Foundations of Ecology: Classic Papers with Commentaries

A book with a wealth of information If a book like this had been availablewhen I was a student it would have saved huddreds of hours of library research, and I wouldn't have found half the information available in one book.

This is a great collection of papers. Some of the papers included in this volume are not easily available online in the PDF format, nor are they available in too many libraries for loan, making this, in my opinion, a must-have for the serious ecology/evolution academic. You get a pretty good idea of the evolution [sic] of ecological thought thanks to the way the papers have been organized, where you can literally see concepts grow, develop, gain momentum, and then either get worshiped or completely rubbished. And the book really is well-organized. It is divided into several sections, peppered with insightful commentary that enhances the whole experience. What really makes this book such a pleasure to read, personally, is the emphasis in the first section of the book on old, descriptive ecological papers, which is a type of publication that (for better or for worse) seems to be completely missing from modern ecological discourse. I recommend this book to academic and armchair ecologists alike.

This book is actually used as one of two required textbooks for my graduate-level Ecology class at the Institute of Ecology at The University of Georgia. It is a great collection of foundational papers in Ecology for anyone interested in this area of study. It is an excellent reference resource to have handy for any serious Ecology student, professor, fanatic, etc.

Nearly a decade ago my colleague Bill Drury and I ran into each other in the hall, each of us waving this book & on the way to give it to the other. We had both been teaching out of endless stacks of xeroxes of xeroxes because neither of us had any time for conventioal textbooks. Bless Real & Brown for putting together not only some really key papers but also intelligent thoughtful commentary by some of the leading lights in the field. I have used the book ever since it came out & my students find it a valuable resource to take off to grad school. I must admit that while the selection is lovely there ARE some missing pieces & the xeroxes of xeroxes haven't altogether disappeared, but this is far and away the best out there to date. So, when can we expect the 2nd addition?

there are not many books on the theoretical background of ecology available, yet. hence, "foundations of ecology" is a valuable contribution to the discussion on ecological (self-)identity. not only are the papers selected of great importance on their own, the additional introductory sequences also succeed to put pieces together, to display the broad horizont and context, in which they ought to be understood, and show the contemporary view of historical scientific work. a lot of my personal theoretical considerations would have been impossible without information and motivation this book offered.