SpringerBriefs in Ecology – serie

Millions of urbanites never see primeval forests during their lives except for the old growth forests found in urban parks. Unfortunately, these forests are on the verge of disappearing because arboreal reproduction is lost to human trampling and park administrators and urban foresters do not maintain these “natural” forests. To aid urban foresters and park managers in meeting the challenges, research on old growth forests in urban parks is synthesized in terms of historical ecology to introduce the methods utilized to reveal long-term forest composition changes. The case study of three stands in Fairmount Park, Philadelphia, PA relates pre-chestnut blight tree species densities and post-chestnut blight arboreal changes to fire and visitor trampling. The information gained on how urban old growth forests have developed and changed is used to develop restoration ecology based frameworks to restore species composition and address challenges to forest survival including invasive species.

Includes our current knowledge of the invasion or encroachment and cause of population growth and spread of some dry land, arid zone woody legumes. Community structure, population growth, and competition of these woody legumes will also be examined. These species and ecosystems are both extensive and dynamic. They occur worldwide, but mainly in the arid zones of the tropics and sub-tropics. The cause of the growth and spread of these species and communities has long been claimed to be caused by distal factors rather than proximal ones. However, these species appear to be influenced and perhaps controlled by anthropogenic factors, specifically grazing and fire or lack of fire. Their overall worldwide distribution has probably changed little in the recent past, but their populations have expanded into grasslands and their density has increased in many places. Some associated communities have shown dramatic changes in response to recent large-scale droughts and the loss of most of the dominant overstory species. However, changes in the woody legume communities and their species are generally unknown. ​

This brief discusses factors associated with group formation, group maintenance, group population structure, and other events and processes (e.g., physiology, behavior) related to mammalian social evolution. Within- and between-lineages, features of prehistoric and extant social mammals, patterns and linkages are discussed as components of a possible social “tool-kit”.  "Top-down” (predators to nutrients), as well as “bottom-up” (nutrients to predators) effects are assessed.  The present synthesis also emphasizes outcomes of Hebbian (synaptic) decisions on Malthusian parameters (growth rates of populations) and their consequences for (shifting) mean fitnesses of populations.  Ecology and evolution (EcoEvo) are connected via the organism’s “norms of reaction” (genotype x environment interactions; life-history tradeoffs of reproduction, survival, and growth) exposed to selection, with the success of genotypes influenced by intensities of selection as well as neutral (e.g. mutation rates) and stochastic effects.  At every turn, life history trajectories are assumed to arise from “decisions” made by types responding to competition for limiting resources constrained by Hamilton’s rule (inclusive fitness operations).

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) provide a powerful tool for the investigation of species-habitat relationships and the development of wildlife management and conservation programs. However, the relative ease of data manipulation and analysis using GIS, associated landscape metrics packages, and sophisticated statistical tests may sometimes cause investigators to overlook important species-habitat functional relationships. Additionally, underlying assumptions of the study design or technology may have unrecognized consequences. This volume examines how initial researcher choices of image resolution, scale(s) of analysis, response and explanatory variables, and location and area of samples can influence analysis results, interpretation, predictive capability, and study-derived management prescriptions. Overall, most studies in this realm employ relatively low resolution imagery that allows neither identification nor accurate classification of habitat components. Additionally, the landscape metrics typically employed do not adequately quantify component spatial arrangement associated with species occupation. To address this latter issue, the authors introduce two novel landscape metrics that measure the functional size and location in the landscape of taxon-specific ‘solid’ and ‘edge’ habitat types. Keller and Smith conclude that investigators conducting GIS-based analyses of species-habitat relationships should more carefully 1) match the resolution of remotely sensed imagery to the scale of habitat functional relationships of the focal taxon, 2) identify attributes (explanatory variables) of habitat architecture, size, configuration, quality, and context that reflect the way the focal taxon uses the subset of the landscape it occupies, and 3) match the location and scale of habitat samples, whether GIS- or ground-based, to corresponding species’ detection locations and scales of habitat use.

This book reviews the mechanisms, patterns, and processes that regulate prokaryotic diversity through different habitats in the context of evolutionary and ecological hypotheses, principles, and theories. Despite the tremendous role of prokaryotic diversity in the function of the global ecosystem, it remains understudied in comparison to the rest of biological diversity. In this book, the authors argue that understanding the mechanisms of species coexistence, functioning relationships (e.g. nutrient cycling and host fitness), and trophic and non-trophic interactions are helpful in addressing the future challenges in basic and applied research in microbial ecology. The authors also examine the ecological and evolutionary responses of prokaryotes to global change and biodiversity loss. Ecological Diversity of the Microbiome in the Context of Ecology Theory and Climate Change aims to bring prokaryotes into the focus of ecological and evolutionary research, especially in the context of global change.

