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

Protecting the world’s freshwater resources requires diagnosing threats over a broad range of scales, from global to local. Here we present the first worldwide synthesis to jointly consider human and biodiversity perspectives on water security using a spatial framework that quantifies multiple stressors and accounts for downstream impacts. We find that nearly 80% of the world’s population is exposed to high levels of threat to water security. Massive investment in water technology enables rich nations to offset high stressor levels without remedying their underlying causes, whereas less wealthy nations remain vulnerable. A similar lack of precautionary investment jeopardizes biodiversity, with habitats associated with 65% of continental discharge classified as moderately to highly threatened. The cumulative threat framework offers a tool for prioritizing policy and management responses to this crisis, and underscores the necessity of limiting threats at their source instead of through costly remediation of symptoms in order to assure global water security for both humans and freshwater biodiversity.

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Global threats to human water security and river biodiversity

Interactions between biotic and abiotic pro- cesses complicate the design and interpretation of eco- logical experiments. Separating causality from simple correlation requires distinguishing among experimental treatments, experimental responses, and the many pro- cesses and properties that are correlated with either the treatments or the responses, or both. When an experi- mental manipulation has multiple components, but only one of them is identified as the experimental treatment, erroneous conclusions about cause and eAect relation- ships are likely because the actual cause of any observed response may be ignored in the interpretation of the experimental results. This unrecognized cause of an observed response can be considered a ''hidden treat- ment.'' Three types of hidden treatments are potential problems in biodiversity experiments: (1) abiotic condi- tions, such as resource levels, or biotic conditions, such as predation, which are intentionally or unintentionally altered in order to create diAerences in species numbers for ''diversity'' treatments; (2) non-random selection of species with particular attributes that produce treatment diAerences that exceed those due to ''diversity'' alone; and (3) the increased statistical probability of including a species with a dominant negative or positive eAect (e.g., dense shade, or nitrogen fixation) in randomly selected groups of species of increasing number or ''diversity.'' In each of these cases, treatment responses that are actually the result of the ''hidden treatment'' may be inadver- tently attributed to variation in species diversity. Case studies re-evaluating three diAerent types of biodiversity experiments demonstrate that the increases found in such ecosystem properties as productivity, nutrient use eAciency, and stability (all of which were attributed to higher levels of species diversity) were actually caused by ''hidden treatments'' that altered plant biomass and productivity.

Hidden treatments in ecological experiments: re-evaluating the ecosystem function of biodiversity.

Tri-Council Policy Statement: Ethical Conduct for Research Involving Humans

It is clear that the above can lead to confusion when scientists of different countries are trying to communicate with each other. Another example is the burrowing rodent called a gopher found throughout the western United States. In the southeastern United States the term gopher refers to a burrowing turtle very similar to the desert tortoise found in the American southwest. One final example; two North American mammals known as the elk and the caribou are known in Europe as the reindeer and the elk. We never sing “Rudolph the Red-nosed elk”! Confused? This was the reason for creating an internationally recognized system of naming organisms. To avoid confusion, living organisms are assigned a scientific name based on Latin or Latinized words. The English sparrow is Passer domesticus or Passer domesticus (italics or underlining these two names is the official written representation of a scientific name). Using a uniform naming system allows scientists from all over the world to recognize exactly which life form a scientist is referring to. The naming process is called the binomial system of nomenclature. Passer is comparable to a surname and is called the genus, while domesticus is the specific or species name (like your given name) of the English sparrow. Now scientists can give all sparrow-like birds the genus Passer but the species name will vary. All similar genera (plural for genus) can be grouped into another, “higher” category (see below). Study the following for a more through understanding of taxonomy. Taxonomy Analogy Kingdom: Animalia Country

Diversity of life

Background The programme of work on agricultural biodiversity, adopted by the Conference of Parties in decision V/5, makes provision for case studies on various topics to identify management practices, technologies and policies that promote the positive and mitigate the negative impacts of agriculture on biodiversity, and enhance productivity and the capacity to sustain livelihoods. More specifically, activity 2.1 of the Programme of Work calls for a series of case studies, in a range of environments and production systems, and in each region: (a) To identify key goods and services provided by agricultural biodiversity, needs for the conservation and sustainable use of components of this biological diversity in agricultural ecosystems, and threats to such diversity;

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Angela Cropper

Papers

Convention on Biological Diversity