James G. Sanderson and Stuart L. Pimm
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780226292724
- eISBN:
- 9780226292861
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226292861.001.0001
- Subject:
- Biology, Biodiversity / Conservation Biology
This book is about the identification and interpretation of nature’s large-scale patterns of species co-occurrence and what we can deduce from them about how nature works. We present Diamond’s ...
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This book is about the identification and interpretation of nature’s large-scale patterns of species co-occurrence and what we can deduce from them about how nature works. We present Diamond’s assembly rules. He suggested that similar species avoid each other, choosing different islands or, on large islands, different elevations within an island, for no better explanation than to avoid each other. Diamond concentrated on birds in two island groups off New Guinea—the Solomons and the Bismarcks. Diamond’s ideaswere vigorously challenged by those who suggested the patterns were simply chance occurrences. In a series of papers, some argued that Diamond’s assembly rules were poorly constructed and that, moreover, his observations did not support them. Certainly, critics made an important contribution to the study of ecological patterns by requiring observed distributions to be compared to carefully constructed null hypotheses. Developing appropriate statistical methods to analyze these patterns in nature is difficult, though it is now a solved problem. We confirm patterns of mutual exclusivity in some island groups, though not all. Finally, we extend these ideas to species along elevational gradients and to applications involving food webs.Less
This book is about the identification and interpretation of nature’s large-scale patterns of species co-occurrence and what we can deduce from them about how nature works. We present Diamond’s assembly rules. He suggested that similar species avoid each other, choosing different islands or, on large islands, different elevations within an island, for no better explanation than to avoid each other. Diamond concentrated on birds in two island groups off New Guinea—the Solomons and the Bismarcks. Diamond’s ideaswere vigorously challenged by those who suggested the patterns were simply chance occurrences. In a series of papers, some argued that Diamond’s assembly rules were poorly constructed and that, moreover, his observations did not support them. Certainly, critics made an important contribution to the study of ecological patterns by requiring observed distributions to be compared to carefully constructed null hypotheses. Developing appropriate statistical methods to analyze these patterns in nature is difficult, though it is now a solved problem. We confirm patterns of mutual exclusivity in some island groups, though not all. Finally, we extend these ideas to species along elevational gradients and to applications involving food webs.
Stefan Bargheer
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780226376639
- eISBN:
- 9780226543963
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226543963.001.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Culture
At the center of Stefan Bargheer’s account of bird watching, field ornithology, and nature conservation in Britain and Germany stands the question how values change over time and how individuals ...
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At the center of Stefan Bargheer’s account of bird watching, field ornithology, and nature conservation in Britain and Germany stands the question how values change over time and how individuals develop moral commitments. Using life history data derived from written narratives and oral histories, Moral Entanglements follows the development of conservation from the point in time at which the greatest declines in bird life took place to the current efforts in large-scale biodiversity conservation and environmental policy within the European Union. While often depicted as the outcome of an environmental revolution that took place since the 1960s, Bargheer demonstrates to the contrary that the relevant practices and institutions that shape contemporary conservation evolved gradually since the early nineteenth century. Moral Entanglements further shows that the practices and institutions in which bird conservation is entangled differ between the two countries. In Britain, birds derived their meaning in the context of the game of bird watching as a leisure activity. Here, birds are now, as then, the most popular and best protected taxonomic group of wildlife due to their particularly suitable status as toys in a collecting game, turning nature into a playground. In Germany, by contrast, birds were initially part of the world of work. They were protected as useful economic tools, rendering services of ecological pest control in a system of agricultural production modeled after the factory shop floor. Based on this extensive analysis, Bargheer formulates a sociology of morality informed by a pragmatist theory of value.Less
At the center of Stefan Bargheer’s account of bird watching, field ornithology, and nature conservation in Britain and Germany stands the question how values change over time and how individuals develop moral commitments. Using life history data derived from written narratives and oral histories, Moral Entanglements follows the development of conservation from the point in time at which the greatest declines in bird life took place to the current efforts in large-scale biodiversity conservation and environmental policy within the European Union. While often depicted as the outcome of an environmental revolution that took place since the 1960s, Bargheer demonstrates to the contrary that the relevant practices and institutions that shape contemporary conservation evolved gradually since the early nineteenth century. Moral Entanglements further shows that the practices and institutions in which bird conservation is entangled differ between the two countries. In Britain, birds derived their meaning in the context of the game of bird watching as a leisure activity. Here, birds are now, as then, the most popular and best protected taxonomic group of wildlife due to their particularly suitable status as toys in a collecting game, turning nature into a playground. In Germany, by contrast, birds were initially part of the world of work. They were protected as useful economic tools, rendering services of ecological pest control in a system of agricultural production modeled after the factory shop floor. Based on this extensive analysis, Bargheer formulates a sociology of morality informed by a pragmatist theory of value.
