Graph theory can be applied to ecological questions in many ways, and more insights can be gained by expanding the range of graph theoretical concepts applied to a specific system. But how do you know which methods might be used? And what do you do with the graph once it has been obtained? This book provides a broad introduction to the application of graph theory in different ecological systems, providing practical guidance for researchers in ecology and related fields. Readers are guided through the creation of an appropriate graph for the system being studied, including the application of spatial, spatio-temporal, and more abstract structural process graphs. Simple figures accompany the explanations to add clarity, and a broad range of ecological phenomena from many ecological systems are covered. This is the ideal book for graduate students and researchers looking to apply graph theoretical methods in their work.

Swamps are for draining--for converting into housing projects and farmland. Or at least that's been the theory ever since European settlers rolled across the continent a century ago.

We've drained a lot of swamps since then. Nationwide, we've "reclaimed" _____% of our wetlands. In Kansas, where we've been particularly diligent, only 4% of our original wetlands remain.

Now we realize we needed them. Wetlands, it turns out, are vital pieces of the unfathomable, intricate system that sustains life on earth.

Among the wetlands that remain, a few are outstanding for their size, location, and role in feeding and sheltering vast numbers of birds and other wildlife. Cheyenne Bottoms, waystation for hundreds of thousands of migrating shorebirds, songbirds, and waterfowl, is one of the most important wetlands in North America.

Located in central Kansas, on the main migration highway between wintering grounds in South America and breeding territory in Canada, the 41,000 acre marsh called Cheyenne Bottoms is a critical refueling stop for migrating birds. It hosts 90% of the populations of five species of shorebirds as well as most of the remaining population of the endangered Whooping Crane and several other threatened and endangered species. Because of its critical role, it has been designated by treaty as a wetland of international importance.

In this book, ecologist/ornithologist John Zimmerman provides an introduction to the Bottoms that is at once personal, impassioned, and technically accurate. He describes the Bottoms from many vantage points. He talks of its history, from its formation 100,000 years ago to the fight to preserve it today. He describes the life there--the rich variety of birds, mammals, and reptiles to whom Cheyenne Bottoms is home. He tells of the jeopardy in which the Bottoms finds itself--buffetted by vagaries of weather, climate changes, irrigation and water rights, and politics. He also traces the grass roots effort to save the Bottoms that brought together conservation groups, garden clubs, grade school and high school students, and the state government. Finally, he talks about solutions, both long- and short-term.

For readers of all levels of interest and expertise, this guide provides a clear, informative look at the ecology and biology of the dunes. Botanically accurate drawings by the author illustrate more than 50 trees, shrubs, vines, herbs, and grasses that can be found on the dunes. Keys, brief descriptions, and other facts about the plants also aid in identification.

Ecologists traditionally regard time as part of the background against which ecological interactions play out. In this book, Eric Post argues that time should be treated as a resource used by organisms for growth, maintenance, and offspring production. Post uses insights from phenology-the study of the timing of life-cycle events-to present a theoretical framework of time in ecology that casts long-standing observations in the field in an entirely new light. Combining conceptual models with field data, he demonstrates how phenological advances, delays, and stasis, documented in an array of taxa, can all be viewed as adaptive components of an organism's strategic use of time. Post shows how the allocation of time by individual organisms to critical life history stages is not only a response to environmental cues but also an important driver of interactions at the population, species, and community levels. To demonstrate the applications of this exciting new conceptual framework, Time in Ecology uses meta-analyses of previous studies as well as Post's original data on the phenological dynamics of plants, caribou, and muskoxen in Greenland.

The paleoecological history of the Americas is as complex as the region is broad: stretching from the Arctic Circle to Tierra del Fuego, the New World features some of the most extraordinary vegetation on the planet. But until now it has lacked a complete natural history. Alan Graham remedies that with "A Natural History of the New World." With plants as his scientific muse, Graham traces the evolution of ecosystems, beginning in the Late Cretaceous period (about 100 million years ago) and ending in the present, charting their responses to changes in geology and climate. By highlighting plant communities' roles in the environmental history of the Americas, Graham offers an overdue balance to natural histories that focus exclusively on animals. Plants are important in evolution's splendid drama. Not only are they conspicuous and conveniently stationary components of the Earth's ecosystems, but their extensive fossil record allows for a thorough reconstruction of the planet's paleoenvironments. What's more, plants provide oxygen, function as food and fuel, and provide habitat and shelter; in short, theirs is a history that can speak to many other areas of evolution. "A Natural History of the New World "is an ambitious and unprecedented synthesis written by one of the world's leading scholars of botany and geology.

