Plasticity of fine-root functional traits in the litter layer in response to nitrogen addition in a subtropical forest plantation

Plant and Soil - Lead (Pb) is one of the most dangerous soil pollutants with high toxicity to plants and animals. However, the molecular mechanisms behind Pb tolerance are poorly understood. Here...     

Test of an adaptive hypothesis for egg speckling along an elevational gradient in a population of Mexican jays Aphelocoma ultramarina

The adaptive significance of avian egg speckling patterns has been a subject of ongoing debate. We examined speckling in a population of Mexican jays Aphelocoma ultramarina exhibiting extreme eggshell variability. We sampled 167 eggs at 55 nests from sites ranging across a steep elevation gradient within the Sierra del Carmen mountain range in Coahuila, Mexico, in order to test the recent hypothesis that egg speckling lends structural support to eggs and should therefore be more prevalent in females subject to reduced environmental calcium. Although we documented high variation in the amount and distribution of eggshell speckling within the Sierra del Carmen jays, we found no relationship between local soil calcium levels and the pattern of speckling. Our results indicate that explanations in addition to soil calcium levels are necessary to explain extreme variation in eggshell speckling in birds.     

Mauss,Interestedness, and Disinterestedness: Hawaiian and Maori Fisheries

This article uses Mauss's thesis on The Gift as a lens through which to critically compare Hawaiian and Māori fisheries. I focus, in particular, on the specific and paradoxical blending of interestedness and disinterestedness in the subsistence sector in Hawaii, and the historical separation of these phenomena in the context of fisheries management in New Zealand. As emergent financial commodities fish symbolises a new type of disjuncture between production and exchange, a disjuncture which is likely to be unsustainable in terms of either human or environmental costs.