Definitions of Ecology

Different pioneers defined ecology in slightly different words, but each definition captures the same central idea — organisms and their surroundings cannot be studied in isolation from each other. Reiter (1885) described ecology simply as 'the study of living organisms, both plants and animals, in their natural habitats or homes' — an emphasis on the organism's home address. Ernst Haeckel (1869), whose definition became the most widely accepted, framed it more dynamically as 'the study of the reciprocal relationship between living organisms and their environment' — stressing that the relationship runs both ways: the environment shapes the organism, and the organism (through grazing, burrowing, shading, decomposing, and so on) shapes the environment right back. The Indian ecologist R. Misra defined ecology as 'a division of biology which deals with the study of environment in relation to organisms', and pointed out that this study can be carried out at any of several levels — the individual organism, the population, the community, the biome, or the biosphere — each paired with its own environment. Read together, these definitions …