Wetlands serve many important functions and provide numerous ecological services such as clean water, wildlife habitat, nutrient reduction, and flood control. Wetland science is a relatively young discipline but is a rapidly growing field due to an enhanced understanding of the importance of wetlands and the numerous laws and policies that have been developed to protect these areas. This growth is demonstrated by the creation and growth of the Society of Wetland Scientists which was formed in 1980 and now has a membership of 3,500 people. It is also illustrated by the existence of 2 journals ("Wetlands" and "Wetlands Ecology and Management") devoted entirely to wetlands.

To date there has been no practical, comprehensive techniques book centered on wetlands, and written for wetland researchers, students, and managers. This techniques book aims to fill that gap. It is designed to provide an overview of the various methods that have been used or developed by researchers and practitioners to study, monitor, manage, or create wetlands. Including many methods usually found only in the peer-reviewed or gray literature, this 3-volume set fills a major niche for all professionals dealing with wetlands."

Biogeography was stuck in a "natural history phase" dominated by the collection of data, the young Princeton biologists Robert H. MacArthur and Edward O. Wilson argued in 1967. In this book, the authors developed a general theory to explain the facts of island biogeography. The theory builds on the first principles of population ecology and genetics to explain how distance and area combine to regulate the balance between immigration and extinction in island populations. The authors then test the theory against data. "The Theory of Island Biogeography" was never intended as the last word on the subject. Instead, MacArthur and Wilson sought to stimulate new forms of theoretical and empirical studies, which will lead in turn to a stronger general theory. Even a third of a century since its publication, the book continues to serve that purpose well. From popular books like David Quammen's "Song of the Dodo" to arguments in the professional literature, "The Theory of Island Biogeography" remains at the center of discussions about the geographic distribution of species. In a new preface, Edward O. Wilson reviews the origins and consequences of this classic book.

The story of life's splendid drama has captivated generations of the general public, just as it has intrigued biologists, especially those who began to try to solve evolutionary puzzles in the years immediately after the publication of Darwin's Origin of Species in 1859. Yet histories of the Darwinian revolution have paid far more attention to theoretical debates and have largely ignored the researchers who struggled to comprehend the deeper evolutionary significance of fossil bones and the structures of living animals. Peter J. Bowler recovers some of this lost history in Life's Splendid Drama, the definitive account of evolutionary morphology and its relationships with paleontology and bio-geography. "Intriguing and insightful."-William Kimler, American Scientist "[A] volume of impressive scholarship and extensive references."-Library Journal "One of Bowler's best."-Kevin Padian, Nature "[Bowler's] comprehensive review of the various debates and ideas in taxonomy, morphology, and vertebrate evolution . . . deserves the attention of biologists and other scholars interested in the history of ideas."-Choice "The persistence of pre-Darwinian modes of thought in contemporary biology underlines the importance of Bowler's book. Its value is not only in the history it provides, but also in the way it illumines the present."-Peter J. Causton, Boston Book Review

Origins of Biodiversity is a unique introduction to the fields of macroevolution and macroecology, which explores the evolution and distribution of biodiversity across time, space and lineages. Using an enquiry-led framework to encourage active learning and critical thinking, each chapter is based around a case-study to explore concepts and research methods from contemporary macroevolution and macroecology. The book focuses on the process of science as much as the biology itself, to help students acquire the research skills and intellectual tools they need to understand and investigate the biological world around them. In particular, the emphasis on hypothesis testing encourages students to develop and test their own ideas. This text builds upon the foundations offered in most general introductory evolutionary biology courses to introduce an exciting range of ideas and research tools for investigating patterns of biodiversity.

Biogeoscience is a rapidly growing interdisciplinary field that aims to bring together biological and geophysical processes. This book builds an enhanced understanding of ecosystems by focusing on the integrative connections between ecological processes and the geosphere, hydrosphere and atmosphere. Each chapter provides studies by researchers who have contributed to the biogeoscience synthesis, presenting the latest research on the relationships between ecological processes, such as conservation laws and heat and transport processes, and geophysical processes, such as hillslope, fluvial and aeolian geomorphology, and hydrology. Highlighting the value of biogeoscience as an approach to understand ecosystems, this is an ideal resource for researchers and students in both ecology and the physical sciences.

This book presents a timely investigation of radar remote sensing observations for agricultural crop monitoring and advancements of research techniques and their applicability for crop biophysical parameter estimation. It introduces theoretical background of radar scattering from vegetation volume and semi-empirical modelling approaches that are the foundation for biophysical parameter inversion. The contents will help readers explore the state-of-the-art crop monitoring and biophysical parameter estimation using approaches radar remote sensing. It is useful guide for academicians, practitioners and policymakers.

Mary Elizabeth Barber (1818-1899), born in Britain, arrived in the Cape Colony in 1820 where she spent the rest of her life as a rolling stone, as she lived in and near Grahamstown, the diamond and gold fields, Pietermaritzburg, Malvern near Durban and on various farms in the eastern part of the Cape Colony. She has been perceived as 'the most advanced woman of her time', yet her legacy has attracted relatively little attention. She was the first woman ornithologist in South Africa, one of the first who propagated Darwin's theory of evolution, an early archaeologist, keen botanist and interested lepidopterist. In her scientific writing, she propagated a new gender order; positioned herself as a feminist avant la lettre without relying on difference models and at the same time made use of genuinely racist argumentation.

This is the first publication of her edited scientific correspondence. The letters - transcribed by Alan Cohen, who has written a number of biographical articles on Barber and her brothers - are primarily addressed to the entomologist Roland Trimen, the director of the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, London. Today, the letters are housed at the Royal Entomological Society in St Albans. This book also includes a critical introduction by historian Tanja Hammel who has published a number of articles and is about to publish a monograph on Mary Elizabeth Barber.

Considering its importance, the history of fetal health and mortality remains a neglected area. Medical historians have tended to focus on maternal mortality and professional conflicts between midwives rather than on the unborn, while among the social scientists demographers and epidemiologists have until recently devoted most of their attention to infants and children.
Death before Birth redresses this imbalance, redirecting attention to the fetus. A study of fetal health from the seventeenth century to the present day, it is the first book to offer an historical perspective on the subject and to combine both medical history and epidemiological and demographic research, using long-term and comparative perspectives, including a strong international comparative element, across both Europe and North America. The book not only provides an account of how fetal health and the risks facing the unborn (miscarriages, abortions, stillbirths etc) have changed, it also offers an interpretation of the causes, one that focuses on the role of obstetrics and the epidemiology of maternal infections.
Along the way, it pays detailed attention to a host of related themes, such as varying cultural practices in the recognition of stillbirths; the age pattern of mortality risk between conception and live birth; comparative trends in late-fetal mortality and their causes; fetal mortality and obstetric care during the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries; and the contrasting approaches of the pathologists and "social epidemiologists" to the causes of fetal death. The book concludes with a study of the "fetus as patient," focusing on issues surrounding the legalization of abortion in many Western countries and the public health challenges of persistently high mortality in less developed countries.

Follow along as award-winning author Hetxw'ms Gyetxw (Brett D. Huson) introduces young readers to a pack of grey wolves. New pups have just begun to open their eyes, one of which is a striking black female. Every day, her ears grow larger, her eyesight gets sharper, and her legs stretch farther. As she learns to hunt, play, and run with her pack, instinct pulls her to explore beyond her home territory. Will the young wolf's bold spirit help her find a new pack of her very own? Learn about the life cycle of these magnificent canines, the traditions of the Gitxsan, and how grey wolves contribute to the health of their entire ecosystem.

This volume incorporates theoretical and practical knowledge through case studies and reviews to serve as a baseline of information for coastal ecosystem research, and discusses the impacts of pollution, industrialisation, agriculture and climate change on coastal ecosystem biogeochemistry and biodiversity. The case studies address the role of coastal ecosystems as a carbon sink which is getting impacted by anthropogenic disturbances. Through this analysis, the book covers various strategies for the conservation and management of coastal ecosystems, considering their unique ecological and biogeochemical attributes and region-specific threats and impacts. The book will be of interest to a wide range of readers including students, researchers and professionals in coastal ecosystem science, coastal pollution, climate change adaptation, biodiversity conservation and environmental management.

