What is ecology?

Ecology has become a household word, but what is it all about? It is concerned with the growth of populations, plant and animal, and the resources available to them, and with the structure of communities and their relationship to an environment which is always in a state of flux, not least at the hands of man. Denis Owen begins with animals, plants, and situations that we all know - thrushes and earthworms on the lawn, and herons and pike in the river - and describes with great clarity (and often with humour) how they live and why they die. He goes on to consider man as a part of nature and explains how ecology affects us, and our supplies of food, oil, and other raw materials. In this completely rewritten second edition, Denis Owen pays particular attention to recent events which have changed the natural ecological balance: Dutch elm disease in Btitain, for example, and oil tanker disasters.