This book covers selected topics on research methods in modern ecology, through the lens of 8 chapters, focusing on animal ecology, landcover assessment and habitat change, human perspectives and management, and research techniques, with examples taken from the Indian subcontinent. This area has emerged as one of the pivotal zones where cutting edge applications may be tested. Topics examined include the development and management of computer software techniques and the syntheses of these into pre-existing research methods, chemical analyses, including studies of animal dietary and foraging patterns, landcover, habitat and plant ecological change and even human/animal relations, and genetic studies. Remote sensing and geographical information systems are considered as cutting-edge research methods, at small, medium and large-scale levels, including more accurate positioning systems, more sensitive tracking systems, the removal of obstacles to clearer observation and species identification, such as darkness and poor lighting, dense vegetation and coarse image resolution and more comparative studies across different local contexts and global ecosystems. The topics cover geoinformatics applications to forest management in India, the paradigm shifts in this area, and the promotion and integration of sustainable forest management (SFM) and geoinformatics within the National Working Plan Code. Another case study is of Geoinformatics, Climate Change, Habitat Dynamics and a Case of Vultures in Central India, focusing on vulture ecology and related climatic variables, assessed with geoinformatics, Species Distribution Models (SDMs) and Global Circulation Models (GCMs). Other topics concern the use of tracking technologies including drones, the use of thermal and infrared drones in the study of large mammalian carnivores, the role of remote sensing and GIS in the assessment of natural resource development, clustering around the central concept of change detection, and the monitoring of agricultural development using socio-cultural parameters. This book presents these issues as some factors among the vast number of current ecological issues.

Carnivorous plants have fascinated botanists, evolutionary biologists, ecologists, physiologists, developmental biologists, anatomists, horticulturalists, and the general public for centuries. Charles Darwin was the first scientist to demonstrate experimentally that some plants could actually attract, kill, digest, and absorb nutrients from insect prey; his book Insectivorous Plants (1875) remains a widely-cited classic. Since then, many movies and plays, short stories, novels, coffee-table picture books, and popular books on the cultivation of carnivorous plants have been produced. However, all of these widely read products depend on accurate scientific information, and most of them have repeated and recycled data from just three comprehensive, but now long out of date, scientific monographs. The field has evolved and changed dramatically in the nearly 30 years since the last of these books was published, and thousands of scientific papers on carnivorous plants have appeared in the academic journal literature. In response, Ellison and Adamec have assembled the world's leading experts to provide a truly modern synthesis. They examine every aspect of physiology, biochemistry, genomics, ecology, and evolution of these remarkable plants, culminating in a description of the serious threats they now face from over-collection, poaching, habitat loss, and climatic change which directly threaten their habitats and continued persistence in them.

The world's mediterranean-type climate regions (including areas within the Mediterranean, South Africa, Australia, California, and Chile) have long been of interest to biologists by virtue of their extraordinary biodiversity and the appearance of evolutionary convergence between these disparate regions. These regions contain many rare and endemic species. Their mild climate makes them appealing places to live and visit and this has resulted in numerous threats to the species and communities that occupy them. Threats include a wide range of factors such as habitat loss due to development and agriculture, disturbance, invasive species, and climate change. As a result, they continue to attract far more attention than their limited geographic area might suggest. This book provides a concise but comprehensive introduction to mediterranean-type ecosystems. It is an accessible text which provides an authoritative overview of the topic. As with other books in the Biology of Habitats Series, the emphasis in this book is on the organisms that dominate these regions although their management, conservation, and restoration are also considered.

Over the last decade, molecular studies carried out on the Australasian biota have revealed a new world of organic structure that exists from submicroscopic to continental scale. Furthermore, in studies of global biogeography and evolution, DNA sequencing has shown that many large groups, such as flowering plants, passerine birds and squamates, have their basal components in this area. Using examples ranging from kangaroos and platypuses to kiwis and birds of paradise, the book examines the patterns of distribution and evolution of Australasian biodiversity and explains them with reference to tectonic and climatic change in the region. The surprising results from molecular biogeography demonstrate that an understanding of evolution in Australasia is essential for understanding the development of modern life on Earth. A milestone in the literature on this subject, this book will be a valuable source of reference for students and researchers in biogeography, biodiversity, ecology and conservation.

