Scaling in Ecology with a Model System

by Aaron Ellison, Nicholas J. Gotelli

Overview

A groundbreaking approach to scale and scaling in ecological theory and practice

Scale is one of the most important concepts in ecology, yet researchers often find it difficult to find ecological systems that lend themselves to its study. Scaling in Ecology with a Model System synthesizes nearly three decades of research on the ecology of Sarracenia purpurea—the northern pitcher plant—showing how this carnivorous plant and its associated food web of microbes and macrobes can inform the challenging question of scaling in ecology.

Drawing on a wealth of findings from their pioneering lab and field experiments, Aaron Ellison and Nicholas Gotelli reveal how the Sarracenia microecosystem has emerged as a model system for experimental ecology. Ellison and Gotelli examine Sarracenia at a hierarchy of spatial scales—individual pitchers within plants, plants within bogs, and bogs within landscapes—and demonstrate how pitcher plants can serve as replicate miniature ecosystems that can be studied in wetlands throughout the United States and Canada. They show how research on the Sarracenia microecosystem proceeds much more rapidly than studies of larger, more slowly changing ecosystems such as forests, grasslands, lakes, or streams, which are more difficult to replicate and experimentally manipulate.

Scaling in Ecology with a Model System offers new insights into ecophysiology and stoichiometry, demography, extinction risk and species distribution models, food webs and trophic dynamics, and tipping points and regime shifts.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691222783
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	08/03/2021
Series:	Monographs in Population Biology , #64
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	338
File size:	8 MB

About the Author

Aaron M. Ellison is the Senior Research Fellow Emeritus in Ecology at Harvard University. Website unbalancedecologist.net Twitter @AMaxEll17 Nicholas J. Gotelli is the George H. Perkins Professor of Zoology at the University of Vermont. Website uvm.edu/~ngotelli/homepage.html They are the coauthors of A Primer of Ecological Statistics and A Field Guide to the Ants of New England.