Mark Payne
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- February 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780226650845
- eISBN:
- 9780226650852
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226650852.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This book explores the imaginative identification with animals enabled by aggression and the narcissistic aversion from them manifested as destructiveness. It explores the attraction to the society ...
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This book explores the imaginative identification with animals enabled by aggression and the narcissistic aversion from them manifested as destructiveness. It explores the attraction to the society of other animals that finds expression in stories about human beings who try to join them, and the affects that cluster around the possibility that the human body is susceptible in various ways to becoming animal. The book looks at two different kinds of attempt to imagine the removal of the boundary separating human beings from other animals. A discussion is presented of the correlation between articulate utterance and social complexity in Aristotle's zoological and political works, which leaves open the possibility that birds may be capable of a degree of political organization comparable to that of human beings. The book contrasts Aristotle's curiosity about the social lives of other animals with Aristophanes' Birds, Herman Melville's Moby Dick, and Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Rigadoon, in all of which isolated individuals who have fallen out of human society experience some form of fascination with the social groups of animals they discover beyond its confines.Less
This book explores the imaginative identification with animals enabled by aggression and the narcissistic aversion from them manifested as destructiveness. It explores the attraction to the society of other animals that finds expression in stories about human beings who try to join them, and the affects that cluster around the possibility that the human body is susceptible in various ways to becoming animal. The book looks at two different kinds of attempt to imagine the removal of the boundary separating human beings from other animals. A discussion is presented of the correlation between articulate utterance and social complexity in Aristotle's zoological and political works, which leaves open the possibility that birds may be capable of a degree of political organization comparable to that of human beings. The book contrasts Aristotle's curiosity about the social lives of other animals with Aristophanes' Birds, Herman Melville's Moby Dick, and Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Rigadoon, in all of which isolated individuals who have fallen out of human society experience some form of fascination with the social groups of animals they discover beyond its confines.
Dale H. Clayton, Sarah E. Bush, and Kevin P. Johnson
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780226302133
- eISBN:
- 9780226302300
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226302300.001.0001
- Subject:
- Biology, Evolutionary Biology / Genetics
This book provides an introduction to coevolution in both microevolutionary (ecological) and macroevolutionary (historical) time. It emphasizes the integration of cophylogenetic, comparative, and ...
