Download or read book Trophic Cascades written by John Terborgh and published by Island Press. This book was released on 2013-06-25 with total page 487 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Trophic cascades—the top-down regulation of ecosystems by predators—are an essential aspect of ecosystem function and well-being. Trophic cascades are often drastically disrupted by human interventions—for example, when wolves and cougars are removed, allowing deer and beaver to become destructive—yet have only recently begun to be considered in the development of conservation and management strategies. Trophic Cascades is the first comprehensive presentation of the science on this subject. It brings together some of the world’s leading scientists and researchers to explain the importance of large animals in regulating ecosystems, and to relate that scientific knowledge to practical conservation. Chapters examine trophic cascades across the world’s major biomes, including intertidal habitats, coastal oceans, lakes, nearshore ecosystems, open oceans, tropical forests, boreal and temperate ecosystems, low arctic scrubland, savannas, and islands. Additional chapters consider aboveground/belowground linkages, predation and ecosystem processes, consumer control by megafauna and fire, and alternative states in ecosystems. An introductory chapter offers a concise overview of trophic cascades, while concluding chapters consider theoretical perspectives and comparative issues. Trophic Cascades provides a scientific basis and justification for the idea that large predators and top-down forcing must be considered in conservation strategies, alongside factors such as habitat preservation and invasive species. It is a groundbreaking work for scientists and managers involved with biodiversity conservation and protection.
Download or read book The Trophic Cascade in Lakes written by Stephen R. Carpenter and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1996-07-13 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This 1993 book documents the importance of trophic cascades in aquatic ecology.
Download or read book Trophic Cascade written by Camille T. Dungy and published by Wesleyan University Press. This book was released on 2017-03-07 with total page 89 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A soulful reckoning for our twenty-first century, held in focus through echoes of the past and future, but always firmly rooted in now.” —Yusef Komunyakaa, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Winner of the Colorado Book Award in Poetry (2018) In this fourth book in a series of award-winning survival narratives, Dungy writes positioned at a fulcrum, bringing a new life into the world even as her elders are passing on. In a time of massive environmental degradation, violence and abuse of power, a world in which we all must survive, these poems resonate within and beyond the scope of the human realms, delicately balancing between conflicting loci of attention. Dwelling between vibrancy and its opposite, Dungy writes in a single poem about a mother, a daughter, Smokin’ Joe Frazier, brittle stars, giant boulders, and a dead blue whale. These poems are written in the face of despair to hold an impossible love and a commitment to hope. A readers companion will be available at wesleyan.edu/wespress/readerscompanions. “Dungy asks how we can survive despair and finds her answers close to the earth.” —Diana Whitney, The Kenyon Review “Trophic Cascade frequently bears witness—to violence, to loss, to environmental degradation—but for Dungy, witnessing entails hope.” —Julie Swarstad Johnson, Harvard Review Online “Tension. Simmering. Beneath her matter-of-fact, easy-going, sit-yourself-down, let-me-tell-it-like-it-is clarifying. And her power we take deadly seriously.” —Matt Sutherland, Foreword Reviews “[Trophic Cascade] asks us, in spite of the pain or difficulty of being human today, to find joy and vibrancy in our experiences.” —Elizabeth Flock, PBS Newshour
Download or read book Ecology of Shallow Lakes written by Marten Scheffer and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ecology of Shallow Lakes brings together current understanding of the mechanisms that drive the diametrically opposite states of water clarity, shown by the cover paintings, found in many shallow lakes and ponds. It gives an outline of the knowledge gained from field observations, experimental work, and restoration studies, linked by a solid theoretical framework. The book focuses on shallow lakes, but the lucid treatment of plankton dynamics, resuspension, light climate and the role of vegetation is relevant to a much wider range of aquatic systems. The models that are used remain simple and most analyses are graphical rather than algebraic. The text will therefore appeal to students, scientists and policy makers in the field of ecology, fisheries, pollution studies and water management, and also to theoreticans who will benefit from the many real-world examples of topics such as predation and competition theory, bifurcation analysis and catastrophe theory. Perhaps most importantly, the book is a remarkable example of how large field experiments and simple models can catalyze our insight into complex ecosystems. Marten Scheffer wrote this book while at the Institute of Inland Water Management and Waste Treatment, RIZA, Lelystad, The Netherlands. He is currently at the Department of Water Quality Management and Aquatic Ecology of the Wageningen Agricultural University. Reviews `Much rarer are textbooks that so succinctly sum up the state-of-the-art knowledge about a subject that they become instant `bibles'. This book is one of these. It is probably one of the best biological textbooks I have read. Scheffer masterfully pulls all this information together under one cover and presents a coherent account, which