Growing Back after Hurricanes

September 1989 was front-page news. Readers learned once again how natural disasters, although rare, are a recurring aspect of life even in the so-called temperate zone. This reminder of nature's unpredictability came just as ecologists are beginning to see catastrophes as critical to the .: dynamics of ecosystems. Ecology's recognition of the importance of hurricanes, earthquakes, vol. y ' canic eruptions, and similar disasters represents a major shift. Until re^ cently, the field had interpreted areas undisturbed by humans as unchanging climaxes. Equilibrium theories def . veloped in the 1950s and 1960s emphasized the role of millenia of . . , . j . evolution in structuring a balance of . : l F nature. But now the pendulum has . ' ^ swung toward seeing periodic distur. bances as preventing equilibria from i....li : being reached, thereby casting doubt* on the idea of the climax. i l : . !a i . ~.. . : , Two major hurricanes in the fall of . j: I: 1988, Hurricane Gilbert in Jamaica ii and Mexico and Hurricane Joan in Nicaragua, led to studies that rein_ force the nonequilibrium view. The relation between storms and tropical forests had long been recognized, with the palm brakes of Puerto Rico's montane rain forest and the storm