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

Communities of microscopic plant life, or phytoplankton, dominate the Earth's aquatic ecosystems. This important new book by Colin Reynolds covers the adaptations, physiology and population dynamics of phytoplankton communities in lakes and rivers and oceans. It provides basic information on composition, morphology and physiology of the main phyletic groups represented in marine and freshwater systems and in addition reviews recent advances in community ecology, developing an appreciation of assembly processes, co-existence and competition, disturbance and diversity. Although focussed on one group of organisms, the book develops many concepts relevant to ecology in the broadest sense, and as such will appeal to graduate students and researchers in ecology, limnology and oceanography.

/pdf/the-ecology-of-phytoplankton-4ev70n3jsq.pdf

The Ecology of Phytoplankton

Humans now strongly influence almost every major aquatic ecosystem, and their activities have dramatically altered the fluxes of growth-limiting nutrients from the landscape to receiving waters. Unfortunately, these nutrient inputs have had profound negative effects upon the quality of surface waters worldwide. This review examines how eutrophication influences the biomass and species composition of algae in both freshwater and costal marine systems. An overview of recent advances in algae-related eutrophication research is presented. In freshwater systems, a summary is presented for lakes and reservoirs; streams and rivers; and wetlands. A brief summary is also presented for estuarine and coastal marine ecosystems. Eutrophication causes predictable increases in the biomass of algae in lakes and reservoirs; streams and rivers; wetlands; and coastal marine ecosystems. As in lakes, the response of suspended algae in large rivers to changes in nutrient loading may be hysteretic in some cases. The inhibitory effects of high concentrations of inorganic suspended solids on algal growth, which can be very evident in many reservoirs receiving high inputs of suspended soils, also potentially may occur in turbid rivers. Consistent and predictable eutrophication-caused increases in cyanobacterial dominance of phytoplankton have been reported worldwide for natural lakes, and similar trends are reported here both for phytoplankton in turbid reservoirs, and for suspended algae in a large river. A remarkable unity is evident in the global response of algal biomass to nitrogen and phosphorus availability in lakes and reservoirs; wetlands; streams and rivers; and coastal marine waters. The species composition of algal communities inhabiting the water column appears to respond similarly to nutrient loading, whether in lakes, reservoirs, or rivers. As is true of freshwater ecosystems, the recent literature suggests that coastal marine ecosystems will respond positively to nutrient loading control efforts. Our understanding of freshwater eutrophication and its effects on algal-related water quality is strong and is advancing rapidly. However, our understanding of the effects of eutrophication on estuarine and coastal marine ecosystems is much more limited, and this gap represents an important future research need. Although coastal systems can be hydrologically complex, the biomass of marine phytoplankton nonetheless appears to respond sensitively and predictably to changes in the external supplies of nitrogen and phosphorus. These responses suggest that efforts to manage nutrient inputs to the seas will result in significant improvements in coastal zone water quality. Additional new efforts should be made to develop models that quantitatively link ecosystem-level responses to nutrient loading in both freshwater and marine systems.

http://globalpnetwork.net/sites/default/files/Smith_2003_ESPR_eutrophication_review.pdf

Eutrophication of freshwater and coastal marine ecosystems a global problem

Ecological and toxicological effects of inorganic nitrogen pollution in aquatic ecosystems: A global assessment.

The rise of harmful cyanobacteria blooms: The potential roles of eutrophication and climate change

This paper considers the structure of freshwater phytoplankton assemblages and promotes a scheme of vegetation recognition', based upon the functional associations of species represented in the plankton. These groups are often polyphyletic, recognizing commonly shared adaptive features, rather than common phylogeny, to be the key ecological driver. Thirty-one such associations are outlined and the basic pattern of their distinctive ecologies is outlined. An invitation to other plankton scientists to assist in the development of this scheme is issued.

Towards a functional classification of the freshwater phytoplankton

SUMMARY. 1. This review considers the periodic cycles of species dominance in a wide selection of temperate lakes. By ascribing individual species to assemblages, a high incidence of similarity among periodic cycles is demonstrated. Reference to lakes at high and low latitudes, as well as to rivers, shows conformity to parts of the same broad patterns.



2. The role of population dynamics in shaping community structure is emphasized. Two types of change are recognized: autogenic, undirectional subsequences (successions), regulated by specific responses to critically changing resource-ratio gradients; and allogenic changes, regulated by variability in the physical environment.