will serve as a benchmark for the subject. The reader will not gain any great insight into the breeding biology of pike from this book, nor learn much about dragonflies or newts. They will, however, come to understand the essential nature of shallow lakes or, as the author puts it, `how shallow lakes work'. Overall, this book will be of great interest to practical and theoretical ecologists, students and managers in all fields of biology. All freshwater ecologists should certainly read it.' Simon Harrison in Journal of Ecology, 86 `The book by Scheffer can be seen as a milestone in the recognition of shallow lakes as a research topic in its own right. Scheffer uses three approaches concurrently to unravel the functioning of shallow lakes: 1) statistical analysis of large datasets from a variety of lakes; 2) simple abstract models made up of a few non-linear ordinary differential equations, which he calls `mini-models'; and 3) logical reasoning based on a mixture of results from fieldwork, experiments and models. What is new is that Scheffer links mathematics very nicely with what one feels is a correct description of the functioning of a shallow lake. Employing logical reasoning, Scheffer combines all these sources of knowledge into a general, coherent picture of the functioning of a shallow lake.' Wolf Mooij in Aquatic Ecology, 32
Download or read book Trophic Ecology written by James E. Garvey and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2016-09-19 with total page 394 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is a bridge between ecological paradigms – organismal/community approaches to food web dynamics and ecosystem-level approaches to production. The unification of organismal, community, and ecosystem approaches in ecology is emerging due to the growing availability of new techniques for assessing trophic interactions and their implications for ecosystems. Trophic Ecology is a formal text for both newcomers to the discipline as well as seasoned professionals looking for new ideas and refreshers on old topics. A wide range of topics are explained including autotrophy, heterotrophy, omnivory, decomposition, foraging behavior and theory, trophic cascades, bioenergetics, and production. The audience is upper-level undergraduate students and entry-level graduate students interested in autecological, organismal approaches to ecology, community and ecosystem ecology. It is also a reference text for instructors teaching upper-division courses, providing examples from the literature, quantitative approaches to teach, and new hypotheses yet to be fully tested by ecologists.
Download or read book Food Webs written by Gary A. Polis and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 475 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reflecting the recent surge of activity in food web research fueled by new empirical data, this authoritative volume successfully spans and integrates the areas of theory, basic empirical research, applications, and resource problems. Written by recognized leaders from various branches of ecological research, this work provides an in-depth treatment of the most recent advances in the field and examines the complexity and variability of food webs through reviews, new research, and syntheses of the major issues in food web research. Food Webs features material on the role of nutrients, detritus and microbes in food webs, indirect effects in food webs, the interaction of productivity and consumption, linking cause and effect in food webs, temporal and spatial scales of food web dynamics, applications of food webs to pest management, fisheries, and ecosystem stress. Three comprehensive chapters synthesize important information on the role of indirect effects, productivity and consumer regulation, and temporal, spatial and life history influences on food webs. In addition, numerous tables, figures, and mathematical equations found nowhere else in related literature are presented in this outstanding work. Food Webs offers researchers and graduate students in various branches of ecology an extensive examination of the subject. Ecologists interested in food webs or community ecology will also find this book an invaluable tool for understanding the current state of knowledge of food web research.
Download or read book Large Carnivores and the Conservation of Biodiversity written by Justina Ray and published by Island Press. This book was released on 2013-04-09 with total page 544 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Large Carnivores and the Conservation of Biodiversity brings together more than thirty leading scientists and conservation practitioners to consider a key question in environmental conservation: Is the conservation of large carnivores in ecosystems that evolved with their presence equivalent to the conservation of biological diversity within those systems? Building their discussions from empirical, long-term data sets, contributors including James A. Estes, David S. Maehr, Tim McClanahan, Andrès J. Novaro, John Terborgh, and Rosie Woodroffe explore a variety of issues surrounding the link between predation and biodiversity: What is the evidence for or against the link? Is it stronger in marine systems? What are the implications for conservation strategies? Large Carnivores and the Conservation of Biodiversity is the first detailed, broad-scale examination of the empirical evidence regarding the role of large carnivores in biodiversity conservation in both marine and terrestrial ecosystems. It contributes to a much more precise and global understanding of when, where, and whether protecting and restoring top predators will directly contribute to the conservation of biodiversity. Everyone concerned with ecology, biodiversity, or large carnivores will find this volume a unique and thought-provoking analysis and synthesis.
