Part 46

Contains several valuable and suggestive papers on the general biological relations of fresh-water plants and animals.

2. The Dynamic Relations of Aggregations and Associations, with Special Reference to Animal Associations

“A group or association of animals or plants is like a single organism in the fact that it brings to bear upon the outer world only the surplus of forces remaining after all conflicts interior to itself have been adjusted. Whatever expenditure of energy is necessary to maintain the existing internal balance amounts to so much power locked up, and rendered unavailable for external use. In many groups this latent energy is so considerable and is liable to such fluctuations, that a knowledge of its amounts and kinds, and of the laws governing its distribution, is extremely important to one interested in measuring or foreseeing the sum and character of the outward-tending activities of the class.”

--S. A. FORBES (1883).

MÖBIUS, K.

1883. The Oyster and Oyster-Culture. U. S. Comm. of Fish and Fisheries, Report of Comm. for 1880, Part VIII, pp. 683-751.

On pp. 721-729 the oyster is discussed as a member of a social community or “biocönosis.” He describes the succession of animals due to the overfishing of the oyster beds and the invasion of cockles and edible mussels which close up the available space and prevent the return of the oyster. One of the earliest papers to recognize clearly a social community in animals. A very important paper, which also shows the method of applying the science of ecology.

FORBES, S. A.

1887. The Lake as a Microcosm. Reprint from Bull. Sci. Associa. of Peoria, Illinois, 1887, pp. 1-15.

Perhaps the first paper by an American naturalist recognizing the interrelations of the social community.

WHEELER, W. M.

1911. The Ant-Colony as an Organism. Jour. Morphology, Vol. XXII, pp. 307-325.

The ant colony is considered as a unit. This paper furnishes an excellent example showing how “individual ecology” may become transformed into an “associational” unit.

MÖBIUS, K.

1893. Ueber die Thiere der Schleswig-Holsteinischen Austerbänke, ihre physikalischen und biologischen Lebensvershältnisse. Sitzungsber. d. Kgl. preuss. Akad. d. Wiss. zu Berlin, Jhrg. 1893, I, pp. 67-92.

The physical and biological relations of the Schleswig-Holstein oyster bank as a social community are carefully described. The animals associated are listed (in all about 100 kinds, p. 80) and their relation to the oyster is shown.

FORBES, S. A.

1909. The General Entomological Ecology of the Indian Corn Plant. Amer. Nat., Vol. XLIII, pp. 286-301.

ESPINAS, ALFRED.

1878. Des Sociétés Animales. Second Edition, pp. 588. Paris.

Discusses associations of different species--parasites, commensals, mutuals, domestic animals; associations of the same species and related through nutrition--the colonial forms, as corals; associations based upon reproduction--the family; and associations based upon relation--as in a horde. Contains an extensive historical introduction. Valuable, although somewhat old.

PETRUCCI, R.

1906. Origine Polyphylétique, Homotypie, et Non Comparabilité directe des Sociétés Animales. L’Inst. de Sociologie (Solvay). Notes et Mémoires, Fascicule 7. pp. 126. Bruxelles.

The multiple or independent origin of “social” life in diverse lines of descent is emphasized and viewed from the comparative and phylogenetic standpoint.

WAXWEILER, E.

1906. Esquisse d’une Sociologie. L’Inst. de Sociologie (Solvay). Notes et Mémoires, Fascicule 2. pp. 306. Bruxelles.

A very important survey of sociology as a branch of ethology or ecology. The history of ecology, and animal societies are parts which deserve special mention. A diagram, on p. 63, gives the subdivisions of ethology.

KROPOTKIN, P.