ACS Folks: please note that most of the links below don't work --the course material is only available within W&L's domain, at Larry Hurd's request. You can at least get a sense of how the page evolved.
19 November: slidesfrom class
5 November: Keyfor Exam #2
29 October: GreatFall Mantid Population Study : instructions for authors
and slidesfrom 29 October class27 October 1998: a couple of searches for articles mentioned
Chatworthy, J.N.; Harper, J.L. 1962. The comparative biologyof closely related species living in the same area. y. Inter- and intraspecificinterference within cultures of Lemna spp. and Salvinia natans. Journalof Experimental Botany 13(38):307-324, 1962And a search for Richard Root's paper ("Niche exploitation pattern of theblue-gray gnatcatcher", 1967) turned up a reference to it at http://nrs.ucop.edu/reserves/hastings/reading.html. In this case we're in luck, because Ecological Monographs are accessibleas online full text via JSTOR (go to http://www.jstor.org/cgi-bin/jstor/listjournal,choose Ecological Monographs, navigate to Autumn 1967, and the articleis between pages 317-350).COMMENT: The success of a speciesin mixture could not be predicted from
the parametersof growth in pure culture. Morphologic features such as the
gibbosity ofL. gibba and the persistent stem of S. natans played a large part
in directingthe course of a struggle for existence in mixed cultures.KEYWORDS: duckweed comparative biology Lemna minor polyrhiza
gibba Salvinia natans
(unfortunately, we don't have this journal)
A hunch that MacArthur's paper on warbler guilds might be in Ecologyled me to a quick search for 'warblers' in article titles and sure enough:
Population Ecology of Some Warblers of Northeastern ConiferousForests(which is just to say it's not too difficult to find these things Dr. Hurdmentions)
Robert H. MacArthur
Ecology, Vol.39, No. 4. (Oct., 1958), pp. 599-619.
Here are three Java applets that allow you to play with the parametersfor population models:
20 October 19987 October 1998
The key for the firstexam is here.
29 September 1998
I'm still experimenting with how to do this, but you can view slides fromtoday's class here.
The two Excel spreadsheets (one for the field cohort, the other forlab mantids) are accessible via the L: drive --you can start Excel, thenOPEN L:\Biology\Bio245, and there they are. The files are 'read only',so you'll need to use the SAVE AS command to save copies in your own filespace.
24 September 1998
I've repeatedly had the experience of opening new issues of journalsmore or less at random and finding something that connects with a subjectI've just learned about. Latest case in point: the new issue of AmericanNaturalist arrived and as I was shelving it I scanned the Table ofContents and found an article on "A meta-analysis of adaptive deme formationin phytophagous insect populations" (Van Zandt and Mopper). Here'sthe abstract:
The adaptive deme formation (ADF) hypothesis predicts thatherbivorous insects become locally adapted to their host plants over time.Since its inception, approximately 17 independent studies have tested ADF,and they are divided in support and rejection of the hypothesis. this field of insect evolutionary ecology has a contentious history, andthe contradictory studies obscure our understanding of the general evolutionaryimportance of adaptive deme formation in phytophagous insects. Weconducted a meta-analysis in an attempt to clarify this issue. Meta-analysisis a statistical method for quantitatively comparing and synthesizing theresults of different studies in a way that is more objective than a traditionalliterature review. our analysis indicates that locl adaptation isan important phenomenon in diverse insect systems. Contrary to predictionsof the original hypothesis, there was no evidence that insect dispersalability, and ostensibly gene flow, was associated with local adaptive differentiation. There was some indication that breeding (parthenogenetic, haplodiploid,diplodiploid) and feeding (exophagous, endophagous) modes may influencethe evolution of lacally adapted demes. Our analysis supports thetheory of adaptive deme formation and provides guidance for future researchdirections.In the same issue is another article that connects with another item mentionedbelow: "Red Queen meets Santa Rosalia: arms races and the evolution ofhost specialization in organisms with parasitic lifestyles" (Kawecki) [theRed Queen hypothesis postulates that "parasites evolve ceaselessly in responseto the perpetual evolution of host defenses" (Kawecki 1998:636)].
22 September 1998
Some links to some of the work of people Dr. Hurd mentioned today, andtwo sets on Cichlids, results of some searches mostly in Cambridge ScientificAbstracts:
I did a search for Hispinae with AltaVista and found some interestingbits at this site:
17 September 1998I decided to do a quick web hunt for Tenodera sinensis and found: Mantis ReferenceList (Mike Maxwell)
Dr. Hurd mentioned Lynn Margulis (author of, among others, Environmentalevolution [QH366.2 .E59 1992], Five kingdoms [QH83 .M36 1998],and Slanted truths: essays on Gaia, symbiosis and evolution [QH311.M37 1997]). She and James Lovelock are known as the originatorsof "the Gaia hypothesis", a global ecology statement first mooted in the1960s. Among web sites which might be useful in summarizing the contentsand importance of this idea are onefrom University of Iowa ("Margulis contends that symbiosis, not chancemutation, is the driving force behind evolution and that the cooperationbetween organisms and the environment are the chief agents of natural selection-- not competition among individuals."), and another from Temple Universitysummarizing InternetResources on the work of Prof. Lynn Margulis , including a link to the Gaia HypothesisHome Page . By the bye, Lynn Margulis was once married to CarlSagan.
