Plant Population Ecology
- LAST REVIEWED: 25 October 2017
- LAST MODIFIED: 25 October 2017
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199830060-0191
- LAST REVIEWED: 25 October 2017
- LAST MODIFIED: 25 October 2017
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199830060-0191
Introduction
Plant population ecology is a broad topic that involves aspects of (see the Oxford Bibliographies articles on Ecology “Community Ecology,” evolutionary biology, and “Conservation Biology.” Demography is one of the foundational areas in plant population ecology and has been reviewed in the literature for many decades. Plant demographic techniques have advanced quickly since the 1970s, and researchers can now apply them to new questions. Population growth rates, which are often studied by demographers, are especially important for populations that are small or fragmented. The metapopulation concept, originally developed for animals, can be applied to plant populations that are connected by gene flow but that are also subject to rapid extinction by disturbance. Inter- and intraspecific “Competition in Plant Communities” can also affect population growth measures such as survival and fecundity. Interactions with animals often impact how a population grows or declines over time. For example, herbivores can depress population growth rates, and pollinators and dispersers of seeds are crucial in determining individual plant fitness. These interactions can be affected by the mating systems of plants. For example, inbred individuals may suffer greater negative impacts of herbivory than outcrossed individuals, and outcrossed individuals may produce larger or more symmetric flowers, leading to more efficient pollination. All of these interactions can affect local adaptation in plants as a consequence of natural selection.
General Overviews
Harper 1977 was one of the early foundational works in plant population ecology. This work organized and started the modern study of plant populations, and its influence is enormous. Although many of the methods that Harper mentioned are outdated, the conceptual issues he addressed are still being investigated. Solbrig, et al. 1979 provided a review of the field that set the stage for later comprehensive works. Dirzo and Sarukhan 1984 showed the wide range of the field. Gurevitch, et al. 2006 is a good introduction to the field and addresses all aspects of plant ecology, with particular emphasis on the integration of ecological and evolutionary topics. Silvertown and Charlesworth 2009 is one of the most important works in the field that has extensive sections on population dynamics, intraspecific interactions, and evolutionary topics. For a text on important field and analytical methods, one needs to read Gibson 2015, which provides in-depth information on all of the techniques used in the 21st century. Cheplick 2015 is a must read for anyone interested in plant populations, with important sections on experimental methods and plant-animal and plant-microbe interactions.
Cheplick, Gregory P. 2015. Approaches to plant evolutionary ecology. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.
A concise and important work that considers natural selection in plants, experimental approaches to studying plant populations, and interactions between plants and animals, microbes, and pollinators.
Dirzo, Rodolfo, and Jose Sarukhan, eds. 1984. Perspectives on plant population ecology. Sunderland, MA: Sinauer Associates.
An influential edited volume with a good listing of the types of topics included in the discipline.
Gibson, David J. 2015. Methods in comparative plant population ecology, 2d ed. Oxford and New York: Oxford Univ. Press.
A useful and influential text on the latest analytical and field methods in plant population ecology. In particular, Gibson provides in-depth coverage on all of the field methods.
Gurevitch, Jessica, Samuel M. Scheiner, and Gordon A. Fox. 2006. The ecology of plants, 2d ed. Sunderland, MA: Sinauer Associates.
An important text suitable for advanced undergraduates and beginning graduate students. Particularly impressive for its clear text and insightful graphics.
Harper, John L. 1977. Population biology of plants. New York: Academic Press.
Probably the most important work in the field. Harper clearly explains the uses of demographic techniques and foreshadows many of the current topics being investigated today.
Silvertown, Jonathan, and Deborah Charlesworth. 2009. Introduction to plant population biology. 4th ed. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell.
This is the most important modern overview of the field and is essential for those interested in starting research on plant populations. Has a particularly comprehensive section on the genetic and evolutionary aspects of plant population biology.
Silvertown, Jonathan, Miguel Franco, and John L. Harper, eds. 1997. Plant life histories: Ecology, phylogeny, and evolution. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
An important collection of papers integrating ecological and phylogenetic perspectives.
Solbrig, Otto T., Subodh Jain, George B. Johnson, and Peter H. Raven, eds. 1979. Topics in plant population biology. New York: Columbia Univ. Press.
