San Antonio College Library

Chance and Change is intended for serious amateur naturalists or professional conservationists who are dissatisfied with the discordance between what they observe in nature and what theory tells them they should see. With the interplay between geological and biological processes as a backdrop, William Drury presents some of the philosophical origins of ecology and discusses the resulting biases that have affected practitioners and theoreticians. Drury...

"Explore[s] the role of birds in such important ecological dynamics as scavenging, nutrient cycling, food chains, and plant-animal interactions-- all seen through the lens of human well-being. ... The contributors show that quantifying avian ecosystem services is crucial when formulating contemporary conservation strategies."--Back cover.

From mating to parenting, foraging to self-defense, plant and animal activities are accomplished largely by the secretion or exchange of organic chemicals. The fascinating and fast-developing science of chemistry in nature is introduced in a series of remarkable stories that is accessible to the general reader yet revelatory to chemists and biologists.

Each chapter consists of a list of works in the genre with some connection to ecological issues and a plot summary no longer than a sentence.

How does nature work in our human-created city, suburb, and exurb/peri-urb? Indeed how is ecology - including its urban water, soil, air, plant, and animal foundations - spatially entwined with this great human enterprise? And how can we improve urban areas for both nature and people? Urban Ecology: Science of Cities explores the entire urban area: from streets, lawns, and parks to riversides, sewer systems, and industrial sites. The book presents...

The Environmental Biology of Agaves and Cacti constitutes the first comprehensive review of how these two interesting and economically important desert succulent taxa respond, in what turn out to be remarkably similar ways, to specific evironmental factors such as water, temperature, photosynthetically active radiation, and nutrients, which affect the exchange of carbon dioxide and water vapor with the environment.

"Gaia, the largest entity in the nested system of life on Earth, is surely not an organism, but it nevertheless shows a kind of physiology with fascinating internal dynamics. This statement implies physiologic functions, chemical cycles, even feedback loops that have some role in long-term stability. What are these functions, how do we know they exist, and how do we learn about them?" "This is the subject that Tyler Volk tackles brilliantly in Gaia's...

"Balancing Water for Humans and Nature, authored by two of the world's leading experts on water management, examines water flows - the 'blood stream' of both nature and society - in terms of the crucial links, balance, conflicts and trade-offs between human and environmental needs. The authors argue that a sustainable future depends fundamentally on our ability to manage these trade-offs and encourage long-term resilience. They advocate an ecohydrological...

"This second edition explains what wetlands are and how they fit into our complex environmental systems. It incorporates recent court cases and regulations, discusses the functions and values of wetlands, and details the scientific classification of wetlands." "Completely updated, this new edition includes new chapters covering the science of wetlands; new developments in the permitting process, enforcement, jurisdiction, and takings; an expanded...