This detailed exposition gives background and context to how modern biogeography has got to where it is now. For biogeographers and other researchers interested in biodiversity and the evolution of life on islands, Biogeology: Evolution in a Changing Landscape provides an overview of a large swathe of the globe encompassing Wallacea and the western Pacific. The book contains the full text of the original article explored in each chapter, presented as it appeared on publication. Key features: Holistic treatment, collecting together a series of important biogeographical papers into a single volume Authored by an expert who has spent nearly three decades actively involved in biogeography Describes and interprets a region of exceptional biodiversity and extreme endemism The only book to provide an integrated treatment of Wallacea, Melanesia, New Zealand, the New Zealand Subantarctic Islands and Antarctica Offers a critique of fashionable neo-dispersalist arguments, showing how these still suffer from the same weaknesses of the original Darwinian formulation. The chapters also include analysis of many major theoretical and philosophical issues of modern biogeographic theory, so that those interested in a more philosophical approach will find the book stimulating and thought-provoking.

"A major event in botany." -- The New York Times
.,."will be the definitive work well into the next century." --Library Journal
"Flora of North America moves forward steadily, remorselessly, impressively....The level of detail makes the work accessible to a range of users, and the text is clearly written and set out for the non-specialist." -- Plant Talk
Volume 5 is the third volume of nineteen on dicots to be published in the Flora of North America series. It treats more than 740 species in 74 genera and three families in the following orders of the subclass Caryophyllidae: Caryophyllales (Pink order); Polygonales (Buckwheat order); and Plumbaginales (Leadwort order). Approximately 60% of the species are endemic to North America north of Mexico, and 19% are known as naturalized elements of the flora.
Of the 74 genera treated, 20 are represented in the flora by introduced species, and 13 of the genera have all their species endemic to the region. One of the five largest genera in North America, Eriogonum (Polygonaceae), is represented in the flora area by 225 of its 248 species, with nearly 200 of them endemic. Each of the genera treated in the volume has one or more representative species illustrated with a line drawing. These, in combination with the key and descriptions, will facilitate identification of the group of plants.
For more information about the Flora of North America series, including a complete listing of the genera in Volume 5, visit www.oup.com/us/fnaseries
New lower price! The list price of all volumes in the Flora of North America series have now been reduced to $95 (from $120)

This book discusses soil and recycling management in the Anthropocene era. Nitrogen shortage is one of nature's most important productivity regulators, but since the advent of technical nitrogen fixation (TNF), biological nitrogen fixation (BNF) input has nearly doubled, particularly in grass and arable lands covering over 13 million km2 of the Earth's surface. This book explores how monoculture grass, arable lands and forests are often over fertilized with TNF, animal slurries, sewage sludge, or municipally produced composts, and as a result, flora and fauna that have adapted to a nitrogen shortage in the soil will have to adjust to a surplus; those that are unable to adapt will disappear.

The interactions of biogeochemical cycles influence and maintain our climate system. Land use and fossil fuel emissions are currently impacting the biogeochemical cycles of carbon, nitrogen and sulfur on land, in the atmosphere, and in the oceans.
This edited volume brings together 27 scholarly contributions on the state of our knowledge of earth system interactions among the oceans, land, and atmosphere. A unique feature of this treatment is the focus on the paleoclimatic and paleobiotic context for investigating these complex interrelationships.
* Eight-page colour insert to highlight the latest research
* A unique feature of this treatment is the focus on the paleoclimatic context for investigating these complex interrelationships.

This book is a summary and analysis of the status of biodiversity in the United States, and is aimed at both the general reader and professional. It is based on information collected by the Nature Conservancy , and they hope that this book will constribute towards the problem of threatened biodiversity.

