Shortlisted for The Marsh Award 2009 Tina's life in Germany had been so happy, it never occurred to her that one day her parents might split. Or - worse still - send her back to Greece to live with her grandmother! But Tina doesn't mind anything anymore. She's found the answer. With the help of her friend Wick, and a really amazing little blue pill... then lots more amazing little pills... then lots of really incredible lies... Sometimes it's as if she's in heaven, sometimes she's crashing back down to earth, and now - there's no return. Or is there?

The development of computer simulation models is an important growth area in both pure and applied ecology. The opportunity that mathematical models provide to integrate the components of an ecosystem, results in the ability to make quantitative predictions about the future behaviour of that system, or of elements within it. This means that they are powerful tools with wide applications and enormous potential for increasing our understanding of natural systems and our ability to use them in a sustainable way. This book is, almost uniquely, a complete account of one such model, the Hurley Pasture Model, a dynamic, deterministic, mechanistic simulation model for grassland, which has been developed by the author over some twenty years, in collaboration with scientists at several centres. Firstly, the rationale and theoretical elements of this type of model are described. An overview of the Hurley grassland simulator and the derivation and construction of its plant, animal, soil and litter, water, and environment and management components is then given. Next, the model is evaluated by a series of long and short-term dynamic simulations and steady state responses, which demonstrate how predictions can be made about the effects of, for example, climate change or particular regimes of fertilizer application, grazing or cutting. This book will be of great value to grassland agronomists and modellers, crop physiologists and plant ecologists, and to students of ecology as a case study of a plant ecosystem model. It will also be of interest to other ecologists and environmentalists and those in the field of computer modelling and its applications.

Bringing together the disciplines of agriculture, animal science, plant science and ecology, this book explores how mathematics can be used to understand and explain agricultural processes. It starts by providing a review of the mathematical models currently available to agriculturalists, and the philosophy behind, and objectives of, modeling. The book then applies these techniques to real-life problems faced by people managing crops and animals, including the influence of digestion on animal growth rates and levels of photosynthesis on crop yield.