[First paragraph(s)...]
Since there are a number of popular books covering the more spectacular aspect, of submarine life, this paper will be confined to some of the less obvious details. I will try to present the aqualung diver as the counterpart of the terrestrial ecologist with his notebook, camera, and sampling techniques.
[First paragraph(s)...]
[First paragraph(s)...]
[First paragraph(s)...]
[First paragraph(s)...]
This paper is based on work carried out by two Otago University students Mr. P. Wardle and Mr. A. F. Mark, and a more detailed account of it is in course of publication.
[First paragraph(s)...]
In the investigation and description of our native and introduced plant communities we are reaching the stage when there is need for more detailed knowledge of the actual species-that is their autecology. In his presidential address to the British Ecological Society Clapham (1956) pointed out that "it is the primary concern of a plant ecologist to explain why a plant of this species and not of that is growing in a given spot."
[First paragraph(s)...]
This paper is headed "The Sampling Problem. . . " because it deals with the type of phenomena which are observed when we try to estimate the number of organisms in a population or community. Often the pattern in space is so complex that difficulties are met in making such an estimate. The appropriate statistical methods are dealt with in text-books, but the fundamental reasons behind these problems are not so well understood as yet.
[First paragraph(s)...]
Commenting on the significance of the papers read during the morning PROF. L. R. RICHARDSON said that 15 years ago there was very little information available in regard to Cook Strait of the kind with which the meeting had been presented. It could be seen from the information contained in the papers that knowledge was rapidly advancing, and that the Cook Strait area would in future become one of the most "researched" in the world. He asked on how many stations the present knowledge of the geology and physical oceanography of the Strait was based.
[First paragraph(s)...]
[First paragraph(s)...]
When I was asked to speak it was suggested that I might summarise the results of the work being done by the Zoology Department here, in Cook Strait, from the point of view of the Decapods.
This is what I propose to do, using the decapod shrimps only, as the systematics of the crab fauna is not well enough known to make generalisations at the moment. The shrimps, however, are well known systematically, though much of this work is, as yet, unpublished.
