed communities to consume a diverse mélange of phytoplankton. By tracking chlorophyll a concentrations over time, I was able to get a proxy for water filtration taking place at the community-level. Species diversity enhanced community filtration, and this response did not depend on whether water was flowing or not. However, individual species and pairs did respond to flow, so these results suggest that interactions between organisms and their modification of water flow may be important for predicting food delivery and ultimately water filtration over time. The balance of competition and niche complementarity appeared to change across flow regimes, which brings species interactions, and their sensitivity to environmental conditions, to the forefront. Chapter 2 investigates a common form of spatial heterogeneity on a rocky shore, namely topography generated by space-holding barnacles and how it interacts with grazer species diversity to drive algal community succession. This chapter was part of a project started by Kristin Aquilino in which we simultaneously manipulated barnacle cover and snail grazer diversity at small scales relevant to seaweed-grazer interactions. Then we tracked communities over time as they recovered from algal clearing. The presence and heterogeneity of barnacles along with the diversity and identity of grazing invertebrates interacted to predict algal succession. Grazer diversity itself was important for suppressing early successional microalgae, while later successional macroalgae were promoted by the presence of a key limpet grazer. In the absence of this limpet heterogeneity in barnacle cover led to increased algal accumulation. Again, species interactions and the potential for niche complementarity depended on habitat heterogeneity, thus the influence of environment on interactions remains strong thread in the dissertation. Chapter 3 also considers topographic heterogeneity on rocky shores, but this time focusing on how topography at different spatial scales modifies community structure during early succession. We have known for a long time that large elevation gradients on rocky shores are critical for the distributions of organisms, but perhaps small scale environmental variation also matters for these communities as suggested by many previous studies. I decided to manipulate small-scale (mm) topography by making settlement plates that mimicked real rock surfaces. Then I placed these plates across areas of mid-intertidal a rocky shore, which represented larger scale (cm to m) variation in topography, including differences in elevation and distance to shore. Importantly, both scales of environmental heterogeneity influenced community composition, but in different ways. Early successional algae responded more strongly to the large-scale heterogeneity present along and across the coastline, while mobile invertebrates responded strongly to small-scale characteristics like rugosity and convexity. It is likely then that small-scale heterogeneity can have a driving influence on algal distributions indirectly through the grazing behaviors of invertebrate animals, but once again this will depend on the traits of the grazers (e.g., body size) and how they interact with heterogeneity. One conceptual result that helps tie all of these chapters together is that in order for environmental heterogeneity to be important to ecological communities, the scale at which heterogeneity occurs must match response and effect traits of the organisms living within the community. Body size and the way organisms of a particular size respond to, and potentially modify, their abiotic surroundings play a role in every chapter, from the fouling invertebrates that emerge from the substrate into flowing water (Chapter 1) to the tidepool invertebrates that crawl on bumpy substrates in search of food and refuge (Chapters 2, 3). All of this work, I hope, will help advance ecological knowledge and our collective ability to make predictions in a changing world. Yet, it is likely that the work presented here will generate more questions than answers. For instance, how do we take the ideas laid out in this dissertation and marry them with life histories, which often cause organisms to experience very different scales of environmental heterogeneity over their lifetimes? If we want to make large-scale predictions about the abundance and distribution of life on Earth and how it responds to environmental change, how much information do we actually need to know at the small scales? Give that body size is important for metabolic rates and impacts on ecosystems, might there be ways to combine scaling and metabolic theories in ecology, which strive for simplicity, with the messier information about environmental heterogeneity and species traits to make predictions across different types of ecosystems? These are the types of questions that continue to motivate me and that, hopefully, motivates the field of ecology in the future.
Author: Mark E. Ritchie Publisher: Princeton University Press ISBN: 1400831687 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 240
Book Description
Understanding and predicting species diversity in ecological communities is one of the great challenges in community ecology. Popular recent theory contends that the traits of species are "neutral" or unimportant to coexistence, yet abundant experimental evidence suggests that multiple species are able to coexist on the same limiting resource precisely because they differ in key traits, such as body size, diet, and resource demand. This book presents a new theory of coexistence that incorporates two important aspects of biodiversity in nature--scale and spatial variation in the supply of limiting resources. Introducing an innovative model that uses fractal geometry to describe the complex physical structure of nature, Mark Ritchie shows how species traits, particularly body size, lead to spatial patterns of resource use that allow species to coexist. He explains how this criterion for coexistence can be converted into a "rule" for how many species can be "packed" into an environment given the supply of resources and their spatial variability. He then demonstrates how this rule can be used to predict a range of patterns in ecological communities, such as body-size distributions, species-abundance distributions, and species-area relations. Ritchie illustrates how the predictions closely match data from many real communities, including those of mammalian herbivores, grasshoppers, dung beetles, and birds. This book offers a compelling alternative to "neutral" theory in community ecology, one that helps us better understand patterns of biodiversity across the Earth.
