279

Book Reviews

Ecological diversity and its measurement, by Anne E. Magurran; Chapman and Hall,
London; second edition (paperback), 1991, 179 pp; GBP 13.95; ISBN 0-412-38330-6
(paperback).

This book, first published in 1988, expressly aims to explain the concepts and
measurement of ecological diversity to readers with little expertise in mathematics. As
somebody who falls firmly into this category, I have so say that it is entirely success-
ful.
The various types of diversity indices and species abundance models (e.g., geometric
series, log series, log normal, broken stick, etc.) are comprehensively described, and a
particularly helpful feature of the book is that a set of worked examples is included at
the back. These take the reader through the various calculations, which can be done
on a programmable pocket calculator, and by doing this one gains a real understanding
of how the method works. Writing the appropriate programs for a microcomputer
would then be a relatively simple next step. Throughout the book the author draws on
examples which are mainly from her own field of specialism, i.e,, terrestrial ecology,
and the figures are embellished with nice vignettes of the organisms under consider-
ation, which break the visual monotony of the inevitable mass of graphs. JEMBE
readers will find, however, that the main literature on marine diversity is not ignored,
but the author is clearly on less familiar territory here (as mention of marine decapod
insects on p. 86 betrays!).
The book deals in an easily understandable way with methods of plotting species
abundance data (rank/abundance curves,/c-dominance, etc.), the relationships between
different diversity indices (Hill numbers) and Jack-knifing to improve the estimate of
an index. A chapter address the tricky problems of random sampling, sample size and
the choice of alternative measures of the relative importances of species, e.g., bio~ass
or area of cover (the latter being particularly appropriate for marine modular organ-
isms such as sponges, bryozoans and corals). In discussing the relative merits and
choice of different diversity measures the author does not sit on the fence but comes
up with a firm series of recommendations based on an assessment of their discriminant
ability, sensitivity to sample size and fit to species abundance models. On a more
functional note, there are sections on the struct~:ral diversity of habitats (no mention
of fractals!), niche width or resource diversity, and their relationsiiips with taxonomic
diversity. In the context of measuring fl diversity (differentiation diversity between
communities), multivariate methods get an airing, but ! did feel that this section could
have been dealt with in a less summary fashion.
280 BOOK REVIEWS

The final part of the book deals with the value of diversity measures in the context
of environmental monitoring and conservation. It is in these areas that there has been
a great deal of recent thinking which, unfortunatley, this book does not reflect. It is a
pity that the opportunity was not taken to update this section rather than undertak-
ing a simple reprinting. Discussing conservation issues without waving the
"biodiversity" banner (the word is not mentioned) seems strange in 1991. Conserva-
tionists have been trying to establish a useful measure of biodiversity for their purposes,
and much store is being placed on taxonomic distinctness. Taxic diversity measures
take into account the greater conservation value of communities of distantly rather than
closely related species, and there is much debate about appropriate methods of taxo-
nomic weighting (May, 1990; Van-Wright et al., 1991). Although hierarchical diversity
does get a paragraph, it is not in this context.
All in all, though, I think this book provides a very useful introduction to a subject
which has suffered in the past from a diffuse and confusing literature. It will probably
be most valuable to late undergraduate or early graduate students, but provides food
for thought for more mature workers too.

REFERENCES

May, R.M., 1990. Taxonomy as destiny. Nature (London), Vol. 347, pp. 129-130.
Vane-Wright, R. I., C.J. Humphries & P. H. Williams, 1991. What to protect? - - Systematics and the agony
of choice. Biol. Conserv., Vol. 55, pp. 235-254.

R.M. Warwick,
Plymouth Marine Laboratory,
Prospect Place,
Plymouth PL1 3DH,
UK

Ecosystems of world. 25. Coralreefs, edited by Z. Dubinsky; Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1990;

xi + 550 pp.; NLG 240.00, USD 1a7.25; ISBN 0-444-87392-9; editor-in-chief of se-
ries D.W. Goodall.

Until now the ecology of coral reefs has been adequately summarised only in a few
reviews. Work done to date on particular facets of this astonishing ecosystem type were
covered well on their own, for example with respect to nutrient fluxe~ biological pro-
ductivity, fish population ecology, crown-of-thorns starfish or biogeography. Most of
the topics mentioned have advanced quickly since those reviews were published. The
present book therefore brings with it the promise of an up-to-date synthesis. More
important, it represents a rare attempt to bring together in one tome the wealth of