- Individuals and populations: the role of long-term,
individual-based studies of animals in ecology a... Trends in
Ecology & Evolution, Volume 25, Issue 10, 1 October 2010, Pages
562-573 Tim Clutton-Brock and Ben C Sheldon AbstractMany
important questions in ecology and evolutionary biology can only
be answered with data that extend over several decades and
answering a substantial proportion of questions requires records
of the life histories of recognisable individuals. We identify
six advantages that long-term, individual based studies afford
in ecology and evolution: (i) analysis of age structure; (ii)
linkage between life history stages; (iii) quantification of
social structure; (iv) derivation of lifetime fitness measures;
(v) replication of estimates of selection; (vi) linkage between
generations, and we review their impact on studies in six key
areas of evolution and ecology. Our review emphasises the
unusual opportunities and productivity of long-term, individual-
based studies and documents the impor