Island Biogeography

CARATTERISTICHE DEL PALEOAMBIENTE E MODALITÀ DI SFRUTTAMENTO DEI VEGETALI. In: Martinelli M.C. (a cura di), 2011, Il villaggio dell’età del Bronzo di Portella nelle isole Eolie (scavi 2006- 2008), Rebus Edizioni, 234- 241.

by angela stellati

Co-authored with Girolamo Fiorentino, Giampiero Colaianni, Anna Maria Grasso.

Isolation affects tree‐scale epiphytic lichen community structure on New Zealand mountain beech trees

by Hannah Buckley

Question: Is epiphytic lichen community structure significantly affected by isolation from source community?
more Question: Is epiphytic lichen community structure significantly affected by isolation from source community?

Location: Foothills of the Southern Alps, South Island, New Zealand.

Methods: Epiphytic lichen richness and environmental variables were measured on 382, young Nothofagus solandri var. cliffortioides (Hook. f.) Poole (mountain beech) trees that had recently colonized grassland adjacent to a forest remnant. Richness and the presence of individual lichen taxa were modelled as a function of isolation from the forest fragment, tree size and other habitat conditions.

Results: Richness of epiphytic lichen communities was negatively related to tree isolation, although this effect was much smaller than the effects of tree size and other local (tree-scale) habitat conditions. Different lichen taxa responded in different ways to isolation, area effects and local habitat conditions.

Conclusions: This study shows that many epiphytic lichens on mountain beech are limited in their ability to colonize new substrate, even over distances of less than 1 km, which may be due to limitation in dispersal and/or establishment. Lichens are greatly influenced by local habitat conditions, such as tree size, and in this particular environment their negative interaction with sooty moulds is an important driver of community structure.

A Lakeland Area in the Late Miocene

by Fridgeir Grimsson

2011
Thomas Denk, Fridgeir Grimsson, Reinhard Zetter, Leifur A Simonarson
Springer
Chapter 8

The Middle Late Miocene Floras - A Window into the Regional Vegetation Surrounding a Large Caldera

by Fridgeir Grimsson

2011
Thomas Denk, Fridgeir Grimsson, Reinhard Zetter, Leifur A Simonarson
Springer
Chapter 7

Landnám: The Settlement of Iceland in Archaeological and Historical Perspective

by Kevin P. Smith

Published in "World Archaeology", 1995

The Norse settlement of Iceland established a viable colony on one of the world's last major uninhabited land masses.... more The Norse settlement of Iceland established a viable colony on one of the world's last major uninhabited land masses. The vast corpus of indigenous Icelandic traditions about the country's settlement makes it tempting to view this as one of the best case studies of island colonization by a pre-state society. Archaeological research in some ways supports, but in other ways refutes the historical model. Comparison of archaeological data and historical sources provides insights into the process of island colonization and the role of the settlement process in the formation of a culture's identity and ideology.

The Classic Surtarbrandur Floras

by Fridgeir Grimsson

2011
Thomas Denk, Fridgeir Grimsson, Reinhard Zetter, Leifur A Simonarson
Springer
Chapter 5

The Archaic Floras

by Fridgeir Grimsson

2011
Thomas Denk, Fridgeir Grimsson, Reinhard Zetter, Leifur A Simonarson
Springer
Chapter 4

The Biogeographic History of Iceland - The North Atlantic Land Bridge Revisited

by Fridgeir Grimsson

2011
Thomas Denk, Fridgeir Grimsson, Reinhard Zetter, Leifur A Simonarson
Springer
Chapter 12

Climate Evolution in the Northern North Atlantic - 15 Ma to Present

by Fridgeir Grimsson

2011
Thomas Denk, Fridgeir Grimsson, Reinhard Zetter, Leifur A Simonarson
Springer
Chapter 13

Floristic turnover in Iceland from 15 to 6 Ma - extracting biogeographical signals from fossil floral assemblages

by Fridgeir Grimsson

2007
Fridgeir Grimsson, Thomas Denk
Journal of Biogeography

The Miocene floras of Iceland and their significance for late Cainozoic North Atlantic biogeography

by Fridgeir Grimsson

2005
Thomas Denk, Fridgeir Grimsson, Zlatko Kvacek
Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society

Middle Miocene floras of Iceland - the early colonization of an island?

by Fridgeir Grimsson

2007
Fridgeir Grimsson, Thomas Denk, Leifur A Simonarson
Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology

Man-handled? How and when did freshwater invertebrates cross the sea to Ireland? A review with particular reference to crustaceans.

by Julian Reynolds

pp 83-95 in 'Mind the gap - postglacial colonization of Ireland, eds. J.L. Davenport, D.P. Sleeman and P.C. Woodman. INJ Special Suppl. 2008.

