FIRST FOUR DECADES OF THE TV^^NTIETH CENTURY 



63 



resents. This book assisted in drawing to- 

 gether the ecological researches of zoolo- 

 gists and botanists under a common denom- 

 inator. It stressed the obvious point that, 

 typically, there is no such thing as a plant 

 community devoid of animals, or con- 

 versely, an animal community devoid of 

 plants. The "bio-ecologists" work with an 

 ecological unit which they designate the 

 "biome."' 



The population books deal wdth the ex- 

 perimental, the natural, and the human 

 population. We include several books on 

 human populations because they contribute 

 in a real way to the ecologist's thinking 

 and methodology. From certam angles the 

 demographers have had a more scholarly 

 approach to the problem than the ecolo- 

 gists. The books on sociality and social 

 organization are WTitten essentially as pop- 

 ulation studies from which special results 

 are derived. The zoogeography books focus 

 on distribution and dispersion in the Hesse 

 sense; i.e., as they are controlled by envi- 

 ronmental factors. 



Later we shall show that during the 

 thirties the ecologist turned much of his 

 attention to ecological aspects of evolution. 

 His concern lay with such matters as geo- 

 graphic variation, isolating mechanisms, 

 natural selection, protective coloration, 

 regressive evolution, and so on. 



The list of books on behavior is pur- 

 posely short. Despite its inextricable rela- 

 tion to any ecological analysis or venture, 

 animal behavior studies per se were matur- 

 ing as a separate field ("comparative psy- 

 chology") and thus making notable contri- 

 butions in their own right. 



During the decade economic biologists 

 became interested in ecology as a solution 

 for their problems. Also, certain ecologists 

 got interested in economic biologv. Some of 

 this effort yielded first-rate ecological re- 

 search, particularly in the field of biological 

 control, host-parasite relations, and fisheries 

 investigation. The books listed document 

 this point, although a survey of the litera- 

 ture suggests that the papers published in 

 journals are more impressive in terms of 

 intellectual content than are the books. 



The interest in theoretical ecologv was 

 acute during the thirties, but discussion of 

 this point is best postponed until later. 



• Their usage of biome is bv no means 

 uniform, and is only in part that of the present 

 work. 



Journals 



With each decade the number of national 

 and international journals available for the 

 publication of ecological data and/or theory 

 increased. This is well illustrated by the 

 journals available to the ecologist during 

 the 1931 to 1942 period. The majority of 

 these journals contain many articles that 

 are not ecological. Of the forty-one listed 

 (p. 70) only four are exclusively ecolog- 

 ical: Ecology, Ecological Monographs, the 

 Journal of Animal Ecology, and the Journal 

 of Ecology. The Journal of Animal Ecol- 

 ogy was started in England in 1932 and 

 has been a successful medium for original 

 research articles. It grew out of the Journal 

 of Ecology, in which many first-rate articles 

 on animal ecology had appeared before 

 1932. In addition to research publication, 

 the Journal of Animal Ecology has helped 

 the ecologist to keep abreast of British pub- 

 lications in the several fields of ecology.* 

 The Foreword to the first issue is of some 

 historical interest. There the editor, Charles 

 Elton, said (p. 1) : 



"The number of ecological papers dealing; 

 with animals is increasing, and \v\\\ imdoubtedly 

 increase even more rapidly in the near future. 

 It therefore appeared to the British Ecological 

 Society that steps ought to be taken now to 

 make adequate provision both for centralising 

 to some extent the widely scattered papers on 

 animal ecology that are now being produced, 

 and also, by planning well ahead, to anticipate 

 the future development of the subject, which 

 runs a real risk of becoming split unnaturally 

 into isolated compartments of knowledge at- 

 tached to specific scientific and economic 

 spheres, and therefore losing the advantaj^es 

 which come from the pooling of ideas and 

 knowledge in a central journal." 



More or less concomitant with the found- 

 ing of the Journal of Animal Ecology was 

 the establishment at Oxford University in 

 1932 of the "Bureau of Animal Population" 



• These "fields" as defined in the Journal of 

 Animal Ecologtf are: (1) "Ecological surveys 

 and habitat notes;" (2) "General reports and 

 taxonomic studies of use to ecologists;" (3) 

 "Animal behaviour and the action of en\nron- 

 mental factors;" (4) "Parasites;" (5) "Food 

 and food-habits;" (6) "Populations;" (7) "Mi- 

 e;ration, dispersal, and introductions;" (8) "Re- 

 ports of organizations." In this connection it is 

 interesting to note that Biological Abstracts also 

 covers the several fields of ecological literature 

 (see p. 43), from a less provincial point of 

 view. 



