Community ecology

From Freepedia

Community ecology is the study of the distribution, abundance, demography, and interactions between populations of coexisting species. It is part of the division of ecology known as synecology that studies the organization of ecosystems specifically at the level of the biotic community (or biocoenosis).

Community ecology focuses on relationships between species, including the study of food webs, energy flow, and nutrient flow. Odum (1959, p. 8) considered that synecology should be divided into population ecology, community ecology, and ecosystem ecology, which suggests that autecology would not be precisely synonymous with population ecology. However, biologists have for some time since recognized that the most important level of organization of a species is its population, because at this level the gene pool is most coherent.

Community ecology has its origin in European plant sociology. Modern community ecology examines processes such as predator-prey population dynamics, succession, and community assembly.

References

• Odum, E. P. 1959. Fundamentals of ecology. W. B. Saunders Co., Philadelphia and London. 546 p.
• Barbour, Burke, and Pitts, 1987. Terrestrial Plant Ecology, 2nd ed. Cummings, Menlo Park, CA.