Cross‐Scale Morphology, Geometry, and Dynamics of Ecosystems

Abstract

Abstract. This paper tests the proposition that a small set of plant, animal, and abiotic processes structure >systems across scales in time and space. Earlier studies have suggested that these key structuring processes ablish a small number of dominant temporal frequencies that entrain other processes. These frequencies en differ from each other by at least an order of magnitude. If true, ecosystems therefore will have a few minant frequencies that are endogenously driven and that are discontinuously distributed. This paper additionally tests the proposition that these structuring processes should also generate a disconuous distribution of spatial structures coupled with the discontinuous frequencies. If that is the case, animals ing in specific landscapes should demonstrate the existence of this lumpy architecture by showing gaps in the >tribution of their sizes. This proved to be the case for birds and mammals of the boreal region forest and : short-grass prairie. Alternative hypotheses to explain the body mass clumps include architectural, develmental, historical, and trophic causes. These were all tested by comparing body-mass clump distributions (1) ecosystems having different spatial structures (forest, grassland, and marine pelagic) and (2) in different animal mps having different body plans (birds and mammals) or feeding habits (carnivore, omnivore, and herbivore). 1e only hypothesis that could not be rejected is that the body-mass clumps are entrained by discontinuous :rarchical structures and textures of the landscape. There is evidence for at least eight distinct habitat "quanta," :h defined by a distinct texture at a specific range of scales. These eight quanta together cover tens of centimetres hundreds of kilometres in space and at least months to millennia in time.There is a striking similarity, but not identity, between the clump structure of prairie and boreal animals. 1is indicates that many processes that form qualitative habitat structure are common to both landscapes or >systems, but a few are landscape specific, particularly over larger scales. That conclusion is extended to all restrial ecosystems by an analysis of the body-mass clump structure of all North American birds. In contrast, there are striking differences in clump structure between landscapes and "waterscapes," indicating 1t fundamentally different processes shape structure in terrestrial and open ocean systems. The discontinuous body-mass structure provides a bioassay of discontinuous ecosystem structure. Mamllian carnivores, omnivores, and herbivores all show the same number of body-mass clumps, and the gaps these distributions occur at the same body masses. Mammals and birds show the same number of bodyiSS clumps, but the mass gaps for mammals occur at larger sizes than those for birds in such a way that the ~-transformed body-mass gaps for mammals are correlated linearly with those for birds. Hence there is a nple cross-calibration between the mammal and bird bioassays.I compiled and analyzed published data on home ranges i...

Concept of scale in marine ecology: linking the words or the worlds?

“…One of the best-known examples is known as Stommell's diagram and presents the characteristic scales of plankton variability: from micropatches up to biogeographical provinces and oceanic fronts (Haury et al 1978). Similar "Stommel' diagrams" were recently presented both for terrestrial (Holling 1992) and benthic (Azovsky and Mokievsky 1996, Fig.3 in this article) communities. Some other examples for vegetation patterns and processes from leaf to landscape were given by Urban et al (1987).…”

“…3b). Recently Holling (1992) showed that terrestrial vertebrates also "measure" their environment and "make their decisions" with grain defined as a function of their size. So we can say that different groups are guided by the unified plan of world-creation but use their own measures to create it!…”

Movements of Marine Fish and Decapod Crustaceans: Process, Theory and Application

“…Some ecological properties of an organism are a function of body size (McNab, 1963;Calder, 1983;Holling, 1992). For land mammals (McNab, 1963;Reiss, 1988;McLoughlin and Ferguson, 2000) and freshwater fish (Minns, 1995) studies have found that home range scaled allometrically with body size.…”

“…We now know that animals are influenced by patterns and processes occurring at a range of scales of space, time and organisational complexity (Haury et al, 1978;Hatcher et al, 1987;Steele, 1988Steele, , 1989Barry and Dayton, 1991;Holling, 1992;Levin, 1992;Marquet et al, 1993). Furthermore, marine animals are likely to respond to and be constrained by the composition and spatial arrangement of resources in a hierarchical way, as has been suggested for many terrestrial animals (Senft et al, 1987;Schaefer and Messier, 1995;McAlpine et al, 1999;Rolstad et al, 2000).…”

Identifying scale-location specific control on vegetation distribution in mountain-hill region

“…Spatial pattern analysis remains challenging when these spatial relationships were examined by large ecological datasets that include patterns determined by multiple processes operating at multiple scales (Holling 1992). For example, vegetation cover was influenced by individual or combined effects from climate, topography, soil properties, and anthropogenic factors.…”