© PSG and PDC, 2005
Last
Update:
February 11, 2008
Chapter 7 - Studying and describing vegetation.
New books and papers | Websites
Chapter Outline :
- Vegetation description is fundamental to studies of succession and zonation and many other areas of biogeography;
- Vegetation is intimately linked with climate and geology, and increasingly, to human activities such as agriculture and forestry;
- It provides
the groundwork on which applied biogeographical studies and increasingly,
environmental assessments depend.
| Author(s) | Title (and link) | Comment |
| Engelbrecht et al 2007 | Drought sensitivity shapes species distribution patterns in tropical forests | An attempt to explain gradients finds rainfall a key factor here |
| Condit et al 2006 | The
Importance of Demographic Niches to Tree Diversity |
Tropical forest tree diversity does not seem to correspond to standard ideas of demographic variation. |
| Bennie et al 2006 | Influence of slope and aspect on long-term vegetation change in British chalk grasslands. | Describes analyses which suggests that steep slopes are more prone to invasive species due to phosphorus limitations. This argues for a more varied response to invasion than often suggested. |
| Fagan et al 2005 | When
Can Herbivores Slow or Reverse the Spread of an Invading Plant? A Test Case from Mount St. Helens. american Naturalist 116(6) |
An interesting research project showing how plant-herbivore interactions can influence vegetation patterns. In this case, caterpillars can slow down the invasion of plants into post-eruption Mt St Helens. |
| Parmesan et al 2005 | Empirical perspectives on species borders: from traditional biogeography to global change | The paper describes and tests various approaches for describing species boundaries and looks at the implications of using these. |
Name |
Comment |
|
| Checklist of online vegetation and plant distribution maps | A useful list from the UC Berkeley Library. Links to a range of global maps many of which are interactive/GIS-type maps allowing for a great deal of control of detail. | |
If you find something that would be useful to other people then please let us know.