Evolutionary Ecology by Bernard Stonehouse; Christopher PerrinsReview by: L. R. TaylorJournal of Animal Ecology, Vol. 48, No. 3 (Oct., 1979), p. 1003Published by: British Ecological SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4210 .

Accessed: 03/05/2014 03:00

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

.

British Ecological Society is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Journal ofAnimal Ecology.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 130.132.123.28 on Sat, 3 May 2014 03:00:06 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Journal of Animal Ecology (1979), 48, 1003-1008

REVIEWS

Bernard Stonehouse & Christopher Perrins (Eds.) (1977). Evolutionary Ecology. Pp. 310. Macmillan, London. Price ?12.95.

This is a commemorative voiume by contributors who were influenced by D. L. Lack and many of the authors of its twenty-seven chapters are now almost as well known as he. As a consequence there are some very fine condensations of lines of work inspired by Lack and continued throughout a life-time by his students. In a scientific world where this kind of continuity is rapidly disappearing, the results are that much more impressive.

The four sections correspond to Lack's own interests; population regulation and the function of territory; feeding adaptations and ecological segregation; breeding adaptations and reproductive rates; and behaviour adaptation and taxonomic relationships. It is impossible to survey these diverse subjects economically in any detail and invidious to select. At the same time it is a delight to see that the first paper is by Wynne-Edwards and to read about the 'lowering of population viscosity'. This is perhaps the one fundamental post-Darwinian concept in population ecology that epitomizes the role of individual behaviour in creating a population that is a living ecological entity, rather than a genetic formality.

Many of the papers in this volume take account of this behavioural glue and, in doing so, emphasize the way in which the Lack-Wynne-Edwards controversy that so excited a previous generation, drew attention away from Pearson, Haldane and Fisher's purely multiplicative physical populations, to those real biological properties of living organisms that identify their different population properties. This volume more than vindicates that old discussion and its editors are to be congratulated accordingly.

L. R. TAYLOR

A. Heymer (1977). Ethologisches Worterbuch. (Ethological Dictionary). Pp. 237. Verlag Paul Parey, Berlin & Hamburg. Price DM28.

I am sure many ethologists will be interested to discover what is meant by an 'aha' experience, afferent throttling, initial friction, bridling and 'shag-time'! However, as an 'attempt to explain a minimum of ethological terms across three languages', this book fails to meet its objective. Many of the terms it describes, for example those mentioned above, are far too specialized and are drawn from just one or two studies. Conversely, some of the terms cur- rently used in ethology such as: inclusive fitness, kin selection, optimality theory, klepto- parasitism, mating systems and sexual selection are omitted completely. Furthermore, a number of concepts which are included are badly defined e.g. 'altruistic behaviour' as the protection and assistance of endangered companions and 'a model' as an object used in behavioural tests for determining the key stimuli and releasers of a particular behavioural pattern. I wonder what a foreign ethologist would understand by the term 'optimal foraging model' when using this dictionary?

On a more functional level, the layout of the book is very confusing and it is difficult to see where one definition ends and another begins. It is not a book I would recommend.

RICHARD J. COWIE

Papers and Proceedings of a Meeting of the Deer Specialist Group of IUCN's Survival Service Commission (1978). Threatened Deer. Pp. 434. International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, Morges, Switzerland. Price ?9.00.

Thirty-one papers are included, two of them setting the scene and acting as an introduction to the proceedings which are in two parts. In the first, the IUCN Threatened Deer Programme, thirteen papers are concerned with reports on the status of certain species or races of deer,

1003

This content downloaded from 130.132.123.28 on Sat, 3 May 2014 03:00:06 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions