E-Book Overview
Most books and courses in ecology cover facts and concepts but don't explain how to actually do ecological research. How to Do Ecology provides nuts-and-bolts advice on organizing and conducting a successful research program. This one-of-a-kind book explains how to choose a research question and answer it through manipulative experiments and systematic observations. Because science is a social endeavor, the book provides strategies for working with other people, including professors and collaborators. It suggests effective ways to communicate your findings in the form of journal articles, oral presentations, posters, and grant and research proposals. The book also includes ideas to help you identify your goals, organize a season of fieldwork, and deal with negative results. In short, it makes explicit many of the unspoken assumptions behind doing good research in ecology and provides an invaluable resource for meaningful conversations between ecologists.
This second edition of How to Do Ecology features new sections on conducting and analyzing observational surveys, job hunting, and becoming a more creative researcher, as well as updated sections on statistical analyses.
E-Book Content
How to Do Ecology How to Do Ecology A Concise Handbook Second Edition Richard Karban Mikaela Huntzinger Ian S. Pearse Princeton University Press Princeton and Oxford Copyright © 2014 by Princeton University Press Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William Street, Princeton, New Jersey 08540 In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press, 6 Oxford Street, Woodstock, Oxfordshire OX20 1TW press.princeton.edu Cover art by Richard Karban, from a photo by Kaori Shiojiri; Sagehen Creek, California All Rights Reserved ISBN 978–0-691–16176–1 Library of Congress Control Number: 2014934363 British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available This book has been composed in ITC New Baskerville Printed on acid-free paper ∞ Printed in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Contents vii List of Illustrations ix List of Boxes xi Preface to the Second Edition xiii Introduction: The Aims of This Book 1 Chapter 1. Picking a Question 19 Chapter 2. Posing Questions (or Picking an Approach) 37 Chapter 3. Using Experiments to Test Hypotheses 58 Chapter 4. Analyzing Experimental Data 77 Chapter 5. Using Surveys to Explore Patterns vi C o n te n ts 97 Chapter 6. Building Your Indoor Skills 105 Chapter 7. Working with People and Getting a Job in Ecology 119 Chapter 8. Communicating What You Find 164 Chapter 9. Conclusions 167 Acknowledgments 169 References 177 Index Illustrations 28 Figure 1. Apparent competition between white-tailed deer and caribou 48 Figure 2. A scope diagram showing an observational, experimental, and modeling approaches used to characterize changes that occur to harbors over decades 51 Figure 3. Experimental designs to evaluate the effects of predators on greenhouse pests 65 Figure 4. The relationship between the number of stork pairs and the human birth rate in 17 European countries 74 Figure 5. Effects of early herbivory on the success of caterpillars and the growth of wild cotton plants 86 Figure 6. Possible relationships between March temperature and bird breeding viii C o n te n ts 94 Figure 7. A path analysis showing various hypotheses