This collection of essays set the stage for the many edited volumes on PPE that followed.
Users without a subscription are not able to see the full content on this page. Please subscribe or login.
How to Subscribe
Oxford Bibliographies Online is available by subscription and perpetual access to institutions. For more information or to contact an Oxford Sales Representative click here.
Article
- Abundance/Biomass Comparison Method
- Accounting for Ecological Capital
- Adaptive Radiation
- Agroecology
- Allelopathy
- Allocation of Reproductive Resources in Plants
- Animals, Functional Morphology of
- Animals, Reproductive Allocation in
- Animals, Thermoregulation in
- Antarctic Environments and Ecology
- Anthropocentrism
- Applied Ecology
- Approaches and Issues in Historical Ecology
- Aquatic Conservation
- Aquatic Nutrient Cycling
- Archaea, Ecology of
- Assembly Models
- Autecology
- Bacterial Diversity in Freshwater
- Benthic Ecology
- Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning
- Biodiversity, Dimensionality of
- Biodiversity, Marine
- Biodiversity Patterns in Agricultural Systms
- Biofuels
- Biogeochemistry
- Biological Chaos and Complex Dynamics
- Biological Rhythms
- Biome, Alpine
- Biome, Boreal
- Biome, Desert
- Biome, Grassland
- Biome, Savanna
- Biome, Tundra
- Biomes, African
- Biomes, East Asian
- Biomes, Mountain
- Biomes, North American
- Biomes, South Asian
- Biophilia
- Braun, E. Lucy
- Bryophyte Ecology
- Buell-Small Succession Study (New Jersey)
- Butterfly Ecology
- Carson, Rachel
- Chemical Ecology
- Classification Analysis
- Coastal Dune Habitats
- Coevolution
- Communicating Ecology
- Communities and Ecosystems, Indirect Effects in
- Communities, Top-Down and Bottom-Up Regulation of
- Community Concept, The
- Community Ecology
- Community Genetics
- Community Phenology
- Competition and Coexistence in Animal Communities
- Competition in Plant Communities
- Complexity Theory
- Conservation Biology
- Conservation Genetics
- Coral Reefs
- Darwin, Charles
- Dead Wood in Forest Ecosystems
- Decomposition
- De-Glaciation, Ecology of
- Dendroecology
- Disease Ecology
- Dispersal
- Drought as a Disturbance in Forests
- Early Explorers, The
- Earth’s Climate, The
- Eco-Evolutionary Dynamics
- Ecological Dynamics in Fragmented Landscapes
- Ecological Education
- Ecological Engineering
- Ecological Forecasting
- Ecological Informatics
- Ecological Relevance of Speciation
- Ecology, Introductory Sources in
- Ecology, Microbial (Community)
- Ecology of Emerging Zoonotic Viruses
- Ecology of the Atlantic Forest
- Ecology, Stochastic Processes in
- Ecosystem Ecology
- Ecosystem Engineers
- Ecosystem Multifunctionality
- Ecosystem Services
- Ecosystem Services, Conservation of
- Ecotourism
- Elton, Charles
- Endophytes, Fungal
- Energy Flow
- Environmental Anthropology
- Environmental Justice
- Environments, Extreme
- Ethics, Ecological
- European Natural History Tradition
- Evolutionarily Stable Strategies
- Facilitation and the Organization of Communities
- Fern and Lycophyte Ecology
- Fire Ecology
- Fishes, Climate Change Effects on
- Flood Ecology
- Food Webs
- Foraging Behavior, Implications of
- Foraging, Optimal
- Forests, Temperate Coniferous
- Forests, Temperate Deciduous
- Freshwater Invertebrate Ecology
- Genetic Considerations in Plant Ecological Restoration
- Genomics, Ecological
- Geoecology
- Geographic Range
- Gleason, Henry
- Grazer Ecology
- Greig-Smith, Peter
- Gymnosperm Ecology
- Habitat Selection
- Harper, John L.
