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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Dillon, Robert T. 1955- (Author)
Format: Book
Language:English
Published: Charleston, South Carolina Freshwater Gastropods of North America Project 2019
Series:Freshwater gastropods of North America Volume IV
Subjects:
Abstract:Freswater snails are common and familiar inhabitants of rivers, lakes and streams throughout North America. In some environments they comprise the majority of the macroinvertabrate biomass, significantly influencing community composition, energy flow and nutrient cycling. Yet their biology remains almost as obscure to the scientific community as to the lay public. Collected in this volume are 30 essays on the ecology and biogeography of North American freshwater gastropods. Patterns of distribution are reviewed and analyzed at regional scales, with particular emphasis on mechanisms of dispersal. New invasions are reported, their progress monitored, and their consequences examined. The subjects of rarity and endemism, first introduced in Volume III, are explored at greater depth in Volume IV as well. The scholarly study of biogeography has, in recent years, become entangled with public policies regarding endangered species conservation and invasive species control. Here we review several striking cases where natural resource agencies have been misled by conservation biologists biased by research funding. We suggest that the correct relationship between science and public policy is analogous to playing baseball and playing the banjo -neither compatible nor incompatible, neither better nor worse, just entirely different. Volume I in this series analyzed the results of a scientific survey of the freshwater gastropod fauna of the Atlantic drainages from Georgia to the New York line. The essays collected here in Volume IV, together with those in Volume II (Pulmonates) and Volume III (Prosobranchs) will be essential companions to Volume I, as well as to additional volumes on the gastropod faunas of interior drainages forthcoming
Physical Description:viii, 257 pages illustrations (chiefly color) 22 cm
ISBN:9780960084333
0960084339