A Resource-Based Habitat View for Conservation

Book excerpt: Winner of the Marsh Book of the Year Award 2012 by theBritish Ecological Society. In A Resource-Based Habitat View for Conservation RogerDennis introduces a novel approach to the understanding of habitatsbased on resources and conditions required by organisms and theiraccess to them, a quantum shift from simplistic andineffectual notions of habitats as vegetation units or biotopes. Indrawing attention to what organisms actually use and need inlandscapes, it focuses on resource composition, structure andconnectedness, all of which describe habitat quality and underpinlandscape heterogeneity. This contrasts with the current bipolarview of landscapes made up of habitat patches and empty matrix butillustrates how such a metapopulation approach of isolatedpatchworks can grow by adopting the new habitat viewpoint. The book explores principles underlying this newdefinition of habitat, and the impact of habitat components onpopulations, species’ distributions, geographical ranges andrange changes, with a view to conserving resources in landscapesfor whole communities. It does this using the example ofbutterflies - the most alluring of insects, flagship organisms andkey indicators of environmental health - in the British Isles,where they have been studied most intensively. The book formsessential reading for students, researchers and practitioners inecology and conservation, particularly those concerned withmanaging sites and landscapes for wildlife.