This open access book synthesizes leading-edge science and management information about forest and rangeland soils of the United States. It offers ways to better understand changing conditions and their impacts on soils, and explores directions that positively affect the future of forest and rangeland soil health. This book outlines soil processes and identifies the research needed to manage forest and rangeland soils in the United States. Chapters give an overview of the state of forest and rangeland soils research in the Nation, including multi-decadal programs (chapter 1), then summarizes various human-caused and natural impacts and their effects on soil carbon, hydrology, biogeochemistry, and biological diversity (chapters 2-5). Other chapters look at the effects of changing conditions on forest soils in wetland and urban settings (chapters 6-7). Impacts include: climate change, severe wildfires, invasive species, pests and diseases, pollution, and land use change. Chapter 8 considers approaches to maintaining or regaining forest and rangeland soil health in the face of these varied impacts. Mapping, monitoring, and data sharing are discussed in chapter 9 as ways to leverage scientific and human resources to address soil health at scales from the landscape to the individual parcel (monitoring networks, data sharing Web sites, and educational soils-centered programs are tabulated in appendix B). Chapter 10 highlights opportunities for deepening our understanding of soils and for sustaining long-term ecosystem health and appendix C summarizes research needs. Nine regional summaries (appendix A) offer a more detailed look at forest and rangeland soils in the United States and its Affiliates.

This book simulates a historical walk through nature, teaching readers about the biodiversity on Earth in various eras with a focus on past terrestrial environments. Geared towards a student audience, using simple terms and avoiding long complex explanations, the book discusses the plants and animals that lived on land, the evolution of natural systems, and how these biological systems changed over time in geological and paleontological contexts. With easy-to-understand and scientifically accurate and up-to-date information, readers will be guided through major biological events from the Earth's past. The topics in the book represent a broad paleoenvironmental spectrum of interests and educational modules, allowing for virtual visits to rich geological times. Eras and events that are discussed include, but are not limited to, the much varied Quaternary environments, the evolution of plants and animals during the Cenozoic, the rise of angiosperms, vertebrate evolution and ecosystems in the Mesozoic, the Permian mass extinction, the late Paleozoic glaciation, and the origin of the first trees and land plants in the Devonian-Ordovician. With state-of-the art expert scientific instruction on these topics and up-to-date and scientifically accurate illustrations, this book can serve as an international course for students, teachers, and other interested individuals.

This book presents important recent applied mathematics research on environmental problems and impacts due to climate change. Although there are inherent difficulties in addressing phenomena that are part of such a complex system, exploration of the subject using mathematical modelling is especially suited to tackling poorly understood issues in the field. It is in this spirit that the book was conceived. It is an outcome of the International INDAM Workshop "Mathematical Approach to Climate Change Impacts - MAC2I", held in Rome in March 2017. The workshop comprised four sessions, on Ecosystems, Hydrology, Glaciology, and Monitoring. The book includes peer-reviewed contributions on research issues discussed during each of these sessions or generated by collaborations among the specialists involved. Accurate parameter determination techniques are explained and innovative mathematical modelling approaches, presented. The book also provides useful material and mathematical problem-solving tools for doctoral programs dealing with the complexities of climate change.

Deserts provide a harsh and inhospitable environment for plants and animals, and the ecosystem is correspondingly fragile and prone to disruption by a variety of external factors. The Mojave Desert is a winter-rainfall desert, experiencing drought in the summer months, and occasional rain during the cooler winter months. For many years, it has attracted the attention of ecologists and conservation biologists concerned to maintain the unique status of this region. This book provides a broad overview of plant and animal ecology in the Mojave Desert, presented with a focus on data from Rock Valley, Nevada. The data from many major research projects is synthesized into a description of community structure and dynamics in desert ecosystems.

This volume explores major wetland ecosystem services, such as climate cooling and water quality improvement, and discusses the recent wetland conservation and restoration activities in China and neighboring countries. The role of wetlands in either cooling or warming the climate is analyzed as the net balance between carbon sequestration and emissions of methane and nitrous oxide. Wetlands start off having a net warming effect on the climate but in time switch to net cooling. Further, they remove 40% of the N and P from run-off and groundwater flow in agricultural areas, but wetlands need to amount to 10% of the total catchment area to make a difference. Reflecting on the recent large investment in wetland ecological studies in China and neighboring countries, the book addresses invasive species in coastal wetlands as well as the protection and wise use of tidal flats around the Yellow Sea. It also presents promising regional case studies on wetland restoration. The book is intended for academics, students and practitioners in the field of wetland ecology, management and restoration, as well as consultants and professionals working in conservation, wise use and environmental policy.

