Over the course of 16 d in the fall of 1998, Hurricane Georges made landfall on five Caribbean Island nations, two U.S. states, and two territories. Along its path, it impacted nearly every type of built environment and terrestrial and marine ecosystem found in the Caribbean and the southeastern United States. We reviewed ecological and sociological research related to Georges in order to demonstrate

Assessing and managing the human influence on the natural and anthropic ecosystems strongly demands for robust measures of their resilience, especially in a world facing global changes as it is the Earth now. Many definitions of resilience have been proposed in order to cover different contexts. However, they are mostly derived either from the ecological or the engineering definitions of resilience

The southern range limit of white spruce (Picea glauca) in western Canada is believed to arise from effects of moisture limitation on seedling recruitment. Within stands near white spruce’s range limit, the adverse effects of water limitation on seedling growth and survival may be compounded by competition from neighboring understory plants and trees. To test this hypothesis, we conducted a competition

Capture–recapture methods are a common tool in ecological statistics, which have been extended to spatial capture–recapture models for data accompanied by location information. However, standard formulations of these models can be unwieldy and computationally intractable for large spatial scales, many individuals, and/or activity center movement. We provide a cumulative series of methods that yield

Counts of independent photo events from camera traps are commonly used to make inference about species occupancy, the density of unmarked populations, and the relative abundance of species across time and space. These applications rest on the untested assumption that data collected from individual cameras are representative of the landscape location in which they are placed, and that nearby cameras

Capture–recapture studies are widely used in ecology to estimate population sizes and demographic rates. In some capture–recapture studies, individuals may be visually encountered but not identified. For example, if individual identification is only possible upon capture and individuals escape capture, visual encounters can result in failed captures where individual identities are unknown. In such

Demographic models enhance understanding of drivers of population growth and inform conservation efforts to prevent population declines and extinction. For species with complex life histories, however, parameterizing demographic models is challenging because some life stages can be difficult to study directly. Integrated population models (IPMs) empower researchers to estimate vital rates for organisms

Eurycea pterophila is a fully aquatic paedomorphic salamander species classified as under review for federal listing and distributed in restricted sections of the Comal River (Comal CO., TX). Unlike Eurycea sosorum, which constitutes the only documented wild sightings of Eurycea eggs in the region, no eggs of Eurycea pterophila have been documented in the wild. During a routine collection of Eurycea

Community and invasion ecology have mostly grown independently. There is substantial overlap in the processes captured by different models in the two fields, and various frameworks have been developed to reduce this redundancy and synthesize information content. Despite broad recognition that community and invasion ecology are interconnected, a process‐based framework synthesizing models across these

Marine mesotherms are able to occupy broader thermal niches than ectotherms; however, this means they must thermoregulate according to diverse thermal conditions across the ocean. Knowledge remains limited about how differences in thermal conditions within the selected habitats affect the behavior and associated ecological traits in mesotherms. Here, we tested if a marine mesotherm, leatherback turtles

The notion that closely related species resemble each other in ecological niche space (i.e., phylogenetic dependence) has been a long‐standing, contentious paradigm in evolutionary biology, the incidence of which is important for predicting the ecosystem‐level effects of species loss. Despite being examined across a multitude of terrestrial taxa, many aspects of niche conservatism have yet to be explored

Allelopathy, a type of interference competition involving exuded chemicals, has been documented for several types of organisms including terrestrial plants, aquatic macrophytes, microbes, and planktonic algae. However, due to the dynamic nature of the aquatic environment it is unclear whether allelopathy is an evolutionarily stable competition mechanism in such a setting. In this research, we consider

The projected climate change and increase in thermal conditions in northern latitudes over the next 60 yr has the potential to alter the metabolic scope and potential fitness of aquatic ectotherms. Here, we experimentally tested if elevated egg incubation temperature affected metabolic scope in juvenile brown trout (Salmo trutta) as a phenotypically plastic response. Cohorts of brown trout from anadromous

Aboveground net primary productivity (ANPP) in grasslands is an important integrator of terrestrial ecosystem function, a key driver of global biogeochemical cycles, and a critical source of food for wild and domesticated herbivores. ANPP exhibits high spatial and temporal variability, driven by a suite of factors including precipitation amount and pattern, biotic and abiotic legacies, and topographic

Turtles are in decline worldwide, and the magnitude and recent acceleration of population declines requires immediate action to inform conservation and management plans. Long‐term studies of population trends and characteristics covering multiple populations across a range of environmental contexts are needed to guide the most effective management decisions, yet such studies are uncommon. Eastern box