Until now, biological invasions have been conceptualised and studied mainly as a linear process: from introduction to establishment to spread. This volume charts a new course for the field, drawing on key developments in network ecology and complexity science. It defines an agenda for Invasion Science 2.0 by providing new framings and classification of research topics and by offering tentative solutions to vexing problems. In particular, it conceptualises a transformative ecosystem as an open adaptive network with critical transitions and turnover, with resident species heuristically learning and fine-tuning their niches and roles in a multiplayer eco-evolutionary game. It erects signposts pertaining to network interactions, structures, stability, dynamics, scaling, and invasibility. It is not a recipe book or a road map, but an atlas of possibilities: a 'hitchhiker's guide'.

In Rio Grande do Sul, Southern Brazil, there are hundreds of Eucalyptus forest farms for pulp production distributed in several municipalities. In these pulpwood production farms, a major forestry restoration project is underway for Permanent Preservation Areas, which have peculiarities that may favor or hinder restoration. In this compilation, in order to search for alternatives for the restoration of these Permanent Preservation Areas, the planting of seedlings of native species in nuclei is implemented and evaluated as an alternative technique to traditional reforestation with total area plantation. Suitable techniques for forest restoration in mined areas are also explored, with the goal of attaining environmental sustainability for the bauxite mining in the region. Thus, by monitoring of mined and restored areas, 146 native species of the Atlantic Forest were found, 61 in the planting of seedlings, 97 in the inventories for evaluation of these plantings and 92 in natural regeneration. The authors set out to elucidate the underlying processes modeled by diversity and community composition with respect to aboveground biomass during succession in an Amazon forest in order to devise better passive restoration plans. 45 20m x 50m (1000 m2) plots were sampled across three sites in secondary forests, having different stand ages after shifting cultivation, and an old-growth forest located in the Northern Amazon forest, Venezuela. One study discusses how, due to the environmental heterogeneity conditions, active restoration measures are fundamental in degraded areas where natural regeneration is limited, mainly due to the absence of fragments in the landscape. Finally, it is emphasized that passive restoration is playing an important role in the ecosystem services recovery at local-scale. In the penultimate study, the authors compare the floristic composition and structure of the natural regeneration stratum of a 23-year-old restored forest with an adjacent dense ombrophilous forest. For this purpose, 60 plots with dimensions of 3x3 m (9m(2)) were equally and systematically distributed in these two areas. All shrub-tree individuals with height <30 cm and circumference at breast height <15 cm in these plots were included and their heights and diameter at ground level were measured. Lastly, the dynamics of soil use and coverage in a region under the influence of mining activities are explored. This region is located in Minas Gerais state, more specifically in the municipalities of Sao Sebastiao da Vargem Alegre e Mirai -- both located in Zona da Mata Mineira.

Have you ever wondered how plants attract certain insects, or how insects communicate with each other? This book explains the natural chemical compounds that determine the fascinating interactions between plants and insects providing a gentle and absorbing introduction to organic chemistry that is highly relevant to everyday life and to the natural world. Specific organic compounds and intriguing chemistry determine whether insects are keen on feeding on plants or avoid certain plants altogether. Some insects have learned to use plant compounds as their own defences, and some plants use digestive processes to use insects as nutritional supplements. Plant-insect interactions are vital for our food supply, for pollination of orchards or detrimentally in insect infestations of crops, as well as in applications like silk production. By the author of the popular book, The Chemistry of Plants: Perfumes, Pigments, and Poisons, this book benefits from Margareta Sequin's vast experience leading field trips and seminars to botanical gardens and nature reserves, and teaching chemistry to beginners. Organic chemistry is often seen as a challenging, sometimes abstract field. This book makes chemistry exciting and accessible for readers interested in a deeper understanding of the natural world. The book is organized according to the increasing complexity of compounds introduced, and so it also serves as a useful teaching aid for undergraduate chemistry or biology courses, and as a supplementary text for students in plant sciences, ecology, and entomology, and in horticultural programs.

