Preface to the Princeton Landmarks in Biology Edition vii Preface xi Symbols Used xiii 1. The Importance of Islands 3 2. Area and Number of Speicies 8 3. Further Explanations of the Area-Diversity Pattern 19 4. The Strategy of Colonization 68 5. Invasibility and the Variable Niche 94 6. Stepping Stones and Biotic Exchange 123 7. Evolutionary Changes Following Colonization 145 8. Prospect 181 Glossary 185 References 193 Index 201

The Theory of Island Biogeography

https://www.cs.princeton.edu/~schapire/papers/ecolmod.pdf

Maximum entropy modeling of species geographic distributions

Quantification of global forest change has been lacking despite the recognized importance of forest ecosystem services. In this study, Earth observation satellite data were used to map global forest loss (2.3 million square kilometers) and gain (0.8 million square kilometers) from 2000 to 2012 at a spatial resolution of 30 meters. The tropics were the only climate domain to exhibit a trend, with forest loss increasing by 2101 square kilometers per year. Brazil's well-documented reduction in deforestation was offset by increasing forest loss in Indonesia, Malaysia, Paraguay, Bolivia, Zambia, Angola, and elsewhere. Intensive forestry practiced within subtropical forests resulted in the highest rates of forest change globally. Boreal forest loss due largely to fire and forestry was second to that in the tropics in absolute and proportional terms. These results depict a globally consistent and locally relevant record of forest change.

High-Resolution Global Maps of 21st-Century Forest Cover Change

Prediction of species' distributions is central to diverse applications in ecology, evolution and conservation science. There is increasing electronic access to vast sets of occurrence records in museums and herbaria, yet little effective guidance on how best to use this information in the context of numerous approaches for modelling distributions. To meet this need, we compared 16 modelling methods over 226 species from 6 regions of the world, creating the most comprehensive set of model comparisons to date. We used presence-only data to fit models, and independent presence-absence data to evaluate the predictions. Along with well-established modelling methods such as generalised additive models and GARP and BIOCLIM, we explored methods that either have been developed recently or have rarely been applied to modelling species' distributions. These include machine-learning methods and community models, both of which have features that may make them particularly well suited to noisy or sparse information, as is typical of species' occurrence data. Presence-only data were effective for modelling species' distributions for many species and regions. The novel methods consistently outperformed more established methods. The results of our analysis are promising for the use of data from museums and herbaria, especially as methods suited to the noise inherent in such data improve.

/pdf/novel-methods-improve-prediction-of-species-distributions-3cmioqeu6v.pdf

Novel methods improve prediction of species' distributions from occurrence data

In the last two decades, interest in species distribution models (SDMs) of plants and animals has grown dramatically. Recent advances in SDMs allow us to potentially forecast anthropogenic effects on patterns of biodiversity at different spatial scales. However, some limitations still preclude the use of SDMs in many theoretical and practical applications. Here, we provide an overview of recent advances in this field, discuss the ecological principles and assumptions underpinning SDMs, and highlight critical limitations and decisions inherent in the construction and evaluation of SDMs. Particular emphasis is given to the use of SDMs for the assessment of climate change impacts and conservation management issues. We suggest new avenues for incorporating species migration, population dynamics, biotic interactions and community ecology into SDMs at multiple spatial scales. Addressing all these issues requires a better integration of SDMs with ecological theory.

Predicting species distribution: offering more than simple habitat models.

SUMMARY Forests have returned to the international political agenda as governments deliberate on the successor to the Kyoto Protocol. Yet forest scientists are ill-equipped to answer the questions raised in these discussions, since their concepts and practices are less applicable at global scales. This article outlines key elements of a new global forest science that could answer these questions. It would, for example, monitor the world's forests annually, just as astronomers observe the universe; show how to construct reliable global knowledge about forests; devise methods to identify normative long-term trends in national forest cover to make a Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) Scheme feasible; improve our understanding of the role of forests in global environmental governance; and map biodiversity and carbon stocks holistically so that combating climate change does not undermine biodiversity.

Towards a New Global Forest Science

Degradation of tropical rain forest in Southeast Asia: taxonomy and appraisal.

SUMMARY 80 acres of the 300 acre Bamburi limestone quarry near Mombasa, Kenya have been reclaimed since 1971 in a novel way. 30 000 trees have been planted: Conocarpus lancifolia and Casuarina equisetifolia are grown for timber and fuel- wood on the quarry floor, which has been stocked with wildlife and also contains a fish farming operation, and Prosopis spp. are grown on the quarry sides as fodder for bees and livestock. The result is a model multiple-use system designed from the beginning as a self-financing enterprise combining commercial possibilities with the creation of a pleasant environment.

The bamburi reclamation project

Little attention was paid to modelling deforestation until the late 1980s, since it was viewed more as a problem to be curtailed than as a universal phenomenon to be understood. But this meant that policies to control deforestation were based on partial or anecdotal evidence, and so it was no surprise that they had little effect (Grainger, 1993a). Controlling deforestation will be difficult until we know more about the processes involved. Modelling is the key to this, for once a suitable theoretical framework has been devised it can form the basis for mathematical models that use empirical data to test hypotheses about deforestation. Models can also be used to predict alternative future scenarios for long-term trends in deforestation and its impacts, and test how these could be influenced by policy-makers (Lambin, 1994). This chapter looks in turn at theoretical and mathematical models of the causes of deforestation, long-term trends in forest cover, spatial trends in deforestation, and spatial trends in logging. It focuses on deforestation in tropical moist forests — the closed forests of the humid tropics — rather than forests in the montane or dry tropics where deforestation processes are rather different.

Modelling tropical land use change and deforestation

Environmental globalization is a distinct dimension of the multi-dimensional phenomenon of globalization, in which the process in each dimension can be defined in a similar way. Environmental globalization involves an intensifying, deepening and expansion of global networks leading to increasing global uniformity and connectedness in regular environmental management practices. It has so far been neglected, differing from the environmental outcomes of economic globalization, and from the rise of global environmental governance. The history of external attempts to impose restrictions on tropical forest use shows that environmental globalization has been resisted by the governments of developing countries through: (a) policy ambiguity, and (b) collective action to directly contest the imposition of new institutions, most notably in defeating plans for a Forest Convention. This experience suggests that environmental globalization will only spread slowly in future, at least as far as tropical forests ...

Alan Grainger

Papers

Towards a New Global Forest Science

Degradation of tropical rain forest in Southeast Asia: taxonomy and appraisal.

The bamburi reclamation project

Modelling tropical land use change and deforestation

Environmental globalization and tropical forests