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This book provides an introduction to coevolution in both microevolutionary (ecological) and macroevolutionary (historical) time. It emphasizes the integration of cophylogenetic, comparative, and experimental approaches for testing coevolutionary hypotheses. Recent work in coevolutionary biology has been successful in demonstrating coadaptation between species in response to reciprocal selection. Fewer studies have tested the influence of coadaptation on the diversification of interacting taxa. We review studies that have attempted to do just this. The overriding question addressed is “how do ecological interactions influence patterns of codiversification?”. We focus on the coevolution of interacting species, particularly those involving external parasites that live on hosts. Such parasites include a diverse assemblage of organisms, ranging from herbivorous insects on plants, to monogenean worms on fish, to feather lice on birds. Ectoparasites are powerful models for studies of coevolution because they are easy to observe, mark, and count. Many of the examples in the book involve parasitic lice of birds and mammals. Lice and their hosts are unusually tractable systems for studies that attempt to integrate coevolutionary ecology and history. Some chapters in the book are very broad in scope, introducing coevolutionary concepts that apply to all interacting species. Other chapters are more narrowly focused on the biology and coevolution of lice and their hosts. The overall goal of the book is to integrate coevolutionary concepts with examples of empirical tests of coevolutionary theory in micro- and macro-evolutionary time. The book concludes with a framework for better integration of coadaptation and codiversification.Less
This book provides an introduction to coevolution in both microevolutionary (ecological) and macroevolutionary (historical) time. It emphasizes the integration of cophylogenetic, comparative, and experimental approaches for testing coevolutionary hypotheses. Recent work in coevolutionary biology has been successful in demonstrating coadaptation between species in response to reciprocal selection. Fewer studies have tested the influence of coadaptation on the diversification of interacting taxa. We review studies that have attempted to do just this. The overriding question addressed is “how do ecological interactions influence patterns of codiversification?”. We focus on the coevolution of interacting species, particularly those involving external parasites that live on hosts. Such parasites include a diverse assemblage of organisms, ranging from herbivorous insects on plants, to monogenean worms on fish, to feather lice on birds. Ectoparasites are powerful models for studies of coevolution because they are easy to observe, mark, and count. Many of the examples in the book involve parasitic lice of birds and mammals. Lice and their hosts are unusually tractable systems for studies that attempt to integrate coevolutionary ecology and history. Some chapters in the book are very broad in scope, introducing coevolutionary concepts that apply to all interacting species. Other chapters are more narrowly focused on the biology and coevolution of lice and their hosts. The overall goal of the book is to integrate coevolutionary concepts with examples of empirical tests of coevolutionary theory in micro- and macro-evolutionary time. The book concludes with a framework for better integration of coadaptation and codiversification.
James G. Sanderson and Stuart L. Pimm
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780226292724
- eISBN:
- 9780226292861
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226292861.003.0008
- Subject:
- Biology, Biodiversity / Conservation Biology
We return to the Bismarck and Solomon islands, the locations that generated Diamond’s ideas on assembly rules. The null models generate a list of species pairs where the number of observed ...
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We return to the Bismarck and Solomon islands, the locations that generated Diamond’s ideas on assembly rules. The null models generate a list of species pairs where the number of observed co-occurrences is unusual, meaning that thisoccurs in fewer than 5% of the null models. As Diamond’s critics had argued, interspecific competition is unlikely to generate some of these unusual pairs—they are ecologically and taxonomically very dissimilar. We show, however, that such unusual pairs are disproportionately common in pairs that belong to the same genus—exactly the pattern one would predict.Less
We return to the Bismarck and Solomon islands, the locations that generated Diamond’s ideas on assembly rules. The null models generate a list of species pairs where the number of observed co-occurrences is unusual, meaning that thisoccurs in fewer than 5% of the null models. As Diamond’s critics had argued, interspecific competition is unlikely to generate some of these unusual pairs—they are ecologically and taxonomically very dissimilar. We show, however, that such unusual pairs are disproportionately common in pairs that belong to the same genus—exactly the pattern one would predict.
Stanley A. Temple and John R. Cary
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- February 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780226871714
- eISBN:
- 9780226871745
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226871745.003.0022
- Subject:
- Biology, Biodiversity / Conservation Biology
This chapter takes advantage of current and historic data to explore changes in the composition of ten Wisconsin bird communities over the past 55 years (1950–2004) and interpret those changes in ...
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This chapter takes advantage of current and historic data to explore changes in the composition of ten Wisconsin bird communities over the past 55 years (1950–2004) and interpret those changes in light of what is known about the birds themselves and their environment. Although species richness in most of those communities has increased over the past several decades, changes in individual species varied a lot, with some showing long-term declines and others increases. Bird communities will continue to change into the future, driven by shifts in climate, land use, and changing landscape patterns.Less
This chapter takes advantage of current and historic data to explore changes in the composition of ten Wisconsin bird communities over the past 55 years (1950–2004) and interpret those changes in light of what is known about the birds themselves and their environment. Although species richness in most of those communities has increased over the past several decades, changes in individual species varied a lot, with some showing long-term declines and others increases. Bird communities will continue to change into the future, driven by shifts in climate, land use, and changing landscape patterns.
