Alan Hastings, University of California, Davis

Abstract

I will begin with several examples of ecological systems that raise important issues of management approaches: invasive species and coral reef ecosystems.  I will then present general approaches that can be used to address management problems for these systems as well as other systems.  Themes will include the role played by simple models on the one hand, and, (1) the importance of recognizing nonlinearities, (2) the possibility of tipping points, (3) importance of transients (4) large stochastic influences (5) conflicting goals and (6) ecological limitations.