- Harvesting Alternative Water Resources (US West)
- Heavy Metal Tolerance
- Heterogeneity
- Himalaya, Ecology of the
- Host-Parasitoid Interactions
- Human Ecology
- Human Ecology of the Andes
- Human-Wildlife Conflict and Coexistence
- Hutchinson, G. Evelyn
- Indigenous Ecologies
- Industrial Ecology
- Insect Ecology, Terrestrial
- Invasive Species
- Island Biogeography Theory
- Island Biology
- Keystone Species
- Kin Selection
- Landscape Dynamics
- Landscape Ecology
- Laws, Ecological
- Legume-Rhizobium Symbiosis, The
- Leopold, Aldo
- Lichen Ecology
- Life History
- Limnology
- Literature, Ecology and
- MacArthur, Robert H.
- Mangrove Zone Ecology
- Marine Fisheries Management
- Marine Subsidies
- Mass Effects
- Mathematical Ecology
- Mating Systems
- Maximum Sustainable Yield
- Metabolic Scaling Theory
- Metacommunity Dynamics
- Metapopulations and Spatial Population Processes
- Microclimate Ecology
- Mimicry
- Movement Ecology, Modeling and Data Analysis in
- Multiple Stable States and Catastrophic Shifts in Ecosyste...
- Mutualisms and Symbioses
- Mycorrhizal Ecology
- Natural History Tradition, The
- Networks, Ecological
- Niche Versus Neutral Models of Community Organization
- Niches
- Nutrient Foraging in Plants
- Ocean Sprawl
- Oceanography, Microbial
- Odum, Eugene and Howard
- Old Fields
- Ordination Analysis
- Organic Agriculture, Ecology of
- Paleoecology
- Paleolimnology
- Parental Care, Evolution of
- Pastures and Pastoralism
- Patch Dynamics
- Patrick, Ruth
- Peatlands
- Phenotypic Plasticity
- Phenotypic Selection
- Philosophy, Ecological
- Phylogenetics and Comparative Methods
- Physics, Ecology and
- Physiological Ecology of Nutrient Acquisition in Animals
- Physiological Ecology of Photosynthesis
- Physiological Ecology of Water Balance in Terrestrial Anim...
- Physiological Ecology of Water Balance in Terrestrial Plan...
- Plant Blindness
- Plant Disease Epidemiology
- Plant Ecological Responses to Extreme Climatic Events
- Plant-Insect Interactions
- Polar Regions
- Pollination Ecology
- Population Dynamics, Density-Dependence and Single-Species
- Population Dynamics, Methods in
- Population Ecology, Animal
- Population Ecology, Plant
- Population Fluctuations and Cycles
- Population Genetics
- Population Viability Analysis
- Populations and Communities, Dynamics of Age- and Stage-St...
- Predation and Community Organization
- Predation, Sublethal
- Predator-Prey Interactions
- Radioecology
- Reductionism Versus Holism
- Religion and Ecology
- Remote Sensing
- Restoration Ecology
- Rewilding
- Ricketts, Edward Flanders Robb
- Sclerochronology
- Secondary Production
- Seed Ecology
- Senescence
- Serpentine Soils
- Shelford, Victor
- Simulation Modeling
- Socioecology
- Soil Biogeochemistry
- Soil Ecology
- Spatial Pattern Analysis
- Spatial Patterns of Species Biodiversity in Terrestrial En...
- Spatial Scale and Biodiversity
- Species Distribution Modeling
- Species Extinctions
- Species Responses to Climate Change
- Species-Area Relationships
- Stability and Ecosystem Resilience, A Below-Ground Perspec...
- Stoichiometry, Ecological
- Stream Ecology
- Succession
- Sustainable Development
- Systematic Conservation Planning
- Systems Ecology
- Tansley, Sir Arthur
- Terrestrial Nitrogen Cycle
- Terrestrial Resource Limitation
- Territoriality
- Theory and Practice of Biological Control
- Thermal Ecology of Animals
- Tragedy of the Commons
- Transient Dynamics
- Trophic Levels
- Tropical Humid Forest Biome
- Urban Ecology
- Urban Forest Ecology
- Vegetation Classification
- Vegetation Dynamics, Remote Sensing of
- Vegetation Mapping
- Vicariance Biogeography
- Weed Ecology
- Wetland Ecology
- Whittaker, Robert H.
- Wildlife Ecology