Stefan Bargheer
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780226376639
- eISBN:
- 9780226543963
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226543963.003.0004
- Subject:
- Sociology, Culture
Chapter 3 looks at the development of organized bird conservation in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The focus is on the factors that made for the foundation of the Society for the ...
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Chapter 3 looks at the development of organized bird conservation in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The focus is on the factors that made for the foundation of the Society for the Protection of Birds (currently Royal Society for the Protection of Birds or RSPB) in Britain in 1889 and the Bund für Vogelschutz (later Deutsche Bund für Vogelschutz and currently Naturschutzbund or NABU) in Germany in 1899. Concern for birds developed from the transformation of already-established practices and institutions of bird collecting and economic ornithology. The valuation of birds changed through the mass production of prismatic binoculars and photo cameras. Through the use of these instruments collectors’ interest in birds transformed from collecting bird bodies to collecting field notes and photographic images. The widespread distribution of bird tables and next boxes further facilitated the aim to increase the abundance of useful species. Bird conservation did not flourish because people in the newly emerging urban centers tried to go back to nature, but because technology was coming to the countryside. Conservationists did accordingly describe their goal as a progressive one – they wanted to move forward to nature, rather than return to it.Less
Chapter 3 looks at the development of organized bird conservation in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The focus is on the factors that made for the foundation of the Society for the Protection of Birds (currently Royal Society for the Protection of Birds or RSPB) in Britain in 1889 and the Bund für Vogelschutz (later Deutsche Bund für Vogelschutz and currently Naturschutzbund or NABU) in Germany in 1899. Concern for birds developed from the transformation of already-established practices and institutions of bird collecting and economic ornithology. The valuation of birds changed through the mass production of prismatic binoculars and photo cameras. Through the use of these instruments collectors’ interest in birds transformed from collecting bird bodies to collecting field notes and photographic images. The widespread distribution of bird tables and next boxes further facilitated the aim to increase the abundance of useful species. Bird conservation did not flourish because people in the newly emerging urban centers tried to go back to nature, but because technology was coming to the countryside. Conservationists did accordingly describe their goal as a progressive one – they wanted to move forward to nature, rather than return to it.
Stefan Bargheer
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780226376639
- eISBN:
- 9780226543963
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226543963.003.0005
- Subject:
- Sociology, Culture
Chapter 4 analyzes how organized bird conservation became tied to the emerging science of field ornithology in the 1930s and 1940s. In Britain, field ornithology became institutionalized through the ...
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Chapter 4 analyzes how organized bird conservation became tied to the emerging science of field ornithology in the 1930s and 1940s. In Britain, field ornithology became institutionalized through the foundation of the British Trust for Ornithology as a volunteer body aiming to organize amateur bird watchers for the goals of science and conservation. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds was largely a club of bird watchers throughout this period. Amateur bird watching and professional field ornithology were both collecting practices and focused on rare and endangered species, enabling a close organizational tie between the two fields. In Germany, by contrast, there developed no such close link between amateur bird watching and bird conservation. Instead, initially privately owned Research Stations for Bird Protection, which were later administered by the state, became the central institutional loci for translating the valuation of birds into action. Bird Protection Stations were experimental sites for determining the usefulness or harmfulness of various bird species in order to inform bird conservation for economic ends. Unlike its British counterpart, the Bund für Vogelschutz aimed for the cooperation of farmers, fruit growers, and foresters, not predominantly for that of amateur bird watchers.Less
Chapter 4 analyzes how organized bird conservation became tied to the emerging science of field ornithology in the 1930s and 1940s. In Britain, field ornithology became institutionalized through the foundation of the British Trust for Ornithology as a volunteer body aiming to organize amateur bird watchers for the goals of science and conservation. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds was largely a club of bird watchers throughout this period. Amateur bird watching and professional field ornithology were both collecting practices and focused on rare and endangered species, enabling a close organizational tie between the two fields. In Germany, by contrast, there developed no such close link between amateur bird watching and bird conservation. Instead, initially privately owned Research Stations for Bird Protection, which were later administered by the state, became the central institutional loci for translating the valuation of birds into action. Bird Protection Stations were experimental sites for determining the usefulness or harmfulness of various bird species in order to inform bird conservation for economic ends. Unlike its British counterpart, the Bund für Vogelschutz aimed for the cooperation of farmers, fruit growers, and foresters, not predominantly for that of amateur bird watchers.