A bridge too far. Comment on “Processes of island colonization by Oligo-Miocene land

by Hanneke Meijer

L.W. van den Hoek Ostende, H.J.M. Meijer & A.A.E. van der Geer. 2009. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 279:128–130

Mazza and Rustioni [Mazza, P.P.A., Rustioni, M., 2008. Processes of island colonization by Oligo-Miocene land mammals... more Mazza and Rustioni [Mazza, P.P.A., Rustioni, M., 2008. Processes of island colonization by Oligo-Miocene land mammals in the central Mediterranean: New data from Scontrone (Abruzzo, Central Italy) and Gargano (Apulia, Southern Italy). Palaeogeogr. Palaeoclim. Palaeoecol. 267 (3–4), 208–215.] suggest that land bridges played an important role in the colonization of the Abruzzo–Apulian bioprovince, as shown by the fossil vertebrates from Scontrone and Gargano. Would they have been able to demonstrate that land bridges indeed played a role in the dispersion of mammals, this would have implied that we had to rethink the modes of colonization for many other isles and rewrite our theories on island biogeography. Unfortunately, their evidence falls short, and even though their paper provides new insights in the history of the insular faunas of the Apulia platform, there is no reason to assume that land bridges played any role in the colonization of these islands.

The fellowship of the hobbit: the fauna surrounding Homo floresiensis

by Hanneke Meijer

H.J.M. Meijer, L.W. van den Hoek Ostende, G.D. van den Bergh & J. de Vos. 2010. Journal of Biogeography, Volume 37, Issue 6

The Late Pleistocene Flores fauna shows a pattern observed on many other islands. It is neither aberrant nor... more The Late Pleistocene Flores fauna shows a pattern observed on many other islands. It is neither aberrant nor exclusive, but the result of non-random selective forces acting upon an impoverished and disharmonic insular fauna. By comparing the Flores vertebrate fauna with other fossil insular biotas, it is apparent that the evolution of Homo floresiensis is part of a general pattern affecting all the inhabitants of Pleistocene Flores. Vertebrate evolution on Flores appears to have been characterized by phylogenetic continuity, low species richness and a disharmonic fauna. All three aspects stem from the isolated position of the island and have resulted in the distinct morphological characteristics of the Flores fauna. Evidence reviewed herein shows that features exhibited by H. floresiensis, such as small stature, a small brain, relatively long arms, robust lower limbs and long feet, are not unique, but are shared by other insular taxa. Therefore, the evolution of H. floresiensis can be explained by existing models of insular evolution and followed evolutionary pathways similar to those of the other terrestrial vertebrates inhabiting Pleistocene Flores.

Evolution of island mammals: adaptation and extinction of placental mammals on islands

by Alexandra van der Geer

http://users.uoa.gr/~geeraae/insularity.html

New records for prehistoric introduction of Neotropical mammals to the West Indies: evidence from Carriacou, Lesser Antilles

by Scott Fitzpatrick

published by Christina Giovas, Michelle Lefebvre, and Scott M. Fitzpatrick in the Journal of Biogeography (2011)

Aim This paper investigates the prehistoric introduction of five mammalian taxa to Carriacou (Lesser Antilles) and... more Aim This paper investigates the prehistoric introduction of five mammalian taxa to Carriacou (Lesser Antilles) and refines the known anthropogenic ranges for these fauna in the pre-Columbian West Indies. The importance of such records for understanding the region’s historical biogeography and ecology is considered.

Geographic variation in morphological traits of the Large Japanese Field Mouse, Apodemus speciosus (Rodentia, Muridae), from the Izu Island Group, Japan

by Mariko Kageyama

in Zoological Science

We investigated geographic variation in morphological traits of the large Japanese field mouse (Apodemus speciosus)... more We investigated geographic variation in morphological traits of the large Japanese field mouse (Apodemus speciosus) from the Izu Island Group, Japan. There was sexual dimorphism in external characters and cranial measurements; hence, these were considered in subsequent analyses. There was geographic divergence in morphometric characters among populations of the Izu Island Group and Honshu. Mice from the Miyakejima Island and Niijima–Shikinejima Islands differed from those of other populations and from each other; Oshima Island mice also differed, but to a lesser degree. Mice from three populations from Honshu were similar to one another, and mice from Kozushima Island were more similar to those from Honshu populations than those from Izu Island Group populations. These results suggest that A. speciosus populations in the Izu Island Group may have had multiple origins. One possible hypothesis to explain these patterns of variation is that the Miyakejima, Niijima, and Shikinejima populations may share a relatively longer history of overseas dispersal, whereas the Kozushima populations may have experienced a recent invasion from Honshu via human activities.

NUOVE RICERCHE NELL’INSEDIAMENTO SULL’ISTMO DI FILO

by angela stellati

published in "XXXII, Nuova ORIGINI Serie IV, 2010: 285-314"

Further significant bird records from Atauro Island, Timor-Leste (East Timor).

by Colin Trainor

"Published in 'Forktail' in 2007"