Collected reprints: Abstract 3364

Collected reprints

Abstract

Bergmans, M. (1983). When m-selection?. Oecologia (Berl.) 58: 256-257

Caswell and Hastings (1980) introduced an explicit model for the relative merits, in terms of growth rate lambda, of developmental shifts vs. fecundity increases. Some aspects of their model are clarified by concentrating on the (fitness >1) half-plane rather than on the (accelerated reproduction) half-plane. There is no strict equivalence between Caswell and Hastings' key parameter lambda/P and the dynamic behaviour of the population which is governed by lambda. Thus in some stationary/declining populations time shifts of reproduction (forward or backward, according to the value of lambda/P) are just as effective in promoting a high lambda as they are in growing populations; therefore selection for higher m, may, but need not, prevail in stationary/declining populations.

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