The Challenges Of Long Term Ecological Research A Historical Analysis

This volume explores the challenges of sustaining long-term ecological research through a historical analysis of the Long Term Ecological Research Program created by the U.S. National Science Foundation in 1980. The book examines reasons for the creation of the Program, an overview of its 40-year history, and in-depth historical analysis of selected sites. Themes explored include the broader impact of this program on society, including its relevance to environmental policy and understanding global climate change, the challenge of extending ecosystem ecology into urban environments, and links to creative arts and humanities projects. A major theme is the evolution of a new type of network science, involving comparative studies, innovation in information management, creation of socio-ecological frameworks, development of governance structures, and formation of an International Long Term Ecological Research Network with worldwide reach. The book’s themes will interest historians, philosophers and social scientists interested in ecological and environmental sciences, as well as researchers across many disciplines who are involved in long-term ecological research.

The Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) Program is, in a sense, an experiment to transform the nature of science, and represents one of the most effective mechanisms for catalyzing comprehensive site-based research that is collaborative, multidisciplinary, and long-term in nature. The scientific contributions of the Program are prodigious, but the broader impacts of participation have not been examined in a formal way. This book captures the consequences of participation in the Program on the perspectives, attitudes, and practices of environmental scientists. The edited volume comprises three sections. The first section includes two chapters that provide an overview of the history, goals, mission, and inner workings of the LTER network of sites. The second section comprises three dozen retrospective essays by scientists, data managers or educators who represent a broad spectrum of LTER sites from deserts to tropical forests and from arctic to marine ecosystems. Each essay addresses the same series of probing questions to uncover the extent to which participation has affected the ways that scientists conduct research, educate students, or provide outreach to the public. The final section encompasses 5 chapters, whose authors are biophysical scientists, historians, behavioral scientists, or social scientists. This section analyzes, integrates, or synthesizes the content of the previous chapters from multiple perspectives and uncovers emergent themes and future directions.

The authors in this volume make a case for LTSER’s potential in providing insights, knowledge and experience necessary for a sustainability transition. This expertly edited selection of contributions from Europe and North America reviews the development of LTSER since its inception and assesses its current state, which has evolved to recognize the value of formulating solutions to the host of ecological threats we face. Through many case studies, this book gives the reader a greater sense of where we are and what still needs to be done to engage in and make meaning from long-term, place-based and cross-disciplinary engagements with socio-ecological systems.

Ecosystems change on a multitude of spatial and temporal scales. While analyses of ecosystem dynamics in short timespans have received much attention, the impacts of changes in the long term have, to a great extent, been neglected, provoking a lack of information and methodological know-how in this area. This book fills this gap by focusing on studies dealing with the investigation of complex, long-term ecological processes with regard to global change, the development of early warning systems, and the acquisition of a scientific basis for strategic conservation management and the sustainable use of ecosystems. Within this book, theoretical ecological questions of long-term processes, as well as an international dimension of long-term monitoring, observations and research are brought together. The outcome is an overview on different aspects of long-term ecological research. Aquatic, as well as terrestrial ecosystems are represented.

An examination of long-term ecological studies. The contributors describe existing international long-term research efforts, evaluate facilitating mechanisms, propose important research questions that require international co-operation and discuss technologies designed to assist in this.

Changing the Nature of Scientists : Participation in the Long-Term Ecological Research Program / Michael R. Willig and Lawrence R. Walker -- Sustaining Long-Term Research : Collaboration, Multidisciplinarity and Synthesis in the Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) Program / Robert B. Waide -- Reflections on LTER from NSF Program Directors' Perspectives / Henry L. Gholz, Robert Marinelli, and Phillip R. Taylor -- Streams and Dreams and Cross Site Studies / Sherri L. Johnson -- Data, Data Everywhere / Susan G. Stafford -- Science, Citizenship, and Humanities in the Ancient Forest of Andrews / Frederick J. Swanson -- Bridging Community and Ecosystem Ecology at the Arctic LTER Site via Collaborations / Laura Gough -- LTER in the Arctic : Where Science Never Sleeps / John E. Hobbie -- Forty Arctic Summers / Gaius R. Shaver -- Of Fish and Platypus : If You Could Ask a Fish What It Feels Like to Swim? / J. Morgan Grove -- Long-Term Ecological Research on the Urban Frontier : Benefiting from Baltimore / Steward T.A. Pickett -- Beneficiary of a Changed Paradigm : Perspectives of a "Next-Generation" Scientist / Elizabeth T. Borer -- Listening to Nature and Letting Data Be Trump / David Tilman -- The Socializing of an Ecosystem Ecologist : Interdisciplinarity from a Career Spent in the LTER Network / Daniel L. Childers -- An Urban Ecological Journey / Nancy B. Grimm -- An Anthropologist Joins the LTER Network / Ted L. Gragson -- The Benefits of Long-Term Environmental Research, Friendships, and Boiled Peanuts / Evelyn E. Gaiser -- Collaboration and Broadening Our Scope : Relevance of LTER Science to the Global Community / Tiffany G. Troxler -- A Dryland Ecologist's Mid-Career Retrospective on LTER and the Science-management Interface / Brandon Bestelmeyer -- Tales from an LTER "Lifer" / Debra P.C. Peters -- A Forest to Prairie Transition as an LTER Scientist / John Blair --Growing-Up with the Konza Prairie LTER Program / Alan K. Knapp -- Born and Bred in the LTER Network : Perspectives on Network Science and Global Collaboration / Melinda D. Smith -- Confessions of a Fungal Systematist / D. Jean Lodge -- A Glimpse of the Tropics Through Odum's Macroscope / Ariel E. Lugo -- Taking the Long View : Growing Up in the LTER / Whendee L. Silver -- Kelp Forests, Coral Reefs, and the LTER Program : Synergies and Impacts on a Scientific Career / Sally J. Holbrook -- The LTER Construct for Understanding Dynamics of Coral Reef Ecosystems and Its Influence on My Science / Russell J. Schmitt -- Top of the World Collaborations : Lessons from Above Treeline / Katharine N. Suding -- My Evolution as an LTER Scientist / John J. Magnuson -- Learning from a Frozen Ocean : The Changing Face of Antarctic Ocean Ecology / Hugh W. Ducklow -- Mysteries in the Marsh / Anne Giblin -- Perspectives on a 30-Year Career of Salt Marsh Research / James T. Morris -- Evolution of an Information Manager / Margaret O?Brien -- From LTER to NSF and Back : A Personal History of LTER Science and Management / Scott L. Collins -- The LTER Stimulus : Research, Education, and Leadership Development at Individual and Community Levels / James R. Gosz -- LTER and Lessons from Networked Lives / John C. Moore -- Networking : From LTER to NEON / Bruce P. Hayden -- Sharing Information : Many Hands Make Light Work / John H. Porter -- Coda : Some Reflections on the Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) Program / William H. Schlesinger -- Scholarly Learning in an Ecological Setting : Applying the Knowledge, Attitudes, and Behaviors Framework to Perceived Outcomes from Participation in the Long-Term Ecological Research Program / Mark A. Boyer and Scott W. Brown -- Exploring the Scientific and Beyond : Science Interactions of LTER Scientists / Courtney G. Flint -- Long-Term Ecological Research over the Long Term : An Historian's Perspective / Christopher Hamlin -- Tradeoffs of Participation in the Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) Program : Immediate and Long-Term Consequences / Lawrence R. Walker and Michael R. Willig

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