Project Links

- Bats

- Caribbean

- NHLD

- UF Roadies

- Ticks

Graeme Cumming: Research Interests

I and my students are currently working on a number of different topics, including land cover change and sustainability in the Caribbean, the foraging dynamics and distributions of bats in Zambia and the southeastern USA, and the ecology of African ticks. I have been involved in an assessment of the Northern Highlands Lake District of Wisconsin (check out our scenarios for the region) and at a broader scale, am contributing to the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. For R&R I meet with the UF Roadies group to talk about resilience and connectivity.

I've worked on a variety of different organisms and systems, as evidenced by my publications list and conference presentations. I have a wide range of interests, centering around spatial aspects of ecology and in particular on how heterogeneity within biological systems translates across spatial and temporal scales. I am also interested in conservation and the sustainable management of natural resources. For example, the distributions of invertebrates are determined by a range of factors, from individual physiology through local patchiness in the environment to continent-wide climatic conditions. Understanding and predicting changes in species distributions requires an approach that crosses these different scales. Similarly, human-caused habitat fragmentation may have broader-scale ecological and evolutionary consequences that affect the long-term sustainability and resilience of animal and plant populations. Clarification of these cross-scale dynamics is essential if we are to maintain long-term ecosystem function.

To get a handle on the UF landscape, check out LEAF (Landscape Ecology At Florida)