Author: Patrik Nosil Publisher: OUP Oxford ISBN: 0191628026 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 304
Book Description
The origin of biological diversity, via the formation of new species, can be inextricably linked to adaptation to the ecological environment. Specifically, ecological processes are central to the formation of new species when barriers to gene flow (reproductive isolation) evolve between populations as a result of ecologically-based divergent natural selection. This process of 'ecological speciation' has seen a large body of particularly focused research in the last 10-15 years, and a review and synthesis of the theoretical and empirical literature is now timely. The book begins by clarifying what ecological speciation is, its alternatives, and the predictions that can be used to test for it. It then reviews the three components of ecological speciation and discusses the geography and genomic basis of the process. A final chapter highlights future research directions, describing the approaches and experiments which might be used to conduct that future work. The ecological and genetic literature is integrated throughout the text with the goal of shedding new insight into the speciation process, particularly when the empirical data is then further integrated with theory.
Author: Thomas J. Matthews Publisher: Cambridge University Press ISBN: 1108477070 Category : Nature Languages : en Pages : 503
Book Description
Provides a comprehensive synthesis of a fundamental phenomenon, the species-area relationship, addressing theory, evidence and application.
Author: Andrew Millington Publisher: SAGE ISBN: 1446254453 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 626
Book Description
A superb resource for understanding the diversity of the modern discipline of biogeography, and its history and future, especially within geography departments. I expect to refer to it often. - Professor Sally Horn, University of Tennessee "As you browse through this fine book you will be struck by the diverse topics that biogeographers investigate and the many research methods they use.... Biogeography is interdisciplinary, and a commonly-voiced concern is that one biogeographer may not readily understand another′s research findings. A handbook like this is important for synthesising, situating, explaining and evaluating a large literature, and pointing the reader to informative publications." - Geographical Research "A valuable contribution in both a research and teaching context. If you are biologically trained, it provides an extensive look into the geographical tradition of biogeography, covering some topics that may be less familiar to those with an evolution/ecology background. Alternatively, if you are a geography student, researcher, or lecturer, it will provide a useful reference and will be invaluable to the non-biogeographer who suddenly has the teaching of an introductory biogeography course thrust upon them." - Adam C. Algar, Frontiers of Biogeography The SAGE Handbook of Biogeography is a manual for scoping the past, present and future of biogeography that enable readers to consider, where relevant, how similar biogeographical issues are tackled by researchers in different ′schools′. In line with the concept of all SAGE Handbooks, this is a retrospective and prospective overview of biogeography that will: Consider the main areas of biogeography researched by geographers Detail a global perspective by incorporating the work of different schools of biogeographers Ecplore the divergent evolution of biogeography as a discipline and consider how this diversity can be harnessed Examine the interdisciplinary debates that biogeographers are contributing to within geography and the biological sciences. Aimed at an international audience of research students, academics, researchers and practitioners in biogeography, the text will attract interest from environmental scientists, ecologists, biologists and geographers alike.
Author: Carlos Galindo Leal Publisher: ISBN: Category : Nature Languages : en Pages : 524
Book Description
This is a detailed assessment of the state of biodiversity in the Atlantic Forest. Separate sections examine each of the three countries that are home to the forest, beginning with a brief overview that explores the dynamics of biodiversity loss in that country and outlining the topics to be addressed.
Author: Robert J. Fuller Publisher: Cambridge University Press ISBN: 0521897564 Category : Nature Languages : en Pages : 555
Book Description
Synthesises important concepts, patterns and issues relating to avian habitat selection, drawing on examples from Europe, North America and Australia.
Author: Navjot S. Sodhi Publisher: OUP Oxford ISBN: 0191574252 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 368
Book Description
Conservation Biology for All provides cutting-edge but basic conservation science to a global readership. A series of authoritative chapters have been written by the top names in conservation biology with the principal aim of disseminating cutting-edge conservation knowledge as widely as possible. Important topics such as balancing conversion and human needs, climate change, conservation planning, designing and analyzing conservation research, ecosystem services, endangered species management, extinctions, fire, habitat loss, and invasive species are covered. Numerous textboxes describing additional relevant material or case studies are also included. The global biodiversity crisis is now unstoppable; what can be saved in the developing world will require an educated constituency in both the developing and developed world. Habitat loss is particularly acute in developing countries, which is of special concern because it tends to be these locations where the greatest species diversity and richest centres of endemism are to be found. Sadly, developing world conservation scientists have found it difficult to access an authoritative textbook, which is particularly ironic since it is these countries where the potential benefits of knowledge application are greatest. There is now an urgent need to educate the next generation of scientists in developing countries, so that they are in a better position to protect their natural resources.
Author: Matthew E. Hopton
Author: Matthew E. Hopton
Author: Matthew Adam Whalen
Author: Mark E. Ritchie
Author: Patrik Nosil
Author: Thomas J. Matthews
Author: Andrew Millington
Author: Carlos Galindo Leal
Author: 
Author: Robert J. Fuller
Author: Navjot S. Sodhi