Ep. 37 Classic Ecology III: Gleason, 1926

Grace, Jon, and Jeff talk about the Gleason, 1926 classic, "The individualistic concept of the plant association" a real barn-burner of a piece that forms one of the foundational pieces of community ecology--despite its controversial reception at the time. The group also chat up the first part of the Dynamic Ecology controversial ideas in ecology piece, why Jeff is a terrible biologist, and talk trash about Kant.

"It has sometimes been assumed that the various stages in a successional series follow each other in a regular and fixed sequence, but that is frequently not the case" - Henry Gleason

In "The individualistic concept of the plant association," Gleason details the myriad problems with the idea of the "climax" community and goes on further to question even the validity of rigid vegetation community structures. His work was not well-received during this life time, even if many ecologists knew he was on to something, but it did find a renaissance late in the 20th century and still informs current ecological theory and work.

Links:
Gleason, 1926
Major Revisions Instagram
Gleason Bio Page

Music:
"Henry" - Soccer Mommy
"Trees" - The Oh Hellos
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