Avian Invasions : The Ecology and Evolution of Exotic Birds

This book uses exotic birds as a case study to understand the science of the invasion process, from the reasons why humans choose to move some species and not others, to how successful invaders interact with the new environment, and even evolve there.

Biological invaders represent one of the primary threats to the maintenance of global biodiversity, human health, and the success of human economic enterprises. The continuing globalization of our society ensures that the need to understand the process of biological invasion will only increase in the future. There is also a growing recognition that the study of biological invaders provides a unique insight into basic questions in ecology and evolution. The study of exotic birds has had a particularly long history and has come to represent a fascinating intersection between the study of biological invasions, avian conservation biology, and basic principles of ecology and evolution. Avian Invasions summarizes and synthesizes this unique historical record and unravels the insights that the study of exotic birds brings to all three of these research strands. It includes chapters on the well-known contributions of exotic bird study to ecological science, and on the post-establishment evolution of introduced bird populations. The result is the most comprehensive picture yet of the invasion process.Avian Invasions is aimed at professional avian biologists and ornithologists as well as graduate students of avian ecology, evolution and conservation. It will also appeal to a more general audience of invasion ecologists.