Download or read book Multitrophic Level Interactions written by Teja Tscharntke and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2002-03-21 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the complex interactions between plants, their herbivores and natural enemies.
Download or read book Edible Sea Urchins Biology and Ecology written by John M. Lawrence and published by Elsevier. This book was released on 2001-05-21 with total page 429 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sea urchins are a major component of marine environments found throughout the world's oceans. A major model for research in developmental biology, they are also of major economic importance in many regions and interest in their management and aquaculture has increased greatly in recent years. This book provides a synthesis of biological and ecological characteristics of sea urchins that are of basic scientific interest and also essential for effective fisheries management and aquaculture. General chapters consider characteristics of sea urchins as a whole. In addition, specific chapters are devoted to the ecology of 17 species that are of major commercial interest and ecological importance. Features include: • A synthesis of what is known about the basic biological characteristics of the sea urchin, useful for the direction of future research. • Case histories of 17 species that illustrate their ecological role in a variety of environments. • With the catastrophic decline in fisheries resulting primarily from over-fishing, it is essential that the populations be managed effectively and that aquaculture be developed. This book provides knowledge of the biology and ecology of the commercially important sea urchins that will contribute to these goals. • The only book available in present literature devoted to sea urchins. With this new title experts provide a broad synthetic treatment and in depth analysis of the biology and ecology of sea urchins from around the world, designed to provide an understanding of the group and the basis for fisheries management and aquaculture.
Download or read book A Sand County Almanac written by Aldo Leopold and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2020-05 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1949 and praised in The New York Times Book Review as "full of beauty and vigor and bite," A Sand County Almanac combines some of the finest nature writing since Thoreau with a call for changing our understanding of land management.
Download or read book Guidebook to Relative Strangers Journeys into Race Motherhood and History written by Camille T. Dungy and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2017-06-13 with total page 183 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Colorado Book Award As a working mother and poet-lecturer, Camille Dungy’s livelihood depended on travel. She crisscrossed America and beyond with her daughter in tow, history shadowing their steps, always intensely aware of how they were perceived, not just as mother and child but as black women. From the San Francisco of settlers’ dreams to the slave-trading ports of Ghana, from snow-white Maine to a festive yet threatening bonfire in the Virginia pinewoods, Dungy finds fear and trauma but also mercy, kindness, and community. Penetrating and generous, this is an essential guide for a troubled land.
Download or read book Applying Graph Theory in Ecological Research written by Mark R.T. Dale and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2017-11-09 with total page 355 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book clearly describes the many applications of graph theory to ecological questions, providing instruction and encouragement to researchers.