3. Analysis of the responses of representative species to allogenic change permits further grouping of the assemblages. These groupings coincide with clear morphological distinctions among the same phytoplankton species according to their unit sizes and surface area/volume ratios.



4. It is argued that these properties condition the physiological responses of algae to seasonal variations in temperature, mixing and exposure to the underwater light field. The responses are compounded by relative resistances to loss processes (sinking, grazing), by short-term photosynthetic adaptation and vertical migratory behaviour.



5. Graphical summaries are presented that relate the morphologically-, physiologically- and behaviourally-mediated responses to a hierarchy of physical, chemical and biotic environmental variables. Phytoplankton periodicity is the outcome of these interactions.

Phytoplankton periodicity: the interactions of form, function and environmental variability

AMBLESIDE, CUMBRIA LA  LP, UK The habitat preferences of dinoflagellate bloom species along an onshore‐offshore, mixing-nutrient gradient, their associated life-form (morphotype) characteristics and adaptive strategies were evaluated from the perspective of Margalef ’s Mandala and Reynolds Intaglio. Nine different mixingnutrient habitats and associated dinoflagellate life-form types having distinctive morphotype features and habitat preferences are distinguishable. Reynolds Intaglio provided greater fidelity to actual in situ dinoflagellate community assembly than the Mandala. We suggest that the correlation between degree of mixing and nutrient levels presumed in the Mandala is not the essential interaction in the selection of life forms and their succession. A more significant aspect of the turbulence axis is the degree of vertical, micro-habitat structural differentiation that it permits. Three primary adaptive strategies consistent with C-S-R strategies recognized among freshwater phytoplankton species characterize the component dinoflagellate species: invasive, small- to intermediate-sized colonist species (C) which often predominate in chemically-disturbed water bodies; acquisitive, larger-celled, nutrient stresstolerant species (S); and disturbance-tolerant ruderal species (R) tolerant of shear/stress forces in physically-disturbed water masses (fronts, upwelling relaxations, current entrainment). It is suggested that harmful algal bloom community assembly and dynamics reflect two basic selection features— life-form and species-specific selection, that commonly held life-form properties override phylogenetic properties in bloom-species selection, and that the latter is often stochastic, rather than singular. The high degree of unpredictability of individual species blooms is consistent with stochastic selection, e.g. bloom species are often selected as a result of being in the right place at the right time at suitable inoculum levels. A focus on the life-form properties, habitat preference and stochastic selection of bloom species would appear to be more viable and realistic than current ecological investigative approaches.

Community Assembly in Marine Phytoplankton: Application of Recent Models to Harmful Dinoflagellate Blooms

The interactions of size, shape, and density of cyanobacteria result in a 5‐order of magnitude difference in flotation or sinking rates which, in turn, influence the extent of their disper...

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/00288330.1987.9516234

Cyanobacterial dominance: the role of buoyancy regulation in dynamic lake environments

A 4 year series of field, light-microscope and ultrastructural observations is presented to illustrate biological aspects of the annual cycle of natural Microcystis populations enclosed in Lund tubes. Nine morphological stati, all referable to M. aeruginosa f. aeruginosa , feature at various stages of the cycle. Summer bloom-forming populations originate from vegetative colonial stock that overwinters on the bottom sediment each year, but there is no mass transfer of these colonies to the water column: intensive growth from individual cells in the old colonies leads to the formation of new infective colonies, being stimulated when the bottom water approaches anoxia and light penetrates to the bottom sediments. Growth is slow but the developing populations sustain only minor losses through grazing and settling out, eventually becoming dominant over other species. Allelopathy possibly contributes to this effect. In postmaximal populations, several mechanisms can contribute to net buoyancy loss and a (usually) rapid recruitment of vegetative colonies to the sediments is observed. Hypotheses are advanced to account for the observed behaviour, and some of these have been tested in the laboratory. The apparent physiological flexibility of Microcystis seems well suited to growth and survival in the microenvironments encountered in eutrophic lakes.

Colin S. Reynolds

Papers

Towards a functional classification of the freshwater phytoplankton

Phytoplankton periodicity: the interactions of form, function and environmental variability

Community Assembly in Marine Phytoplankton: Application of Recent Models to Harmful Dinoflagellate Blooms

Cyanobacterial dominance: the role of buoyancy regulation in dynamic lake environments

On the Annual Cycle of the Blue-Green Alga Microcystis Aeruginosa Kutz. Emend. Elenkin