Island Biogeography Geo-Environmental Dynamics, Ecology, Evolution, Human Impact, and Conservation

About this book

Island biogeography is the study of the distribution and dynamics of species in island environments. Due to their isolation from more widespread continental species, islands are ideal places for unique species to evolve, but they are also places of concentrated extinction. Consequently, they are widely studied by ecologists, evolutionary biologists, and conservationists.

This accessible textbook builds on the success and reputation of its predecessors, documenting the recent advances in this exciting field and explaining how islands have contributed to both theory development and testing. In addition, the book describes the main processes of island formation, subsequent dynamics, and eventual demise, explaining the relevance of island environmental history to island biogeography. The authors demonstrate the significance of islands as hotspots of biodiversity and of prehistoric and historic anthropogenic extinction. Since island species continue to feature disproportionally in the lists of threatened species today, the book examines both the chief threats to their persistence and some of the mitigation measures that can be put in play, with conservation strategies specifically tailored to islands.

Contents

Preface and Acknowledgements

PART 1: Setting the Scene: Islands as Natural Laboratories
1. The natural laboratory paradigm
2. Island types, origins, and dynamics
3. Island environments
4. The biogeography of island life: biodiversity hotspots in context

PART 2: Island Ecology
5. Island macroecology
6. Assembly rules for island metacommunities
7. Extending the timescale: island biodynamics in response to island geodynamics

PART 3: Island Evolution
8. Colonization, evolutionary change, and speciation
9. Evolutionary diversification across islands and archipelagos
10. Island evolutionary syndromes in animals
11. Island evolutionary syndromes in - and involving - plants

PART 4: Human Impact and Conservation
12. The application of island theory to fragmented landscapes
13. The human transformation of island ecosystems
14. Anthropogenic extinction on islands: a synthesis
15. Meeting the conservation challenge

Customer Reviews

Biography

Robert J. Whittaker is a Professor of Biogeography in the School of Geography and the Environment at the University of Oxford and holds a part-time professorial position at the Centre for Macroecology, Evolution, and Climate at the University of Copenhagen. He is a co-founder and past President of the International Biogeography Society. He is a co-author of Island Biogeography: Ecology, Evolution, and Conservation (OUP, 2006). His research interests span island biogeography, diversity theory, macroecology, and conservation biogeography.

José María Fernández-Palacios is Full Professor of Ecology at the La Laguna University, Tenerife, Spain. He is an internationally recognised researcher on island ecology and biogeography, and in 2019 was elected President of the Society of Island Biology (SIB), a scientific association of island researchers and managers worldwide. He is a co-author of Island Biogeography: Ecology, Evolution, and Conservation (OUP, 2006).

Tom Matthews is a Senior Research Fellow in the School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, UK. He researches global environmental change issues using macroecological, macroevolutionary and biogeographical approaches. He applies a mixture of theoretical and empirical methods to investigate various macroecological topics, including species-area relationships and species abundance distributions. He has a keen interest in island systems and in particular the application of island theory to habitat island systems.