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Species Invasions: Insights into Ecology, Evolution, and Biogeography. Edited by Dov E Sax, John J. Stachowicz, and Steven D, Gaines. Xiii + 495 pp. Sinauer Associates, Inc., Sunderland, MA. 2005. US $49.95, ISBN 0-87893-811-7, paper; US $74.95, ISBN 0-087893-821-4, casebound.
The peer-reviewed and popular literature on invasive species has expanded exponentially over the last decade, largely spurred by our realization that we are entering into the exponential phase of a serious, widespread, biological problem. The vast amount of research produced to date has been presented in the context of applied problems related to non-native invasive species (NNIS). Indeed, these problems are real and must be attended to. However, the overarching goal of this volume is to return to some of the basic biological questions regarding species invasions, population genetics, and biogeography. Moreover, can invasive species be used to answer fundamental questions in ecology and evolutionary biology? While strongly rooted in the basic sciences, this text has an obvious feedback into solving real world NNIS problems.
Not since the landmark volumes of Elton (1958, The Ecology of Invasions by Animals and Plants, Methuen) and Baker and Stebbins (1965, The Genetics of Colonizing Species, Academic Press) have the biological implications of NNIS been viewed as a research tool to address basic questions in the biological sciences. Here, the editors have enlisted 45 authors to generate a volume with 17 chapters, roughly allocated equally to insights into three general areas: ecology, evolution, and biogeography. Large multiauthored volumes are notoriously difficult to review because of the broad subject coverage, but I will attempt to identify the subject matter and major point(s) by chapter to provide richer insight for the reader.
Part-I, Ecology, begins with a chapter entitled, "Insights into biotic interactions from studies of invasive species," and challenges our view of competition as the sole interaction affecting species invasions. In fact, facilitation may play a greater role than previously thought. Chapter 2, "Species invasions and the relationships between species diversity, community saturation, and ecosystem functioning," attempts to untangle the relationship between diversity and community invasibility and how this relates to productivity. Data suggest...