Landscape Ecology of Small Mammals [Paperback]

A summary of much of the experimental work on the spatial ecology of small mammals. This field has entered an exciting stage with such new techniques as GIS and systems modeling becoming available. Leading contributors describe and analyze the most well-known case studies and provide new insights into how landscape patterns and processes have had an impact on small mammals and how small mammals have, in turn, affected landscape structure and composition.Small mammals can be regarded as excellent subjects to test suppositions about population growth migration and reproduction, and, in particular, on how the complex physical structure of the environment affects the ecology of populations and communities. In other words, these small mammal studies can help formulate landscape ecological principles. This book summarizes a great deal of experimental work on the spatial ecology of small mammals. The field has entered an exciting stage with several new techniques (such as GIS and systems modeling) becoming available. Leading contributors describe and analyze the most well-known case studies and provide new insights into how landscape patterns and processes have had an impact on small mammals and how small mammals have, in turn, affected landscape structure and composition.INTRODUCTION.- 1. Small Mammal Ecology: A Landscape Perspective.- I. PATTERNS OF MOVEMENT AND HABITAT USE. 2. On Applying Behavioral Model Systems to Landscape Ecology. 3. Influence of Landscape Structure on Movement patterns of Small Mammals. 4. Patterns and Impacts of Movements at Different Scales in Small Mammals. 5. Pattern Selection in Geographically Complex Environments.- II. POPULATION AND COMMUNITY DYNAMICS IN HETEROGENEOUS LANDSCAPES. 6. Experimental Analysis of Population Dynamics: Scaling up to the Landscape. 7. Spatial Demographic Synchrony in Fragmented Populations. 8. EMS Studies at the Individual, Patch and landscape Scale: Designing Landscapes to Measure Scale-Specific Responses to Habital£!