@article {Lawton1999Are,
	title = {Are There General Laws in Ecology?},
	journal = {Oikos},
	volume = {84},
	number = {2},
	year = {1999},
	pages = {177{\textendash}192},
	publisher = {Blackwell Publishing on behalf of Nordic Society Oikos},
	abstract = {The dictionary definition of a law is: "Generalized formulation based on a series of events or processes observed to recur regularly under certain conditions; a widely observable tendency". I argue that ecology has numerous laws in this sense of the word, in the form of widespread, repeatable patterns in nature, but hardly any laws that are universally true. Typically, in other words, ecological patterns and the laws, rules and mechanisms that underpin them are contingent on the organisms involved, and their environment. This contingency is manageable at a relatively simple level of ecological organisation (for example the population dynamics of single and small numbers of species), and re-emerges also in a manageable form in large sets of species, over large spatial scales, or over long time periods, in the form of detail-free statistical patterns - recently called {\textquoteright}macroecology{\textquoteright}. The contingency becomes overwhelmingly complicated at intermediate scales, characteristic of community ecology, where there are a large number of case histories, and very little other than weak, fuzzy generalisations. These arguments are illustrated by focusing on examples of typical studies in community ecology, and by way of contrast, on the macroecological relationship that emerges between local species richness and the size of the regional pool of species. The emergent pattern illustrated by local vs regional richness plots is extremely simple, despite the vast number of contingent processes and interactions involved in its generation. To discover general patterns, laws and rules in nature, ecology may need to pay less attention to the {\textquoteright}middle ground{\textquoteright} of community ecology, relying less on reductionism and experimental manipulation, but increasing research efforts into macroecology.},
	keywords = {biodiversity, communities, ecology, saturation},
	issn = {00301299},
	doi = {10.2307/3546712},
	url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/3546712},
	author = {Lawton, John H.}
}
@article {FarnonEllwood2009Stochastic,
	title = {Stochastic and deterministic processes jointly structure tropical arthropod communities},
	journal = {Ecology Letters},
	volume = {12},
	number = {4},
	year = {2009},
	month = {April},
	pages = {277{\textendash}284},
	address = {University Museum of Zoology, Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK; Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK},
	abstract = {The question of whether ecological assemblages are structured by stochastic and deterministic (e.g. interspecific competition) processes is controversial, but it is difficult to design sampling regimes and experiments that can dissect the relative importance of stochastic and deterministic processes in natural assemblages. Using null models, we tested communities of arthropod decomposers in tropical epiphytes for patterns of species co-occurrence, while controlling for habitat gradients, seasonal variations and ecological succession. When environmental conditions were controlled, our analysis showed that the communities were structured stochastically. However, analysing mixed sets of communities that were deliberately created either from two distinct heights or two successional stages revealed that communities were structured deterministically. These results confirm that habitat gradients and dispersal/competition trade-offs are capable of generating non-random patterns within decomposer arthropod communities, but reveal that when such effects are accounted for, species co-occurrence is fundamentally random.},
	keywords = {assembly, biodiversity, communities, ecology, nullmodels, structure},
	issn = {1461023X},
	doi = {10.1111/j.1461-0248.2009.01284.x},
	url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1461-0248.2009.01284.x},
	author = {Farnon Ellwood, M. D. and Manica, Andrea and Foster, William A.}
}
@article {Leidner2010Does,
	title = {Does Tropical Forest Fragmentation Increase Long-Term Variability of Butterfly Communities?},
	journal = {PLoS ONE},
	volume = {5},
	number = {3},
	year = {2010},
	month = {March},
	pages = {e9534+},
	publisher = {Public Library of Science},
	abstract = {Habitat fragmentation is a major driver of biodiversity loss. Yet, the overall effects of fragmentation on biodiversity may be obscured by differences in responses among species. These opposing responses to fragmentation may be manifest in higher variability in species richness and abundance (termed hyperdynamism), and in predictable changes in community composition. We tested whether forest fragmentation causes long-term hyperdynamism in butterfly communities, a taxon that naturally displays large variations in species richness and community composition. Using a dataset from an experimentally fragmented landscape in the central Amazon that spanned 11 years, we evaluated the effect of fragmentation on changes in species richness and community composition through time. Overall, adjusted species richness (adjusted for survey duration) did not differ between fragmented forest and intact forest. However, spatial and temporal variation of adjusted species richness was significantly higher in fragmented forests relative to intact forest. This variation was associated with changes in butterfly community composition, specifically lower proportions of understory shade species and higher proportions of edge species in fragmented forest. Analysis of rarefied species richness, estimated using indices of butterfly abundance, showed no differences between fragmented and intact forest plots in spatial or temporal variation. These results do not contradict the results from adjusted species richness, but rather suggest that higher variability in butterfly adjusted species richness may be explained by changes in butterfly abundance. Combined, these results indicate that butterfly communities in fragmented tropical forests are more variable than in intact forest, and that the natural variability of butterflies was not a buffer against the effects of fragmentation on community dynamics.},
	keywords = {biodiversity, butterflies, communities, fragmentation, insects, tropics},
	doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0009534},
	url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0009534},
	author = {Leidner, Allison K. and Haddad, Nick M. and Lovejoy, Thomas E.}
}