This new book is the first to make logical and important connections between trapping and foraging ecology. It develops and describes—both verbally and mathematically--the underlying principles that determine and define trap-organism interactions. More important, it goes on to explain and illustrate how these principles and relationships can be used to estimate absolute population densities in the landscape and to address an array of important problems relating to the use of trapping for detection, population estimation, and suppression in both research and applied contexts. The breakthrough nature of subject matter described has broad fundamental and applied implications for research for addressing important real-world problems in agriculture, ecology, public health and conservation biology. Monitoring traps baited with potent attractants of animals like insects have long played a critical role in revealing what pests are present and when they are active. However, pest managers have been laboring without the tools necessary for quick and inexpensive determination of absolute pest density, which is the cornerstone of pest management decisions. This book spans the gamut from highly theoretical and fundamental research to very practical applications that will be widely useful across all of agriculture.

This book shows how tablets (and smartphones) using a variety of selected ‘apps’, can enhance fieldwork and other out-of-classroom activities. The authors review imaginative uses of tablets from their own project and as well as examples from other colleagues. To help readers keep abreast of new technology and innovative ways to use it, the book is supported by a web site and a social media community.

This is a challenging new approach to understanding ecological systems especially in urban and urbanised areas. Synthesising current ideas and approaches the book develops an historic context to ecological fusion and recombinant or hybrid ecosystems. With massive climate change and other environmental fluxes, this volume provides insight into consequences for future ecologies. Invasive and non-native or alien species are spreading, often aggressively around the globe. However, much current thinking in ecology and nature conservation fails to accommodate the consequences of changing environmental conditions and fusion of both species and ecological communities. Whether or not conservationists accept ecological change, factors such as urbanisation and globalisation combine with climate and other changes to trigger new hybrid communities and ecologies. Embedding this approach into current ecological thinking this book presents an overview of ideas set in the exemplar case study area of the British Isles. However, the approaches, ideas and conclusions presented here will find application in ecosystem studies and in nature conservation around the world.

Ecology studies biodiversity in its variety and complexity. It describes how species distribute and perform in response to environmental changes. Ecological processes and structures are highly complex and adaptive. In order to quantify emerging ecological patterns and investigate their hidden mechanisms, we need to rely on the simplicity of mathematical language. Ecological patterns are emerging structures observed in populations, communities and ecosystems. Elucidating drivers behind ecological patterns can greatly improve our knowledge of how ecosystems assemble, function and respond to change and perturbation. Mathematical ecology has, thus, become an important interdisciplinary research field that can provide answers to complex global issues, such as climate change and biological invasions.The aim of this book is to (i) introduce key concepts in ecology and evolution, (ii) explain classic and recent important mathematical models for investigating ecological andevolutionary dynamics, and (iii) provide real examples in ecology/biology/environmental sciences that have used these models to address relevant issues. Readers are exposed to the key concepts, frameworks, and terminology in the studies of ecology and evolution, which will enable them to ask the correct and relevant research questions, and frame the questions using appropriate mathematical models.

The book reviews the literature on the ecological succession of plants on fallowed swiddens in tropical forests.  Patterns of ecological succession in tropical forests are insufficiently understood, partly because results are scattered through a large number of case studies reported in academic articles. So far, no publication has attempted to bring these different case studies together to identify common patters and trends. The goal of the book is to review the different case studies, and identify common patterns of ecological succession in fallowed swiddens, as well as to pinpoint the factors that cause ecological succession in some areas to differ from those in other areas. The book is organised in four different sections: forest structure, forest diversity, species composition, and the factors that contribute to differences in forest recovery rates (the number of times the field was burned, the length of fallow period, the type of soil, and the type of forest).  This book is an important contribution to tropical forestry and shifting cultivation. Deforestation and forest degradation are the largest sources of CO2, and shifting cultivation is one of the main culprits. For this (and other economic and political) reason governments attempt to curtail shifting cultivation by shortening the years the fields can be left fallow, or outright outlawing the farming practice. Yet, there is insufficient understanding of the processes of ecological succession in fallows, which raises the questions as to whether the policy fulfils its objectives.  ​