Ecological Assembly Rules: Perspectives, Advances, Retreats

by Evan Weiher (Editor), Paul A. Keddy (Editor)

It is over twenty years since Jared Diamond focused attention on the possible existence of assembly rules for communities. Since then there has been a proliferation of studies trying to promote, refute, or test the idea that there are sets of constraints (rules) on community formation and maintenance (assembly). This timely volume brings together carefully selected contributions which examine the question of the existence and nature of assembly rules with some rigor and in some detail, using both theoretical and empirical approaches in a variety of systems. The result is a balanced treatment which encompasses a wide range of topics within ecology including competition and coexistence, conservation and biodiversity, niche theory, and biogeography. As such it provides much to interest a broad audience of ecologists, while also making an important contribution to the study of community ecology in particular.

432 pages, Paperback

First published June 16, 1995

Reviews

[Nadiah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ecological assembly rules are ecological restrictions on the observed patterns of species presence or abundance that are based on the presence or abundance of one or more other species or groups of species.

Or are they? Wrangling about the definitions of assembly and what constitutes a proper assembly rule is one of several topics discussed across this collection of papers. This collection provides a useful overview of the state of research from Jared Diamond's 1975 paper to its time of publication. More than that however, the discussions and opinions are put forward in a way that's much more candid than what one would find in an ordinary journal paper. When the editors' introduction includes a comparison between some research efforts in the area and masturbation (page 13 if you must know), the reader is warned that there will be some frankly-put opinions to come. While the candidness of each chapter varies from author to author, the content is freer overall.

I read papers from this collection with the hope of gaining a quick overview of the area, and the book satisfied me to this purpose. I'm not sure how important all of the _results_ presented were, but the discussions around them were definitely useful to me. The collection also seems to have given some of the authors an opportunity to put forward some of their more speculative or philosophical thoughts on the topic (e.g. Drake et al.'s contribution), which may be useful to those looking to brainstorm or looking for new ideas for models.