The application and interpretation of statistics are central to ecological study and practice. Ecologists are now asking more sophisticated questions than in the past. These new questions, together with the continued growth of computing power and the availability of new software, have created a new generation of statistical techniques. These have resulted in major recent developments in both our understanding and practice of ecological statistics. This novel book synthesizes a number of these changes, addressing key approaches and issues that tend to be overlooked in other books such as missing/censored data, correlation structure of data, heterogeneous data, and complex causal relationships. These issues characterize a large proportion of ecological data, but most ecologists' training in traditional statistics simply does not provide them with adequate preparation to handle the associated challenges. Uniquely, Ecological Statistics highlights the underlying links among many statistical approaches that attempt to tackle these issues. In particular, it gives readers an introduction to approaches to inference, likelihoods, generalized linear (mixed) models, spatially or phylogenetically-structured data, and data synthesis, with a strong emphasis on conceptual understanding and subsequent application to data analysis. Written by a team of practicing ecologists, mathematical explanations have been kept to the minimum necessary. This user-friendly textbook will be suitable for graduate students, researchers, and practitioners in the fields of ecology, evolution, environmental studies, and computational biology who are interested in updating their statistical tool kits. A companion web site provides example data sets and commented code in the R language.

Tropical East Asia is home to over one billion people and faces massive human impacts from its rising population and rapid economic growth. It has already lost more than half of its forest cover to agriculture and urbanization, and has the highest rates of deforestation and logging in the tropics. Habitat loss, coupled with hunting and the relentless trade in wildlife products, threatens all its large and many of its smaller vertebrates. Despite these problems, the region still supports an estimated 15-25% of global terrestrial biodiversity and a growing environmental awareness means that it is no longer assumed that economic development justifies environmental damage, and no longer accepted that this trade-off is inevitable. Effective conservation action now depends on integrating a clear understanding of the ecological patterns and processes in the region with the varied needs of its human population. This third edition continues to provide an overview of the terrestrial ecology of Tropical East Asia: from southern China to Indonesia, and from Bhutan and Bangladesh to the Ryukyu Islands of Japan. It retains the balance between compactness and comprehensiveness of the previous editions, and the even-handed geographical treatment of the whole region, but it updates both the contents and the perspective. Approximately one third of the text is new or greatly modified, reflecting the explosion of new research in the region in the last few years and the increasing use of new tools, particularly from genomics and remote sensing. The change in perspective largely reflects the growing realization that we are in a new epoch, the Anthropocene, in which human activities have at least as large an influence as natural processes, and that stopping or reversing ecological change is no longer an option. This does not mean that biodiversity conservation is no longer possible or worthwhile, but that the biodiverse future we strive for will inevitably be very different from the past. The Ecology of Tropical East Asia is an advanced textbook suitable for senior undergraduate and graduate level students taking courses on the terrestrial ecology of the East Asian tropics, as well as an authoritative regional reference for professional ecologists, conservationists, and interested amateurs worldwide.

This book has been written in an attempt to advance people's knowledge on the Lima bean (Phaseolus lunatus) crop in tropical and sub-tropical regions. The Lima bean is an important species of plant for humans in tropical regions and its seeds are considered an important source of protein for people from South America, Africa, and Mexico. There is little information about the Lima bean crop regarding its origin, diversity, evolution, growth and production. This book encompasses nine chapters on the topic to provide a broad knowledge of this fascinating crop. The first three chapters cover the origin, diversity and evolution of the crop, including important information from Mexico and Brazil. Chapter Four covers the phenology and development of the Lima bean aiming to understand all periods of growth. Chapter Five shows important information for plant production regarding soil, chemical and organic fertilisation. Chapters Six and Seven explain all aspects related to biological nitrogen fixation with information about soil bacterial diversity and the potential to fix the problem in tropical soil. Chapter Eight reports important diseases related to the Lima bean and their management. Chapter Nine shows the social and economic importance of the Lima bean mainly for developing countries.

The rate of species and natural habitat loss across our planet is steadily accelerating. This book argues that existing practises of plant conservation are inadequate and firmly supports the placement of ecological restoration at the cornerstone of biodiversity conservation. The author unifies different aspects of conservation into one coherent concept, including natural area protection, ex situ conservation and in situ interventions through either population management or ecological restoration. Assisted colonization, experimentation, and utilization of threatened plant species are raised as crucial elements in restoration, with partly novel ecosystems being among its major target areas. Covering a wide spectrum of plant conservation examples, and offering practical methodologies alongside the theoretical context, this is a vital resource for students, research scientists and practitioners in conservation biology and restoration ecology.

This book covers a topic of current interest in flora, and it can be considered as a specialised work that will not go out of date for a long time. This book provides new insights into the area of plant taxonomy with respect to xeric conditions. This area, being a hostile and harsh climate, has been neglected for the comprehensive and scientific study point of view. This book is thus a contribution of over 10 years exploration and collection of plant specimens from the whole study area.

