Trophic and Guild Interactions in Biological Control [Hardcover]

This volume explores modern concepts of trophic and guild interactions among natural enemies in natural and agricultural ecosystems - a field that has become a hot topic in ecology and biological control over the past decade. It is the first book on trophic and guild interactions to make the link to biological control, and is compiled by internationally recognized scientists who have combined their expertise.

This book origins from a symposium we organized in May 2005 at a joint meeting of the Biocontrol Network of Canada and the International Organization for Biological Control in Magog, Qu?bec, Canada. During this symposium, we discussed concepts of direct and indirect interactions among natural enemies of herbivores in natural and agricultural ecosystems  a field of growing interest in ecology and biological control. Natural enemies of herbivores exist in nature as an assemblage of species that interact with one another and may transcend trophic levels. The community embracing a natural enemy can be complex and includes taxonomically dissimilar species of pathogens, parasitoids, and predators. These interactions involve predation and competition processes and share the typical characteristics of resource-consumer relationships where the resource species is killed and consumed by the other. Although they are mostly viewed as primary carnivores (developing on herbivores), natural enemies can also be secondary carnivores (when they attack other natural enemies), hosts, prey, or even herbivores, as several species may also feed on and acquire energy from plant resources.Contributing Authors. Preface. 1. The influence of intraguild predation on the suppression of a shared prey population: an empirical reassessment; J.A. Rosenheim and J.P. Harmon. 2. Intraguild predation usually does not disrupt biological control; A. Janssen et al.. 3. Multiple predator interactions and food-web connectance: implications for biological control; R.F. Denno and D.L. FlÓ{