Department of Life Sciences, Imperial College London, Silwood Park Campus, Buckhurst Road, Ascot, Berkshire SL5 7PY, UK.
Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2011 Nov 27;366(1582):3292-302. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2011.0049.
Opportunities to conduct large-scale field experiments are rare, but provide a unique opportunity to reveal the complex processes that operate within natural ecosystems. Here, we review the design of existing, large-scale forest fragmentation experiments. Based on this review, we develop a design for the Stability of Altered Forest Ecosystems (SAFE) Project, a new forest fragmentation experiment to be located in the lowland tropical forests of Borneo (Sabah, Malaysia). The SAFE Project represents an advance on existing experiments in that it: (i) allows discrimination of the effects of landscape-level forest cover from patch-level processes; (ii) is designed to facilitate the unification of a wide range of data types on ecological patterns and processes that operate over a wide range of spatial scales; (iii) has greater replication than existing experiments; (iv) incorporates an experimental manipulation of riparian corridors; and (v) embeds the experimentally fragmented landscape within a wider gradient of land-use intensity than do existing projects. The SAFE Project represents an opportunity for ecologists across disciplines to participate in a large initiative designed to generate a broad understanding of the ecological impacts of tropical forest modification.
开展大规模野外实验的机会很少，但这为揭示自然生态系统内部复杂的过程提供了独特的机会。在这里，我们回顾了现有的大规模森林破碎化实验的设计。基于这一回顾，我们为稳定的森林生态系统改变项目（SAFE）设计了一个新的森林破碎化实验，该实验将位于婆罗洲（马来西亚沙巴州）的低地热带森林中。SAFE 项目代表了现有实验的一个进步，因为它：（i）允许区分景观水平的森林覆盖与斑块水平的过程的影响；（ii）旨在促进广泛的生态模式和过程的数据类型的统一，这些数据类型在广泛的空间尺度上运作；（iii）比现有的实验有更大的复制；（iv）包含对河岸带走廊的实验性管理；（v）将实验性破碎的景观嵌入到比现有项目更广泛的土地利用强度梯度中。SAFE 项目为跨学科的生态学家提供了一个参与大型计划的机会，该计划旨在广泛了解热带森林改造对生态的影响。