Stefan Bargheer
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780226376639
- eISBN:
- 9780226543963
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226543963.003.0007
- Subject:
- Sociology, Culture
Chapter 6 looks at the rise in membership numbers of the British and German bird conservation organizations since the 1970s. The focus is on the organizational strategies that facilitated this rise. ...
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Chapter 6 looks at the rise in membership numbers of the British and German bird conservation organizations since the 1970s. The focus is on the organizational strategies that facilitated this rise. Currently one of the main strategies of organized bird conservation for recruiting new members is to turn people into bird watchers. The large membership of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds is based exclusively on the appeal of birds. The organization is engaged in a wider set of environmental issues, yet it maintains bird conservation as its focal concern. In Germany, by contrast, bird conservation has become one issue among many others in the work of the organization. In 1990, the Deutsche Bund für Vogelschutz (German League for Bird Protection) changed its name to Naturschutzbund Deutschland (League for Nature Protection Germany) to reflect this change and to attract new members. The increasing success of the organization was made possible by the retreat from bird conservation as its main focus. It has only been in more recent years, when larger environmental topics began to lose public resonance, that the German organization started to copy some of the more popular bird watching schemes from its British counterpart.Less
Chapter 6 looks at the rise in membership numbers of the British and German bird conservation organizations since the 1970s. The focus is on the organizational strategies that facilitated this rise. Currently one of the main strategies of organized bird conservation for recruiting new members is to turn people into bird watchers. The large membership of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds is based exclusively on the appeal of birds. The organization is engaged in a wider set of environmental issues, yet it maintains bird conservation as its focal concern. In Germany, by contrast, bird conservation has become one issue among many others in the work of the organization. In 1990, the Deutsche Bund für Vogelschutz (German League for Bird Protection) changed its name to Naturschutzbund Deutschland (League for Nature Protection Germany) to reflect this change and to attract new members. The increasing success of the organization was made possible by the retreat from bird conservation as its main focus. It has only been in more recent years, when larger environmental topics began to lose public resonance, that the German organization started to copy some of the more popular bird watching schemes from its British counterpart.
Theodore H. Fleming and W. John Kress
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780226253404
- eISBN:
- 9780226023328
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226023328.003.0003
- Subject:
- Biology, Biodiversity / Conservation Biology
Tropical plant-visiting birds and mammals feed on two distinctly different resources: nectar and fruit. This chapter describes the basic nutritional characteristics of the nectar and fruit resource ...
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Tropical plant-visiting birds and mammals feed on two distinctly different resources: nectar and fruit. This chapter describes the basic nutritional characteristics of the nectar and fruit resource bases and how the availability of these resources varies temporally and spatially. It presents quantitative estimates of the biomass of these resources within communities and the biomass of vertebrate nectarivores and frugivores that they support. It begins by summarizing data on the extent to which tropical plants rely on birds and mammals as their primary or exclusive pollinators and seed dispersers.Less
Tropical plant-visiting birds and mammals feed on two distinctly different resources: nectar and fruit. This chapter describes the basic nutritional characteristics of the nectar and fruit resource bases and how the availability of these resources varies temporally and spatially. It presents quantitative estimates of the biomass of these resources within communities and the biomass of vertebrate nectarivores and frugivores that they support. It begins by summarizing data on the extent to which tropical plants rely on birds and mammals as their primary or exclusive pollinators and seed dispersers.