I'm tempted to engage in some intellectual history here, lookinginto how Gaia was appropriated by environmentalists, how the Lovelock-Margulishypothesis has been used and interpreted beyond its originators' intentions,etc. But I'll forbear for now...15 September 1998
Cleaning up our terminological act
'Cold blooded' is inaccurate as well as jejune. Ectothermicis much more elegant, and this summary (from http://palaeo.gly.bris.ac.uk/communication/rothery/page1b)is handy:
An animal is an ectotherm if it keeps its body warm using heatmainly from outside its body - externally heated.There's a detailed page on bioenergeticsand thermal regulation from GaTech.The main sources for this heat are the sun and the air around the body.Ectotherms lie in the sun to warm their bodies up so that they can workproperly.
Modern ectotherms include crocodiles, alligators and lizards.
Ectotherms are also poikilotherms [their body temperature varies withexternal conditions]. This means that their body temperature varies widely.
Niche
The Lorax: text is at http://www.arcos.org/lorax/lorax.html with an illustration, and alsolocally with just the text. There's a literaryanalysis too.
R.T. Paine's classic paper turned out to be a bit of challengeto locate, since we don't have American Naturalist for 1966 (oursubscription ended in 1945 and then restarted in 1970), but my strategyis worth describing as an example of virtue rewarded. I reasonedthat we might have some collections of classic papers, did a keyword searchin Annie for ecology papers, and quickly found Foundations ofEcology: classic papers with commentaries [QH541.145.F68 1991], which includes
Robert T. Paine Food web complexity and species diversity.American Naturalist vol 100 number 910 (1966), pp. 65-75.The same volume has another American Naturalist article, by G. E[velyn]Hutchinson ("Father of Modern Ecology"), which might be worth a look:
G. E. Hutchinson Homage to Santa Rosalia or why are thereso many kinds of animals? American Naturalist vol 93 number870 (1959), pp. 145-159.We do have Hutchinson's Introduction to population ecology (1978)[QH541 .H87] and several books by Charles S[utherland] Elton.
I went looking for some augmentative stuff on eutrophication(the outcome of oversupply of nutrients, as in the algal blooms relatedto sewage and/or phosphates, etc.). I did a search on AltaVista (the'Advanced' mode) for "algae near sewage and phosphates" and found a pointerto a page on macronutrientsfrom a Rutgers Environmental Sciences course (Limnology of Urban and SuburbanWaters, Prof. K. Irwin Keating). It mentions a 1969(!) book whichis in our library:
Eutrophication: causes, consequences, correctives (NAS1969) [QH96 .A1 I63]which has an introduction by G.E. Hutchinson ("Eutrophication, past andpresent", pp 17-26), about which its author speaks in hushed tones:
Hutchinson's words are regarded as somewhat Biblical by limnologists.His opinions are often better data than the data generated by most scientists.I think he was familiar with every word that had ever been written re ecologyand limnology (and at times I have a suspicion that most other topics wereequally known to him) and his decade old words, when carefully read, holdan incredible number of answers to as yet unasked questions.
Clemmys muhlenbergii
(the bog turtle)
A search of AltaVista turns up 111 hits --some of which areprobably useless, but others look like they'll be wonderful. There'san article by Dorothy DeLisle from TortugaGazette (1992) (and the site, http://www.tortoise.org, looks like itwould be a worthwhile one to explore further). And there's a turtleindex , and an article with pictures ( BogTurtles Finally Seen as Threatened ), and an article abstract ( LandUse, Development and Natural Succession ), each of which adds someuseful information to what Dr. Hurd said. There's also a Dept of Interiordocument with morethan you'd ever want to know about the bog turtle.
So what? What we have here is an example of the richesof the Web, at the same time a temptation ("everything is on the web...")and a pitfall (?how do you know what to trust? ?how do you know whenyou have everything/enough/the right stuff?).
Dr. Hurd mentioned an article on trophic levels which alsoturns out to be available in full text online:Interactions among three trophic levels: influence of plantson interactions between insect herbivores and natural enemies. Price,Peter W. et al. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, vol 11(1980), pp 41-65.Here's alink to it (page down to find the Article link).