Table of Contents

Preface xiii

Abbreviations xxi

1 Introduction: Why Scale? 1

1.1 Time and Space 2

1.2 Genes to Ecosystems 3

1.3 Modeling: Metabolic Theory and Macroecology 5

1.4 Mechanisms at Scales 6

1.5 Organisms as Model Systems 7

1.6 Summary 8

Part I Ecophysiology, Nutrient Limitation, and Stoichiometry 11

2 Context: Nutrient Limitation, the Evolution of Botanical Carnivory, and Environmental Change 13

2.1 Background 14

2.1.1 Nutrient Acquisition, Plant Traits, and the Evolution of Botanical Carnivory 14

2.1.2 Anthropogenic Activities Alter Resource Availability and Fluxes 14

2.2 Next Steps 18

3 The Small World: Stoichiometry and Nutrient Limitation in Pitcher Plants and Other Phytotelmata 20

3.1 Stoichiometric Manipulations of Sarracenia 21

3.1.1 Effects of Soluble N from Atmospheric Sources 21

3.1.2 Effects of Nutrient Inputs from Supplemental Prey 23

3.1.3 Synthesis of Supplemental Feeding Experiments 26

3.2 Nutrient Additions in Other Phytotelmata 26

3.3 Summary 29

4 Scaling Up: Stoichiometry, Traits, and the Place of Sarracenia in Global Spectra of Plant Traits 31

4.1 Global Plant Trait Spectra 31

4.1.1 Traits 32

4.1.2 Trait Data 32

4.2 Carnivorous Plants in Global Trait Spectra 33

4.2.1 Nutrient Concentrations 33

4.2.2 Nutrient Stoichiometry 37

4.2.3 Stoichiometric Effects of Supplemental Prey on Carnivorous Plants 37

4.2.4 Stoichiometric Effects of Adding Inorganic Nutrients to Carnivorous Plants 42

4.2.5 Photosynthesis and Construction Costs 47

4.3 Synthesis 48

Part II Demography, Global Change, and Species Distribution Models 51

5 Context: Demography, Global Change, and the Changing Distributions of Species 53

5.1 Background 54

5.2 SDMs, Demography, and Anthropogenic Drivers: Moving Beyond Temperature 54

5.2.1 Weak Responses to Temperature 55

5.2.2 Nutrient Enrichment as Another Global-Change Driver 56

5.2.3 The Importance of Demographic Effects 57

5.3 Next Steps 57

6 The Small World: Demography of a Long-Lived Perennial Carnivorous Plant 59

6.1 Demographic Models of Sarracenia purpurea 59

6.1.1 A Deterministic, Stage-Based Demographic Model for Sarracenia purpurea 59

6.1.2 Stochastic Stage-Based Models 63

6.2 Experimental Demography 67

6.3 Demography in a Changing World 70

6.3.1 Forecasting Nitrogen Deposition 70

6.3.2 Linking N-Deposition Rates to Stage-Transition Matrices 71

6.3.3 Modeling Population Growth 74

6.3.4 The Future Is Now: Nitrogen Deposition and Extinction Risk in 2020 77

6.4 Summary 80

7 Scaling Up: Incorporating Demography and Extinction Risk into Species Distribution Models 82

7.1 Available Data 82

7.1.1 Sarracenia purupurea Occurrence Data 82

7.1.2 Environmental and Climatic Data 83

7.2 Continental Scaling of Demographic Models 83

7.2.1 Challenges and Simplifying Assumptions 83

7.2.2 Including P Introduced Additional Complexity 86

7.2.3 Continental Forecasts for S. purpurea Persistence 88

7.3 Forecasting the Future Distribution of Sarracenia purpurea 91

7.3.1 A MaxEnt Model for Sarracenia purpurea 91

7.3.2 Comparison of Forecasts of Demographic and MaxEnt Models 91

7.4 Additional Forecasting Scenarios, Past and Future 93

7.5 Synthesis 95

Part III Ecology of the Sarracenia Community 97

8 Context: Community Ecology, Community Ecologies, and Communities of Ecologists 99

8.1 Background 100

8.1.1 What Is an Ecological Community? 100

8.1.2 Substituting Space for Time, and Vice Versa 100

8.1.3 The Importance of Networks 103

8.2 Next Steps 103

9 The Small World: Structure and Dynamics of Inquiline Food Webs in Sarracenia purpurea 104

9.1 Composition and Structure of the Sarracenia purpurea Food Web 104

9.1.1 The Inquilines 104

9.1.2 Network Structure of the Sarracenia purpurea Food Web 105

9.2 Co-occurrence Analysis of Sarracenia purpurea Inquilines 107

9.2.1 Quantifying and Testing Inquiline Co-occurrence 107

9.3 Succession of the Inquiline Food Web 114

9.4 Dynamics of the Sarracenia purpurea Food Web 117

9.4.1 Temporal Changes in Food-Web Structure 117

9.4.2 A Model of Food-Web Temporal Dynamics 118

9.5 Summary 123

10 Scaling Up: The Generality of the Sarracenia Food Web and Its Value as a Model Experimental System 124

10.1 The Sarracenia Food Web and Other Container Webs Are "Normal" Food Webs 125

10.1.1 Food-Web Data 125

10.1.2 Food-Web Structure 126

10.2 Spatial Scaling of the Sarracenia purpurea Food Web 126

10.3 The Sarracenia purpurea Food Web as a Model Experimental System for Understanding and Managing Food Webs 132

10.3.1 Fishing Down the Sarracenia Food Web 135

10.3.2 Is Wyeomyia smithii a Keystone Predator? 136

10.3.3 Dynamic Food Webs in Dynamic Habitats 137

10.4 Synthesis 143

Part IV Tempests in Teapots 145

11 Context: Tipping Points and Regime Shifts 147

11.1 Background 148

11.1.1 Examples of Regime Shifts and Alternative States 149

11.1.2 Linking Empirical Data with Mathematical Models of Alternative States 150

11.2 A Potential Need for Interventions 151

11.3 Next Steps 151

12 The Small World: Tipping Points and Regime Shifts in the Sarracenia Microecosystem 153

12.1 State Changes in the Sarracenia Microecosystem 153

12.1.1 Temporal Dynamics of Aerobic and Anaerobic Conditions in Sarracenia purpurea Pitchers 154

12.1.2 An Alternative Approach 157

12.2 Summary 161

13 Scaling Up: Using *omics to Identify Ecosystem States and Transitions 162

13.1 Protein Surveys of the Sarracenia Microecosystem 162

13.2 Proteomics of Sarracenia Fed Supplemental Prey 163

13.3 The Cybernetics and Information Content of the S. purpurea Proteome 166

13.4 Early Warning Indicators, Hysteresis, and the Twisted Path of Funded Research 168

13.4.1 Hysteresis, Environmental Tracking, and Anti-hysteresis in the Sarracenia Microecosystem 170

13.5 Synthesis 173

14 Conclusion: Whither Sarracenia! 175

14.1 Resources, Nutrients, and Stoichiometry 176

14.2 Demography and Species Distributions 177

14.3 Food Webs and Other Networks 178

14.4 Tipping Points, Regime Shifts, and Alternative States 180

Appendices 183

Appendix A The Natural History of Sarracenia and Its Microecosystem 185

Appendix B The Basics of Resource Limitation 212

Appendix C Deterministic Stage-Based Models 215

Appendix D The Basics of Species Distribution Models 218

Appendix E A Brief History and Précis of Methods for Analyzing Ecological Communities 221

Appendix F On Tipping Points and Regime Shifts 238

Appendix G On Biodiversity, Ecosystem Function, and *omics 249

Notes 255

References 259

Subject Index 303

Taxonomic Index 309

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"This engaging book is a wonderful example of how to do the kind of integrative science that the founders of ecology originally intended. Ellison and Gotelli offer the next generation of ecologists a new way to think about nature."—Oswald J. Schmitz, author of The New Ecology: Rethinking a Science for the Anthropocene

"This unique book provides a rare and complete synthesis of research and observations on a single study system, and is a superb example of ecological thinking that blends theory and empiricism. Scaling in Ecology with a Model System is a rich introduction to ecological science for any reader."—Mary O’Connor, University of British Columbia