Biogeography: too big for a single volume?

Special issue of Vie et Milieu/Life and Environment ( 2000 ) Biogeography: evolutionary, historical and ecological aspects of biodiversity [ in English ]. Vol. 50 ( 4 ), 310 pp. ISSN 0240-8759 . Vie et Milieu/Life and Environment is a long-running quarterly journal of general ecology published by the ARAGO laboratory, at the Oceanographic Institute in Banyuls-sur-Mer, France. It focuses primarily on ecology, biology and systematics in marine, estuarine and terrestrial environments, and has thus branched well beyond its normal boundaries in putting together this biogeographically-based collection of articles for its annual ‘special topic’ issue. A list of the papers contained within the special issue can be found at http://www.cicimar.ipn.mx/biblioteca/may22.htm. Biogeography per se, however, is a broad subject and attempting to limit coverage to only the evolutionary, historical and ecological aspects of biodiversity related to biogeography does very little to help delimit the subject area. As is immediately apparent from the titles of the nine articles that make up this issue, despite the title, there is no obvious theme to the contributions. Articles entitled ‘Spatial and temporal variability in chlorophyll-a and diatom distribution in the south-east Indian ocean’ are set alongside papers on ‘Species body-size distribution and spatial scale in Iberian ants’ and ‘Evolution and ecology of birds on islands: trends and prospects’. However, at least half the papers do relate to the biogeography of marine organisms, e.g. Holarctic fishes, Hyriidae, bryozoans and ostracods, presumably reflecting the core subject area of the journal. Overall, the diversity of subject matter covered in the articles leads one to ask: was an editorial decision taken to put together a collection of papers on the evolutionary, historical and ecological aspects of biodiversity related to biogeography, or did they just have a bunch of papers lying around which the editors decided to group together under a particular heading? Of course, this is not to criticise the quality of individual articles, nearly all of which are generally well-written and of interest to the non-specialist, if largely lacking in primary data. Indeed, of the nine papers which comprise this volume, only three contain original data, with the majority being either re-analyses of published data or review articles. Unfortunately, rightly or wrongly, an author's willingness to place his/her primary data in a journal/publication is often interpreted as a measure of the status and perceived quality of the publication in question; in this respect, this volume of Vie et Milieu does not score well. Nevertheless, as stated, there are some interesting articles in this volume, of which three in particular provide logical and convincing biogeographical interpretations of their respective data. The article on the biogeography of parasites of Holarctic fish by Carney and Dick (University of Manitoba, Canada) provides a thorough critique of the limits within which host-parasite associations are supported across continents, and questions the predictability of such associations and their implications for co-evolution. The resulting pattern of associations is then interpreted in the light of ecological similarities, rather than phylogeny, i.e. co-evolution. Graf and O’Foighil (University of Michigan) address the origins of Australasian Hyriidae using a now standard molecular phylogenetics approach. Based on analysis of segments of 28S rDNA and cytochrome oxidase I sequence data, they explore the phylogenetic relationships of contemporary hyriid taxa in relation to their geographical origins and conclude that 1) the Hyriidae pre-date the break-up of Gondwanaland and 2) the New Zealand Hyridellini are relics rather than colonisers. Creditably, the plausibility of longstanding alternative long-distance dispersal hypotheses is also evaluated in the light of the relationships defined by the new molecular data. The paper by Froneman and Pakhomov (Rhodes University, South Africa) on spatial and temporal variability in chlorophyll-a and diatom distribution in the south-east Indian ocean presents a massive body of data collected on oceanic cruises across a four-year period. Analyses of pigment (chlorophyll-a) concentrations and species richness provide new insights into the nature of biogeographical boundaries acting on diatoms in the ocean to the south of Africa. In particular, analysis of spatial variability in chlorophyll-a concentration patterns provides an insight into the marked spatial variability with which oceanic currents can act as biogeographical barriers. Overall then, a somewhat eclectic collection of papers make up this biogeographical special topic edition of Vie et Milieu. Although diverse and in several cases short of original data, the majority of papers present at least novel insights into biogeographical interpretation, particularly in the field of marine organisms. Whether or not the volume meets the scope of its somewhat grandiose all-encompassing title, however, is open to debate. Special issue of Vie et Milieu/Life and Environment ( 2000 ) Biogeography: evolutionary, historical and ecological aspects of biodiversity [ in English ]. Vol. 50 ( 4 ), 310 pp. ISSN 0240-8759 .

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