Nitrogen (N) management is a critical agronomic challenge, as N losses are a source of pollution affecting both waterways and air quality and a potential economic loss for farmers. One approach to N conservation is through ecologically based agricultural systems that reduce tillage and incorporate cover crops. However, these systems exhibit considerable complexity resulting in potential agronomic trade‐offs

Plant defense chemistry is often hypothesized to drive ecological and evolutionary success in diverse tropical forests, yet detailed characterizations of plant secondary metabolites in tropical plants are logistically challenging. Here, we explore a new integrative approach that combines visible‐to‐shortwave infrared (VSWIR) spectral reflectance data with detailed plant metabolomics data from 19 Protium

Widespread shrub encroachment in grasslands can lead to changes in soil aggregates and soil organic carbon (SOC), especially in deep soils. Soil aggregates physicochemically protect SOC and thus affect soil carbon sequestration. Characterizing the changes in soil aggregates and their organic carbon associated with shrub encroachment is critical for evaluating the ecological consequences of shrub encroachment

Marine coastal ecosystems are crucial to human populations in reducing disaster risk. Least Developed Countries are particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change, such as sea‐level rise and storm surges. The Mauritanian coast, West Africa, ranks among the most vulnerable worldwide to sea‐level rise, and coastal communities in the National Park of Banc d’Arguin (PNBA) are particularly at

Understanding patterns of biodiversity is a key goal of ecology and is especially pressing in the current human‐caused biodiversity crisis. In wetland ecosystems, human impacts are centered around hydrologic manipulation including the common practice of wetland diking and impoundment. Constraining how wetland management influences plant biodiversity patterns across spatial scales will provide information

Dispersal of animals among populations helps to increase genetic variability and population viability. The endangered ocelot (Leopardus pardalis) in south Texas persists in two small populations separated by 30 km and cutoff from populations in northeastern Mexico. Despite the relatively short distance separating the two south Texas populations, movement between them has been limited, leading researchers

Post‐dispersal seed predation is an important determinant of plant recruitment. Although many plant species are dispersed following consumption by omnivorous vertebrates, the potential for these dispersal agents to indirectly affect seed fate by modifying seed predator behavior is poorly understood. We evaluated the hypothesis that the scat of an omnivorous vertebrate (coyote, Canis latrans), which

Plague is a flea‐vectored disease introduced to North America c. 1900. It is lethal to many American mammal species, causes major die‐offs (epizootics) in some populations, and may be ecologically disruptive even at lower interepizootic (enzootic) levels of transmission. We sought to determine the effects of enzootic plague on survival of Mexican woodrats (Neotoma mexicana) and to test the hypothesis

The degradation and loss of ecologically important wetlands has been a topical issue in the Great Lakes region, where 60–80% of the coastal wetlands have been lost since the 1800s. The present modeling study aims to guide the restoration efforts in Cootes Paradise marsh, one of the most degraded shallow wetlands in Southern Ontario. We use a process‐based eutrophication model designed to reproduce

Tracing the flow of dietary energy sources, especially in systems with a high degree of omnivory, is an ongoing challenge in ecology. In aquatic systems, one of the persistent challenges is in differentiating between autochthonous and allochthonous energy sources to top consumers. Bulk carbon stable isotope values of aquatic and terrestrial prey often overlap, making it difficult to delineate dietary

With increasing biodiversity loss occurring worldwide, there is a need to understand how these losses will affect ecosystem structure and function. Biodiversity loss leads to changes in species interactions and alters the trophic complexity of food webs. These alterations to trophic complexity can be described by changes to the diversity of food resources and the diversity of trophic levels. To understand

Community assembly has been an important topic in ecological research and theory for over a century. Recently, restoration ecologists have emphasized the use of community assembly rules, such as environmental filtering, to better inform management actions. Although there has been a strong call for the use of community assembly rules in terrestrial restoration ecology, few studies have examined their

We analyze here the nature of research in freshwater macrosystem biology (especially lotic studies) from both conceptual and current research perspectives. The boundaries of permanent and transitional lotic macrosystems from the smallest to largest spatial extents are described. We contrast ecosystem vs. macrosystem research and macroecology vs. macrosystems ecology and provide some examples of representative

The idea that the presence of sharks impacts the behavior of mesopredatory reef fishes is controversial and lacks clear evidence at reef‐wide scales. We compared the abundance and behavior of these reef fishes in response to the presence of reef sharks using Baited Remote Underwater Video System (BRUVS) deployments in two adjacent reef systems where sharks have either been exclusively targeted by fishing

