Designer food webs: from build-it-and-they-will-come to intentionality-in-design
- Published
- Accepted
- Subject Areas
- Ecology, Coupled Natural and Human Systems
- Keywords
- Designer food webs, design process, food webs, trophic dynamics, trophic structure, urban ecology, form and function
- Copyright
- © 2017 Felson et al.
- Licence
- This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ Preprints) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
- Cite this article
- 2017. Designer food webs: from build-it-and-they-will-come to intentionality-in-design. PeerJ Preprints 5:e3375v1 https://doi.org/10.7287/peerj.preprints.3375v1
Abstract
Anthropogenic landscapes provide opportunities for ecologists to deliberately and intentionally design urban food webs. Ecologists working as full, collaborative partners with designers can construct functional food webs for urban environments that benefit society. As a first step, ecologists can learn to partner with designers by translating ecological knowledge at scales relevant to design strategies and decision-making. Building relationships at multiple intersections within a designed project is essential for fostering co-generated strategies to achieve functional food webs in a designed and aesthetic urban context. Designing diverse, self-sustaining, urban food webs will require testing, monitoring, and adaptive management. Here, we discuss relevant ecological theory and explore case studies illustrating aspects of the design process and opportunities for designing and constructing food webs.
Author Comment
This is a preprint submission to PeerJ Preprints