This book is the story of the search to discover the biological basis of seed behavior in the weedy Setaria species-group. It consists of seven chapters, five experimental, a concluding essay and an introduction. The first two are from studies by Milt Haar. In the first, stable and plastic seed productivity behaviors are studied in terms of plant architecture. In the second, the structure of seed dormancy (seed heteroblasty) is elucidated. In the next three by Kari Jovaag (based on field experimental work by Brad Atchison), seed heteroblasty defines the evolutionary ecological role this...

Evolutionary Ecology of Weeds is the story of WHAT, WHY and HOW some plant species invade and occupy habitats ripe for exploitation. The nature of weeds is the evolution of adaptive traits for seizing and exploiting locally available opportunity. Weeds are the consequence of human disturbance which creates opportunity spacetime, leaving unused resources eager for invasion by weeds. The nature of weeds is the story of us, humans. We created highly successful wild-crop-weed complexes that resist control. We created them by channeling natural selection, the driver of biological change. Plants...