Theoretical Evolutionary Ecology

Ecology, Dec, 1995 by Frederick R. Adler

The greatest strength of this book is the tight integration of theory with specific and well-chosen empirical examples. The introduction presents the fundamental idea of the Lack clutch size, supporting data, and some potential difficulties in interpreting those data. Unfortunately, I found the exposition of the "silver spoon" effect, one factor potentially confounding use of the Lack clutch size, rather confusing. Nonetheless, this section introduces the power of evolutionary ecology and its healthy integration with quantitative theory.

The book continues with three chapters on population dynamics, following the standard progression from one species to two species to age-structured populations. Although the exposition is clear, I fear that some topics may go by too fast for the target audience of biologists. Furthermore, many of these topics are not used explicitly in the later exposition. For example, none of the later models build significantly upon predator-prey models or the full complexity of Leslie matrices. These topics might better have been left to a more mathematical textbook, leaving more space to expound the key ideas of dynamics (such as the dynamics of simple genetic systems which are covered swiftly later in the book), optimization, and the ever-useful Poisson distribution. Additional mathematical topics, such as eigenvalues, are covered in the appendices.

I hope that these chapters do not give the impression that this book is another compilation of mathematically appealing "off-the-shelf" models. The remainder of the book, in barely over 200 pages, gives a wonderful course in evolutionary ecology. The chapters include life-history evolution, foraging theory, frequency-dependent selection, evolutionary game theory, kin selection, sex ratio theory, sexual selection (in 14 pages!), and the evolution of sex. How complete is this coverage? I tested this in two ways. First, it covers quite successfully many of the problems I am currently thinking about, including foraging theory, parental care, population viscosity, and game theory (although the latter, like so much of the field, is much less successfully tied to ecological mechanisms). It misses evolution of defenses (although this is related to the evolution of sex) and cooperative foraging (or anything about cooperation except the discussion of tit-for-tat). Second, I surveyed articles published in 1994 in Evolutionary ecology and found that a reader who consulted the appropriate portions of the book would find genuinely enlightening background material for 25 out of 47 articles. Topics that turned up several times in the journal that are missing from the book include morphological evolution, ecological (rather than kin-selected) implications of dispersal and habitat selection, and coevolution of defenses or competitive traits. The motivated student, one hopes, could use the tools from the book to begin thinking about these issues.

This comparison makes me wish that the word "theoretical" could be dropped from the book title, given that theory is an integral part of evolutionary ecology, rather than a specialized approach. Convincing as the examples are, this book helps point the way to future research. The new directions in the literature show that ecologists are beginning to tie these well-presented pieces together to understand the lives of organisms. This attractively-printed, conveniently-sized book presents an eminently usable overview of what we now understand, and will provide present and future researchers with a solid foundation upon which to build.

FREDERICK R. ADLER UNIVERSITY OF UTAH Department of Biology and Department of Mathematics Salt Lake City, Utah 84112