To understand how the environment drives spatial variation in population dynamics, we need to assess the effects of a large number of potential drivers on vital rates (survival, growth, and reproduction) and explore these relationships over large geographical areas and broad environmental gradients. In this study, we examined the effects of a wide variety of abiotic and biotic environmental factors

Ongoing climate change is increasing rainfall variability in many parts of the world; in particular, the heaviest rainfall events are becoming heavier. In terrestrial ecosystems, nitrogen deposition is increasing as a result of emissions from fossil fuel burning and volatilization of nitrogen‐based fertilizers. These changes in the timing and rate of resource inputs can impact plant communities by

Gallery forests are widespread in most tropical savanna landscapes creating a mosaic of grass‐dominated systems with tree components and forest patches. Interactions among water, nutrient availability, and wildfires have influenced the structure, patterns, and processes of these landscape systems and have shaped today’s biodiversity in the savanna–forest transitions of the Orinoco basin in Colombia

Quantifying the contribution of habitat dynamics relative to intrinsic population processes in regulating species persistence remains an ongoing challenge in ecological and applied conservation. Understanding these drivers and their relationship is essential for managing habitat‐dependent species, especially those that specialize in transitional habitats. Limitations in the ability of natural disturbance

Initial errors and model parameter errors are two of the main factors that produce uncertainties in numerical simulations and predictions. It is crucial to determine in advance which of these types of errors should be reduced to improve numerical simulations and increase their prediction skill. In this study, a fundamental issue related to studies of the predictability about terrestrial carbon cycle

Understanding of the impact of environmental factors on endangered plant species provides a basis for assessment of the risk of their extinction in the near future. Of particular importance is the search for optimal environmental conditions to preserve the continued existence of endangered taxa. Thus, there is a need for a method based on mathematical modeling to connect the current status of an endangered

Taxonomic revisions using newly available molecular data can have profound consequences for identifying areas of high endemism and, therefore, high conservation priority. A good example of the connection between taxonomy, biodiversity ecology, and conservation issues is genus Phaeiris (Iris subsect. Hexagonae), an endemic taxon of the southeastern United States and in particular P. hexagona (I. hexagona)

In the paper by Lu et al. (“Cascading implication of a single climate change event for fragile ecosystems on the Qinghai‐Tibetan Plateau,” Ecosphere 11(9):e03243), a statement regarding authorship should have appeared in the Acknowledgments section. The statement should read “S. Lu and A. Hughes contributed equally to the work reported here.” The authors regret the omission.

As wild ungulate densities increase across Europe and North America, plant–herbivore interactions are increasingly important from ecological and economic perspectives. These interactions are particularly significant where agriculture and forestry occur and where intensive grazing and browsing by wild ungulates can result in economic losses to growing crops and trees. We studied plant–herbivore interactions

Understanding how drivers of ecological disturbance operate across scales is important in an era of increasing disturbance activity. Severe and extensive Dendroctonus bark beetle outbreaks across western North America have left in their wake dominance by shade‐tolerant and commonly late‐seral trees such as subalpine fir (Abies lasiocarpa), which can foster resilience of forest cover. However, subalpine

In fluctuating lake ecosystems, the severity of anthropogenic disturbance is often difficult to assess because the magnitude of natural dynamics rivals or surpasses that of ecosystem alteration due to human impact. Consequently, it is also difficult to evaluate the resilience of these ecosystems' plant and animal communities to that impact. Unfortunately, lake ecosystem response to natural cycles of

Conservation efforts have mainly been focused on depleted species or populations, but many formerly reduced marine mammal populations have recovered to historical abundances. This calls for new management strategies and new models for ecological risk assessment that incorporate local density dependence and multiple environmental stressors. The harbor seal metapopulation in Swedish and Danish waters

Landslides are common disturbances in forests around the world, and a major threat to human life and property. Landslides are likely to become more common in many areas as storms intensify. Forest vegetation can improve hillslope stability via long, deep rooting across and through failure planes. In the U.S. Rocky Mountains, landslides are infrequent but widespread when they do occur. They are also

In complex urban systems, urban parks are rare hot spots of nature, responsible for delivering a range of ecosystem services. Trees are critically important components of urban parks that provide many benefits, and, at the same time, face challenges such as lack of funds, mismanagement, climate change, pests, and diseases. There is a growing need to increase the urban tree cover to sustain urban ecosystems

Understanding the environmental drivers of demographic rates and population dynamics over space and time is critical for anticipating how species will respond to climate change. While the influence of temporal environmental variation and large environmental gradients are well recognized, less is known about how local topography and landscape position influence demography over small spatial scales.

