Subject: Herring's House Park/re: keystone species
Date: Jan 12 12:00:47 2002
From: Kevin Li - kdli at msn.com


Herring's House Park on the lower Duwamish yesterday afternoon had several green winged teal, hooded and red breasted mergansers, a couple of bald eagles, and a cooper's hawk, among the usual sightings.

My impression is that the term "keystone species" was first coined around the early 1970s by Prof. emeritus Robert Paine of the University of WA Zoology Dept., with regard to the starfish Pisaster and its role in the structure of intertidal communities at Tatoosh Island. I'm not familiar with use of the term "keynote" in regard to a species.

Kevin Li
Ballard, USA
kdli at msn.com