Extinction Risk in Successional Landscapes Subject to Catastrophic Disturbances

• Published in: Conservation ecology Vol. 6; no. 2; p. 2
• Main Authors: Boughton, David, Malvadkar, Urmila
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Resilience Alliance 01.12.2002
• Subjects: biodiversity; Birth rates; catastrophe; Conservation biology; Demography; dispersal; disturbance; Extinct species; extinction; Habitat conservation; landscape; Landscape ecology; Landscapes; metapopulation; Metapopulation ecology; patch dynamics; patchy population; Species; Species extinction; succession

We explore the thesis that stochasticity in successional-disturbance systems can be an agent of species extinction. The analysis uses a simple model of patch dynamics for seral stages in an idealized landscape; each seral stage is assumed to support a specialist biota. The landscape as a whole is ch...