Climate change is amplifying the frequency and severity of droughts and wildfires in many forests. In the western United States, fuel reduction treatments, both mechanical and prescribed fire, are widely used to increase resilience to wildfire but their effect on resistance to drought and beetle mortality is not as well understood. We followed more than 10,000 mapped and tagged trees in a mixed‐conifer

The spatial overlap of multiple ecological disturbances in close succession has the capacity to alter trajectories of ecosystem recovery. Widespread bark beetle outbreaks and wildfire have affected many forests in western North America in the past two decades in areas of important habitat for native ungulates. Bark beetle outbreaks prior to fire may deplete seed supply of the host species, and differences

During the last few decades, much attention has focused on how global change is affecting the environment and species distributions. Land‐use change is still the major cause of species declines worldwide, but changes in species distributions have been documented even in pristine and protected areas. Here, we document the distribution dynamics of 26 species of frogs and birds within a Caribbean protected

Species coexistence is a central issue in plant community ecology. Among processes potentially promoting coexistence is the competition–colonization trade‐off: the idea that inferior competitors can coexist with superior competitors if they are better colonizers. The competition–colonization trade‐off usually assumes superior competitors have an impact on inferior competitors, but not vice versa. In

Parasites and pathogens are crucial in shaping immune systems. Many animals and especially insects have outsourced part of their immune function to protective symbionts. There is good evidence that, akin to immune systems, parasites shape the occurrence and diversity of protective symbionts and that likewise, protective symbionts can shape the occurrence and diversity of parasites. Such a relationship

The American plains bison (Bison bison) is an iconic herbivore on North American grasslands, yet many questions surrounding their basic biology remain unanswered. We analyzed fine‐resolution movement data (12 minute) from two of the largest remaining prairie tracts in the Great Plains of North America to address whether bison movement and distance travelled are affected by seasonal or diurnal rhythms

Woody plant expansions are altering ecosystem structure and function, as well as fire regimes, around the globe. Tree‐reduction treatments are widely implemented in expanding woodlands to reduce fuel loads, increase ecological resilience, and improve habitat, but few studies have measured treatment outcomes over long timescales or large geographic areas. The Sagebrush Treatment Evaluation Project (SageSTEP)

Scavengers play an important role in nutrient recycling and disease control, and this role may be particularly critical after mass mortality events, such as those caused by epidemics, culling, or natural disasters. Current work on scavenger ecology has focused on use of single carcasses, but behaviors are likely to be different at mass mortality events, in which high resource abundance can prolong

Variation among demographic rates for a population reflects the allocation of available energy by individuals to competing life‐history strategies. Species exhibiting slow‐paced life histories often prioritize energy allocation to adult survival over any single reproductive event, therefore maximizing future reproductive potential. Survival of adult female ungulates is generally high with little variability

The management of species that occur in low densities is a conservation concern worldwide across taxa with consequences for managers and policymakers. The distribution boundary at the upper extent of fish in North America receives extra attention because stream reaches with fish are managed differently and often have more protections than fishless reaches. Here, we examine the relative reliability

At small spatial scales, attraction or deterrence of herbivores by plant neighbors can alter the susceptibility of plants to damage (i.e., associational effects). Given the patchy nature of plants and insect herbivory, we hypothesized that induced resistance may play an important role in mitigating such spatial variability. To test this notion, we first documented neighbor effects between two closely

Boreal forests have been evidenced to be highly sensitive to enhanced nitrogen (N) deposition due to prevailing N limitations, and external N inputs from atmospheric deposition are expected to alter plant nutrient stoichiometry. Previous studies have mostly focused on the dominant tree species while neglecting understory plants that often play important role in the nutrient cycles in forest ecosystems

Several species of aggressive bark beetle in the genus Dendroctonus (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) undergo large fluctuations in population density with distinct outbreak and non‐outbreak phases. We investigated attributes we hypothesized as subject to density‐dependent variation (in particular, those likely to express phenotypic plasticity) in the southern pine beetle (SPB), Dendroctonus frontalis, as

Nitrogen (N) limits plant growth in temperate ecosystems, yet many evergreens exhibit low photosynthetic N use efficiency, which can be explained in part by their tendency to store more N than to use it in photosynthesis. However, it remains uncertain to what extent mature conifers translocate internal N reserves or take up N from soils to support new growth. In this study, we explored N dynamics within

Coral spawning is a fundamental process in the preservation of coral reef systems. However, reproductive information is still rare for many coral species and across a number of locations. No reproductive information is yet available from the western coast of the central and southern Red Sea. We document here the daytime spawning of Pocillopora verrucosa across the two coasts of the central Red Sea