Download or read book Encyclopedia of the Anthropocene written by and published by Elsevier. This book was released on 2017-11-27 with total page 2290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Encyclopedia of the Anthropocene, Five Volume Set presents a currency-based, global synthesis cataloguing the impact of humanity’s global ecological footprint. Covering a multitude of aspects related to Climate Change, Biodiversity, Contaminants, Geological, Energy and Ethics, leading scientists provide foundational essays that enable researchers to define and scrutinize information, ideas, relationships, meanings and ideas within the Anthropocene concept. Questions widely debated among scientists, humanists, conservationists, politicians and others are included, providing discussion on when the Anthropocene began, what to call it, whether it should be considered an official geological epoch, whether it can be contained in time, and how it will affect future generations. Although the idea that humanity has driven the planet into a new geological epoch has been around since the dawn of the 20th century, the term ‘Anthropocene’ was only first used by ecologist Eugene Stoermer in the 1980s, and hence popularized in its current meaning by atmospheric chemist Paul Crutzen in 2000. Presents comprehensive and systematic coverage of topics related to the Anthropocene, with a focus on the Geosciences and Environmental science Includes point-counterpoint articles debating key aspects of the Anthropocene, giving users an even-handed navigation of this complex area Provides historic, seminal papers and essays from leading scientists and philosophers who demonstrate changes in the Anthropocene concept over time
Download or read book Resolving Ecosystem Complexity written by Oswald J. Schmitz and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2010-07-01 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An ecosystem's complexity develops from the vast numbers of species interacting in ecological communities. The nature of these interactions, in turn, depends on environmental context. How do these components together influence an ecosystem's behavior as a whole? Can ecologists resolve an ecosystem's complexity in order to predict its response to disturbances? Resolving Ecosystem Complexity develops a framework for anticipating the ways environmental context determines the functioning of ecosystems. Oswald Schmitz addresses the critical questions of contemporary ecology: How should an ecosystem be conceptualized to blend its biotic and biophysical components? How should evolutionary ecological principles be used to derive an operational understanding of complex, adaptive ecosystems? How should the relationship between the functional biotic diversity of ecosystems and their properties be understood? Schmitz begins with the universal concept that ecosystems are comprised of species that consume resources and which are then resources for other consumers. From this, he deduces a fundamental rule or evolutionary ecological mechanism for explaining context dependency: individuals within a species trade off foraging gains against the risk of being consumed by predators. Through empirical examples, Schmitz illustrates how species use evolutionary ecological strategies to negotiate a predator-eat-predator world, and he suggests that the implications of species trade-offs are critical to making ecology a predictive science. Bridging the traditional divides between individuals, populations, and communities in ecology, Resolving Ecosystem Complexity builds a systematic foundation for thinking about natural systems.
Download or read book Once There Were Wolves written by Charlotte McConaghy and published by Flatiron Books. This book was released on 2021-08-03 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "Blazing...Visceral" (Los Angeles Times) · "Exceptional" (Newsweek) · "Bold...Heartfelt" (New York Times Book Review) · "Thought-provoking and thrilling" (GMA) · "Suspenseful and poignant" (Scientific American) · "Gripping" (The Sydney Morning Herald) From the author of the beloved national bestseller Migrations, a pulse-pounding new novel set in the wild Scottish Highlands. Inti Flynn arrives in Scotland with her twin sister, Aggie, to lead a team of biologists tasked with reintroducing fourteen gray wolves into the remote Highlands. She hopes to heal not only the dying landscape, but Aggie, too, unmade by the terrible secrets that drove the sisters out of Alaska. Inti is not the woman she once was, either, changed by the harm she’s witnessed—inflicted by humans on both the wild and each other. Yet as the wolves surprise everyone by thriving, Inti begins to let her guard down, even opening herself up to the possibility of love. But when a farmer is found dead, Inti knows where the town will lay blame. Unable to accept her wolves could be responsible, Inti makes a reckless decision to protect them. But if the wolves didn’t make the kill, then who did? And what will Inti do when the man she is falling for seems to be the prime suspect? Propulsive and spell-binding, Charlotte McConaghy's Once There Were Wolves is the unforgettable story of a woman desperate to save the creatures she loves—if she isn’t consumed by a wild that was once her refuge.
Download or read book Marine Disease Ecology written by Donald C. Behringer and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2020-01-30 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Whether through loss of habitat or cascading community effects, diseases can shape the very nature of the marine environment. Despite their significant impacts, studies of marine diseases have tended to lag behind their terrestrial equivalents, particularly with regards to their ecological effects. However, in recent decades global research focused on marine disease ecology has expanded at an accelerating rate. This is due in part to increases in disease emergence across many taxa, but can also be attributed to a broader realization that the parasites responsible for disease are themselves important members of marine communities. Understanding their ecological relationships with the environment and their hosts is critical to understanding, conserving, and managing natural and exploited populations, communities, and ecosystems. Courses on marine disease ecology are now starting to emerge and this first textbook in the field will be ideally placed to serve them. Marine Disease Ecology is suitable for graduate students and researchers in the fields of marine disease ecology, aquaculture, fisheries, veterinary science, evolution and conservation. It will also be of relevance and use to a broader interdisciplinary audience of government agencies, NGOs, and marine resource managers.
Download or read book Rewilding written by Nathalie Pettorelli and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2019-01-31 with total page 465 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discusses the benefits and risks, as well as the economic and socio-political realities, of rewilding as a novel conservation tool.
