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Letters to Nature
Nature 334, 613-614 (18 August 1988) | doi:10.1038/334613a0; Accepted 21 June 1988
The variability of population densities
Stuart L. Pimm*† & Andrew Redfearn†
- *, Department of Zoology and †Graduate Program in Ecology, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee 37996, USA
Abstract
The variability of population densities over time (henceforth called population variability) is one of several meanings of ecological stability1. Here we show that estimates of the variability of population densities increase as we increase the number of years included in their calculation. This result appears for the majority of populations surveyed and over almost all the time intervals over which we calculate the variability. This result has implications for the debate over whether populations have an equilibrium.
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