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

Statistical method for testing the neutral mutation hypothesis by DNA polymorphism.

Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder

http://leml.asu.edu/jingle/Wu-Publications-PDFs/2014/Wu-2014-Urban%20ecology%20and%20sustainability.pdf

Urban ecology and sustainability: The state-of-the-science and future directions

Challenges and strategies for urban green-space planning in cities undergoing densification: A review

Contemporary cities are expanding rapidly in a spatially complex, non-linear manner. However, this form of expansion is rarely taken into account in the way that urbanization is classically assessed in ecological studies. An explicit consideration of the temporal dynamics, although frequently missing, is crucial in order to understand the effects of urbanization on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning in rapidly urbanizing landscapes. In particular, a temporal perspective highlights the importance of land-use legacies and transient dynamics in the response of biodiversity to environmental change. Here, we outline the essential elements of an emerging framework for urban ecology that incorporates the characteristics of contemporary urbanization and thus empowers ecologists to understand and intervene in the planning and management of cities.

Time for a change: dynamic urban ecology

Restoration is a young and swiftly developing field. It has been almost a decade since the inception of one of the field's foundational documents-the Society for Ecological Restoration International Primer on Ecological Restoration (Primer). Through a series of organized discussions, we assessed the Primer for its currency and relevance in the modern field of ecological restoration. We focused our assessment on the section entitled "The Nine Attributes of a Restored Ecosystem" and grouped each of the attributes into one of four categories: species composition, ecosystem function, ecosystem stability, and landscape context. We found that in the decade since the document's inception, the concepts, methods, goals, and thinking of ecological restoration have shifted significantly. We discuss each of the four categories in this light with the aim of offering comments and suggestions on options for updating the Primer. We also include a fifth category that we believe is increasingly acknowledged in ecological restoration: the human element. The Primer is an important document guiding the practice of restoration. We hope that this critical assessment contributes to its ongoing development and relevance and more generally to the development of restoration ecology, particularly in our current era of rapid environmental change.

/pdf/primed-for-change-developing-ecological-restoration-for-the-2an0v4rbwx.pdf

Primed for change: Developing ecological restoration for the 21st century

In many cities worldwide, urbanization is leading to the rapid and extensive fragmentation of native vegetation into small and scattered urban remnants. We investigated the effects of fragmentation on plant species richness and abundance in 30 remnant Banksia woodlands in the rapidly expanding city of Perth, located in the southwestern Australian global biodiversity hotspot. We considered a comprehensive set of factors characterizing landscape fragmentation dynamics (current and historical remnant area and connectivity, time since isolation, and trajectories of landscape change), disturbance regimes (fire frequency, grazing, and intensity of human activities), and local environmental conditions (soil nutrient status and litter depth). We used generalized linear mixed models to determine the interactive effects of time since remnant isolation and remnant area on plant species richness, and structural equation models to disentangle the direct and indirect effects of landscape and local factors on plant species richness and abundance. Fragmentation impacts were most rapid in smaller remnants. Indeed, in the small remnants, native plant species richness was halved in only a few decades after isolation, suggesting an underlying rapid loss of habitat quality. We found that richness and abundance of woody species were higher in historically large remnants and lower in the rural areas, despite these rural remnants showing greater connectivity. Richness of native herbaceous species declined with time since isolation, mainly in the smaller remnants, and this was associated with altered soil properties. Furthermore, increased litter depth (possibly indicating higher productivity) and increased abundance of nonnative herbaceous species in the older and smaller remnants was associated with a decline in the abundance of native herbaceous species. Our study suggests that in rapidly expanding cities, landscape fragmentation can have major and complex effects on remnant vegetation. Yet these impacts might take several decades to manifest themselves. Hence, understanding the long-term conservation capacity of newly formed remnants, which is key to setting conservation priorities, requires consideration of landscape fragmentation and land use history. Moreover, the smaller and older remnants may already display changes due to fragmentation, providing clues for urban planning and ecosystem management that help to protect urban remnant plant diversity.

Complex effects of fragmentation on remnant woodland plant communities of a rapidly urbanizing biodiversity hotspot

This chapter addresses the facets of novelty that pervade the urban environment before reviewing the ecosystem services that different components of the urban environment provide. It describes the known and potential contribution of novel elements to these services, with a particular focus on vegetation. The services reviewed include biodiversity maintenance, carbon storage, flood regulation, recreation, spiritual fulfilment and education. The chapter discusses how ecosystem service provision could be boosted by novel components but adds that experiments are required to test our assertions. Research is also needed to investigate trade‐offs among the delivery of ecosystem services in urban areas and to investigate whether they can be successfully implemented in urban areas across the globe and in different socio‐cultural, economic and ecological contexts.

Novel urban ecosystems and ecosystem services

Biological indicators for Mediterranean rivers are poorly developed. This study evaluates the effectiveness of the Index of Biotic Integrity approach (IBI) with fish assemblages in the Guadiana catchment, a typical Mediterranean watershed in Southern Portugal. Reference sites were selected from a set of 95 sites, using a multivariate approach. Fifty-five candidate metrics were screened for range, responsiveness, precision and redundancy. Final metrics included: proportion of native fish, number of intolerant and intermediate species, number of invertivore native fish, number of phyto-lithophilic and polyphilic species, and catches of exotics. The IBI scores correlated with composite gradients of human impact and differed significantly between reference and non-reference sites. Application of the IBI to an independent validation set with 123 sites produced results congruent with the development set and repeatable assessments at 22 sites showed concordance in IBI scoring. This application highlights the effectiveness of the IBI approach even with fish assemblages of limited diversity and ecological specialisation as in Mediterranean streams.

Cristina E. Ramalho

Papers

Time for a change: dynamic urban ecology

Primed for change: Developing ecological restoration for the 21st century

Complex effects of fragmentation on remnant woodland plant communities of a rapidly urbanizing biodiversity hotspot

Novel urban ecosystems and ecosystem services

Assessing biotic integrity in a Mediterranean watershed: development and evaluation of a fish-based index.