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Chapter 11 - Diversity

Paul Keddy
Affiliation:
Southeastern Louisiana University
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Summary

Three main patterns: area, habitat variation, latitude. Some evolutionary considerations. Some examples of diversity: Mediterranean climates, carnivorous plants, deciduous forests, endemic species. Four models describing diversity at smaller scales: intermediate biomass, competitive hierarchies, intermediate disturbance/gap dynamics, centrifugal organization. Relative abundance patterns. Evenness and diversity. Laboratory experiments. Field experiments. Conservation.

Introduction

How many kinds of plants are there altogether? And why do some areas of the world have more plant species than others? In some textbooks and reviews, students new to these questions are referred to articles such as Hutchinson (1959) and May (1988) – both of which conspicuously ignore plants! In his essay entitled “Homage to Santa Rosalia” Hutchinson (1959) wrote “[W]hy are there so many kinds of plants? As a zoologist I do not want to ask that question directly, I want to stick with animals but also get the answer.” May (1988) makes one single statement (without a reference) on plant diversity and then moves on to animal diversity! Yet, plants constitute over one-quarter of a million species (Groombridge 1992) and over 99 percent of the Earth's biomass (Whittaker 1975), while the number of species of fungi has been estimated at 1.65 million (Hawksworth 1990).

In this chapter we will explore the factors that allow so many different species of plants to occur and to coexist. The approach emphasizes two questions:

  1. What environmental factors are correlated with plant diversity at specified scales?

  2. What methods have provided evidence about the nature and causes of these patterns?

Type
Chapter
Information
Plants and Vegetation
Origins, Processes, Consequences
, pp. 502 - 548
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2007

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References

Williams, C. B. 1964. Patterns in the Balance of Nature. London: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Whittaker, R. H. 1965. Dominance and diversity in land plant communities. Science 147: 250–260.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pielou, E. C. 1975. Ecological Diversity. New York: John Wiley and Sons.Google Scholar
Huston, M. A. 1979. A general hypothesis of species diversity. The American Naturalist 113: 81–101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Specht, A. and Specht, R.. 1993. Species richness and canopy productivity of Australian plant communities. Biodiversity and Conservation 2: 152–167.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosenzweig, M. L. 1995. Species Diversity in Space and Time. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cowling, R. M. and Samways, M. J.. 1995. Predicting global patterns of endemic plant species richness. Biodiversity Letters 2: 127–131.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zobel, M. 1997. The relative role of species pools in determining plant species richness: an alternative explanation of species coexistence?Trends in Ecology and Evolution 12: 266–269.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Willig, M. R., Kaufman, D. M., and Stevens, R. D.. 2003. Latitudinal gradients of biodiversity: pattern, process, scale and synthesis. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution and Systematics 34: 273–309.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keddy, P. A. 2005. Putting the plants back into plant ecology: six pragmatic models for understanding, conserving and restoring plant diversity. Annals of Botany 96: 177–189.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

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  • Diversity
  • Paul Keddy, Southeastern Louisiana University
  • Book: Plants and Vegetation
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511812989.012
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  • Diversity
  • Paul Keddy, Southeastern Louisiana University
  • Book: Plants and Vegetation
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511812989.012
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Diversity
  • Paul Keddy, Southeastern Louisiana University
  • Book: Plants and Vegetation
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511812989.012
Available formats
×