Intrinsic and extrinsic variability in community dynamics

The relative importance of intrinsic and extrinsic sources of variability in population dynamics has long been a question central to ecology. It has recently generated a wave of studies that use time-series analyses to identify density dependence in single-species data. One limitation of these efforts has been that, with their emphasis on single species, they do not explicitly include the effects of interactions among species. We propose to assemble a working group to examine intrinsic and extrinsic variability from a community perspective. We would assess the importance of species interactions as sources of intrinsic variability in population dynamics and explore how time-series data on the population densities of all species in a community can be used to understand the role of species interactions.