We evaluated three possible functions of clonal growth related to genet persistence in the root-suckering understory tree pawpaw, Asimina triloba (L.) Dunal: (1) risk spreading through multiplication of stems, (2) enhanced establishment and survival of new stems, and (3) horizontal expansion growth of patches. The number, diameter growth, and spatial distribution of annual stem recruits were ex...

Bumble-bee declines across Europe have been linked to loss of habitat and forage availability due to agricultural intensification. These declines may have severe ecological and commercial consequences since bumble-bees pollinate a range of wildflowers and crops. In England, attempts are being made to reintroduce forage resources through agri-environment schemes, yet there are few data on how th...

Bunn, Urban and Keitt[12] discuss landscape connectivity in the Coastal Plain of North Carolina through a graph theoretic approach using focal-species analysis. Graph Theory is very much useful in the study of landscape connectivity using graph as an ecological construct. Different nodes (vertices) represent habitat patches and edges, the distance (functional distance and not Euclidean distance...

BACKGROUND Urbanization is a major cause of habitat fragmentation worldwide. Ecological and conservation theory predicts many potential impacts of habitat fragmentation on natural populations, including genetic impacts. Habitat fragmentation by urbanization causes populations of animals and plants to be isolated in patches of suitable habitat that are surrounded by non-native vegetation or seve...

1. While many plant species offer rewards (e.g. nectar) to pollinators, some species, particularly in orchids, do not provide rewards. Ecological factors, such as interactions with rewarding co-flowering species may affect pollinator visitation rates to such deceptive species by influencing pollinator ability to learn to avoid deceptive plants (avoidance learning). 2. We tested the effect of fl...

In terrestrial ecosystems, ecological processes and patterns within focal patches frequently depend on their matrix. Crop fields (focal patches) are often surrounded by a mosaic of other land-use types (matrix), which may act as habitats for organisms and differ in terms of the immigration activities of organisms to the fields. We examined whether matrix quality affects wild pollinator abundanc...

Wildfires are frequent boreal forest disturbances, and particularly in Ontario, emulating them with forest harvesting has emerged as a legislated forest management goal. Since wildfires typically contain a considerable number of unburned residual patches, we present means for learning their characteristics to improve the subsequent emulation of wildfires. We present a method for developing prob...

Describing and quantifying the spatial heterogeneity of land cover in urban systems is crucial for developing an ecological understanding of cities. This paper presents a new approach to quantifying the fine-scale heterogeneity in urban landscapes that capitalizes on the strengths of two commonly used approaches—visual interpretation and object-based image analysis. This new approach integrates...

The Japanese National Biodiversity Strategy 2010 calls for the creation of ecological networks as a biodiversity conservation policy. This study proposed a plan of ecological networks to conserve two threatened local populations of Asiatic black bear (Ursus thibetanus japonicus) in Fuji and Tanzawa region in Japan with the support of GIS technologies. Using the predicted habitat patches of bear...

Metrics that quantify habitat connectivity and fragmentation in landscape ecology are examined, as well as the relations between them and their interpretation. The radius of gyration, defined here as the root-mean-square distance of habitat patches from the center of the habitat, has special significance from an ecological point of view that other metrics lack. This metric has been incorrectly ...