This book presents current research in the study of the ecology, economic uses and environmental impacts of algae. Topics include ultraviolet irradiation to control algal proliferation in the environment; alga Trachydiscus minutus as a new source of polyunsaturated fatty acids; systematics and taxonomic keys for the marine green algal family monostromataceae; the ecophysiology of soil algae; and an evaluation of the total phenolic content and antioxidant activities of crude extracts from red alga, Corallina elongata.

The Quaternary covers the last 2.5 million years in Earth's history. This unique period is well known for a record of oscillating climatic parameters. Fluctuating climates are reflected in peatbog profiles. Paleoecological studies using plant macrofossils, like bryophyte remains, have an important role in the reconstruction of past hydrological changes in lakes and peatbogs. Plant macrofossil analysis has been used most frequently in the oceanic regions of Europe, where the moisture gradient is reflected clearly in different Sphagnum taxa. This book discusses research in regard to the paleoecology of peatlands, with a particular emphasis placed on Hungary.

This volume documents healing traditions in Eastern Siberia in an area extending from Lake Baikal to the Arctic Ocean. The region shows an interesting unity in healing traditions across a wide range of landscape types and culture areas: from the taiga-steppe borderlands influenced by Tibetan and Russian practices in the south, to the north where regional shamanic traditions prevail. There are broad similarities in using unrefined natural materials for healing, as well as in a concern over the 'spiritual' foundations of health, with an accent upon the land as an important dimension. Due to this diversity, this region provides a strong point of comparison to ecologies in other parts of the circumpolar North. The chapters document a blossoming of autonomous healing traditions in post-Soviet Siberia resulting from a social crisis in the aftermath of the collapse of the previous centralized health system. It is a type of 'medical pluralism' marked by a popularity of alternate, non-clinical treatments. But, the sudden upsurge in autonomous cures also speaks to the silent survival of these knowledge traditions in a context where the official medical practice dominated the public sphere for seventy years.

From their ability to use energy from sunlight to make their own food, to combating attacks from diseases and predators, plants have evolved an amazing range of life-sustaining strategies. Written with the non-specialist in mind, John King's lively natural history explains how plants function, from how they gain energy and nutrition to how they grow, develop and ultimately die. New to this edition is a section devoted to plants and the environment, exploring how problems created by human activities, such as global warming, pollution of land, water and air, and increasing ocean acidity, are impacting on the lives of plants. King's narrative provides a simple, highly readable introduction, with boxes in each chapter offering additional or more advanced material for readers seeking more detail. He concludes that despite the challenges posed by growing environmental perils, plants will continue to dominate our planet.

Forest ecology includes within its scope the components and functions of forest ecosystems -- a community of organisms interacting with each other and with their physical environment. Forest ecosystems, which consist of bacteria, plants, birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, soil, water and air, differ from other ecosystems in that they are dominated by trees and other woody vegetation. Each of these components plays an important role in the function and health of the forest. This book presents important new research in the field.

Just like humans, animals and plants suffer from infectious diseases, which can critically threaten biodiversity. This book describes key studies that have driven our understanding of the ecology and evolution of wildlife diseases. Each chapter introduces the host and disease, and explains how that system has aided our general understanding of the evolution and spread of wildlife diseases, through the development and testing of important epidemiological and evolutionary theories. Questions addressed include: How do hosts and parasites co-evolve? What determines how fast a disease spreads through a population? How do co-infecting parasites interact? Why do hosts vary in parasite burden? Which factors determine parasite virulence and host resistance? How do parasites influence the spread of invasive species? How do we control infectious diseases in wildlife? This book will provide a valuable introduction to students new to the topic, and novel insights to researchers, professionals and policymakers working in the field.

There is a growing concern that many important ecosystems, such as coral reefs and tropical rain forests, might be at risk of sudden collapse as a result of human disturbance. At the same time, efforts to support the recovery of degraded ecosystems are increasing, through approaches such as ecological restoration and rewilding. Given the dependence of human livelihoods on the multiple benefits provided by ecosystems, there is an urgent need to understand the situations under which ecosystem collapse can occur, and how ecosystem recovery can best be supported. To help develop this understanding, this volume provides the first scientific account of the ecological mechanisms associated with the collapse of ecosystems and their subsequent recovery. After providing an overview of relevant theory, the text evaluates these ideas in the light of available empirical evidence, by profiling case studies drawn from both contemporary and prehistoric ecosystems. Implications for conservation policy and practice are then examined.