The contents of this book are the syntheses of studies of tropical catchments carried out in three continents — Central/South America, Africa and Asia — in the 1990s, mostly through the support of the EU Science and Technology for Development programme. Each chapter reflects on a particular aspect of the seemingly intractable problem: achieving and understanding tropical rural development without compromising longer-term sustainability of the soil and water systems which underpin it. The studies encompass examples of erosion measurement; of scaling measurements from plots to estimates for catchments; of erosion control and conservation techniques at soil and ecosystem levels; of the limits to uses of fragile tropical soils; of the effects of runoff combined with regulation on rivers and reservoirs; of the importance of indigenous people in the development processes and of the value and limitations of modelling at scales from soils to catchment. There is no single message from the book because there is no single solution to the problems of achieving sustainable tropical development. The Sustainable Management of Tropical Catchments presents ideas, techniques and case studies, knowledge of which will help researchers in many scientific and social disciplines to understand the complexities better, and politicians and bureaucrats to understand the consequences of development decisions and learn from the failure of many earlier ones.

Not Good Enough for Canada investigates the development of Canadian immigration policy with respect to persons with a disease or disability throughout the twentieth century. With an emphasis on social history, this book examines the way the state operates through legislation to achieve its goals of self-preservation even when such legislation contradicts state commitments to equality rights. Looking at the ways federal politicians, mainstream media, and the judicial system have perceived persons with disabilities, specifically immigrant applicants with disabilities, this book reveals how Canadian immigration policy has systematically omitted any reference to this group, rendering them socially invisible.

This is the first book that analyses the future raw materials supply from the demand side of a society that chiefly relies on renewable energies, which is of great significance for us all. It addresses primary and secondary resources and substitution, not only from technical but also socioeconomic and ethical points of view. The "Energiewende" (Energy Transition) will change our consumption of natural resources significantly. When in future our energy requirements will be covered mostly by wind, solar power and biomass, we will need less coal, oil and natural gas. However, the consumption of minerals, especially metallic resources, will increase to build wind generators, solar panels or energy storage facilities. Besides e.g. copper, nickel or cobalt, rare earth elements and other high-tech elements will be increasingly used. With regard to primary metals, Germany is 100 % import dependent; only secondary material is produced within Germany. Though sufficient geological primary resources exist worldwide, their availability on the market is crucial. The future supply of the market is dependent on the development of prices, the transparency of the market and the question of social and ethical standards in the raw materials industry, as well as the social license to operate, which especially applies to mining. The book offers a valuable resource for everyone interested in the future raw material supply of our way of life, which will involve more and more renewable energies.

This work summarizes the science and management of a rapidly expanding topic in climate science, namely adaptation and mitigation. The term 'blue carbon' refers to the rates, pathways and volumes of greenhouse carbon sequestered in coastal estuarine and marine ecosystems such as salt marshes, mangroves and seagrass meadows. Blue carbon and its vital role in climate change mitigation are central to this book. Readers find summaries and analysis of both the basic scientific data and data from blue carbon field projects, and a practical guide on how to manage a successful blue carbon field project. There is a discussion on how to maximize the carbon sequestration and consideration of whether blue carbon projects make a difference. The work is not only of interest to scholars involved in climate science, but also those in the marine sciences, and those in ecosystem ecology, biogeochemistry; geochemistry; estuarine and marine plant ecology.

Having been the fourth largest lake on the globe roughly 50 years ago, today the Aral Sea no longer exists. Human activities caused its desiccation and the formation of a huge new desert, the Aralkum, which can be regarded as one of the greatest ecological catastrophes and - at the same time - the largest primary succession experiment of mankind.

This volume brings together the results of international and interdisciplinary long-term studies on the new desert ecosystem and is divided into four main sections. The first section provides an overview of the physical characteristics of the area and covers geological, pedological, geomorphological and climatological aspects and their dynamics, especially dust-storm dynamics. The second focuses on the biotic aspects and highlights the spatial and temporal patterns of the flora and fauna. In the third section studies and projects aiming to combat desertification by phytomelioration and to develop strategies for the conservation of biodiversity are presented. The book is rounded off with a section providing a synthesis and conclusions.