Essentials of Ecology

Part I: Introduction.1. Ecology and How To Do It.Introduction.Scales, diversity, and rigor.Questions of scale.The diversity of ecological evidence.Statistics and scientific rigor.Ecology in practice.The brown trout in New Zealand - effects on individuals, populations, communities and ecosystems.Successions on old fields in Minnesota - a study in time and space.Hubbard Brook - a long-term commitment of large-scale significance.A model study: genetically modified crops - bad for biodiversity?Summary.Review Questions.2. The Ecology of Evolution.Introduction.Evolution by natural selection.Evolution within species.Geographical variation within species.Variation within a species with man-made selection pressures.Adaptive peaks and specialized abysses.The ecology of speciation.What do we mean by a "species"?Islands and speciation.The effects of climate change on the evolution and distribution of species.The effects of continental drift on the ecology of evolution.Interpreting the results of evolution: convergent and parallel evolution.Summary.Review Questions.Web Research Questions.Part II: Conditions and Resources:3. Physical Conditions and the Availability of Resources.Introduction.Environmental conditions.What do we mean by "harsh," "benign," and "extreme"?Effects of conditions.Conditions as stimuli.The effects of conditions on interactions between organisms.Responses by sedentary organisms.Animal responses to environmental temperature.Microorganisms in extreme environments.Plant resources.Solar radiation.Water.Mineral nutrients.Carbon dioxide.Animals and their resources.Nutritional needs and provisions.Defense.The effect of intraspecific competition for resources.Conditions, resources, and the ecological niche.Summary.Review .Questions.4. Conditions, Resources, and the World's Communities.Introduction.Geographical patterns at large and small scales.Large-scale climatic patterns.Small-scale patterns in conditions and resources.Patterns in conditions and resources in aquatic environments.Temporal patterns in conditions and resources - succession.The terrestrial biomes.Describing and classifying biomes.Tropical rain forest.Savanna.Temperate grasslands.Desert.Temperate forest.Northern coniferous forest (taiga) grading into tundra.Aquatic environments.Stream ecology.Lake ecology.The oceans.Coasts.Estuaries.Summary.Review Questions.Web Research Questions.Part III: Individuals, Populations, Communities, and Ecosystems:5. Birth, Death, and Movement.Introduction.What is an individual?Counting individuals, births, and deaths.Life cycles.Life cycles and reproduction.Annual life cycles.Longer life cycles.Monitoring birth and death: life tables and fecundity schedules.Annual life tables.Life tables for populations with overlapping generations.A classification of survivorship curves.Dispersal and migration.Dispersal determining abundance.The role of migration.The impact of intraspecific competition on populations.Patterns of population growth.Life history patterns.Summary.Review Questions.6. Interspecific Competition.Introduction.Ecological effects of interspecific competition.Competition between diatoms for silicate.Coexistence and exclusion of competing salmonid fishes.Some general observations.Coexistence and exclusion of competing bumble bees.Coexistence of competing diatoms.Coexistence of competing rodents and ants.The Competitive Exclusion Principle.Environmental heterogeneity.Evolutionary effects of interspecific competition.Character displacement and release in the Indian mongoose.Canadian sticklebacks.Interspecific competition and community structureLimiting resources and the regulation of diversity in phytoplankton communities.Bumble bees in Colorado.Aggregation alters competitive interactions in plant communities.Niche differentiation amongst animals and amongst plants.How significant is interspecific competition in practice?The prevalence of current competition.Competition or mere chance?Summary.Review Questions.7. Organisms as Habitats.Introduction.Hosts as habitats.Life on the surface of another organism.Inhabitants of the body cavity.Inhabitants of host tissues and cells.Hosts as responsive habitats.Changes in the growth and form of hosts caused by their inhabitants.Changes in host behavior caused by their inhabitants.Immune and other defensive responses of the host.Distribution and regulation of parasites and mutualists within hosts and their populations.Life cycles and dispersal.Coevolution.Summary.Review Questions.8. Predation, Grazing, and Disease.Introduction.Prey fitness and abundance.The subtleties of predation.Interactions with other factors.Compensation and defense by individual prey.From individual prey to prey populations.Predator behavior - foraging and transmission.Foraging behavior.Population dynamics of predation.The underlying dynamics of predator-prey interactions: a tendency to cycle.Predator-prey cycles in practice.Disease dynamics and cycles.Crowding.Predators and prey in patches.Predation and community structure.Summary.Review Questions.9. Population Processes - the Big Picture.Introduction.Multiple determinants of the dynamics of populations.Fluctuation or stability?Theories of species abundance.Key-factor analysis.Dispersal, patches, and metapopulation dynamics.Temporal patterns in community composition.Founder-controlled and dominance-controlled communities.Community succession.Food webs.Indirect and direct effects.Top-down or bottom-up control of food webs.Community stability and food web structure.Summary.Review Questions.10. Patterns in Species Richness.Introduction.A simple model of species richness.Spatially varying factors that influence species richness.Productivity and resource richness.Predation intensity.Spatial heterogeneity.Environmental harshness.Temporally varying factors that influence species richness.Climatic variation.Disturbance.Environmental age: evolutionary time.Gradients of species richness.Habitat area and remoteness - island biogeography.Latitudinal gradients.Gradients with altitude and depth.Gradients during community succession.Patterns in taxon richness in the fossil record.Appraisal of patterns in species richness.Summary.Review Questions.11. The Flux of Energy and Matter Through Ecosystems.Introduction.Primary productivity.Geographical patterns in primary productivity.Factors limiting primary productivity.The fate of primary productivity.Relationship between primary and secondary productivity.The fundamental importance of energy transfer efficiencies.Relative roles of the "live-consumer" and "decomposer" systems.The process of decomposition.The decomposers: bacteria and fungi.The detritivores and specialist microbivores.Consumption of plant detritus.Consumption of feces and carrion.The flux of matter through ecosystems.Nutrient budgets in terrestrial ecosystems.Nutrient budgets in aquatic communities.Global biogeochemical cycles.The hydrological cycle.The phosphorus cycle.The nitrogen cycle.The sulfur cycle.The carbon cycle.Human impacts on biogeochemical cycles.Summary.Review Questions.Web Research Questions.Part IV: Applied Issues in Ecology:12. Sustainability.Introduction.The human population "problem".Introduction.Population growth up to the present.Predicting the future.Two future inevitabilities.A global carrying capacity.Harvesting living resources from the wild.Fisheries - maximum sustainable yields.Obtaining MSYs through fixed quotas.Obtaining MSYs through fixed effort.Beyond MSY.The farming of monocultures.Degradation and erosion of soil.Sustainability of water as a resource.Pest control.Aims of pest control: economic injury levels and action thresholds.The problems with chemical pesticides - and their virtues.Biological control.Integrated farming systems.Forecasting agriculturally driven global environmental change.Summary.Review Questions.13. Pollution.Introduction.Urban Pollution.Burial and cremation.Feces, urine, and other urban waste.Agriculture pollution.Intensive livestock management.Nitrate.Pesticides.Atmospheric pollution.Carbon dioxide - a major atmospheric pollutant.The greenhouse effect.Acid rain.Thinning of the ozone layer.Nuclear radiation.Mining and quarrying.Restoration ecology.Summary.Review Questions.14. Conservation.Introduction.Threats to species.Overexploitation.Habitat disruption.Introduced species.Possible genetic problems in small populations.A review of risks.The dynamics of small populations.Conservation in practice.Species management plans.Ex situ conservation.Protected areas.Restoration ecology.Finale - a healthy approach to conservation.Summary.Review Questions.Web Research Questions.