Lawrence Slobodkin was a leading pioneer in modern ecology — the study of the distribution and abundance of all living systems and the way they interact with their environment. He made important contributions to the philosophy of ecology and the role of ecological science in public policy.
He was perhaps most widely known for a paper, Community Structure, Population Control and Competition, published in 1960, giving a comprehensive explanation of how terrestrial ecosystems operate. Co-authored with two colleagues, the paper, popularly known as “The World is Green”, argues that the vast amount of greenery in our environment indicates that herbivores are not eliminating plants and that the growth of populations of herbivores is limited by predators rather than their food supply. This simple conclusion was, and still is, inspirational.
A professor of ecology and evolution at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, Slobodkin was the founding chairman of the first department of ecology and evolution in America. The department became one of the world’s best-known centres of ecological science, training a large number of ecologists. They, and the many scientists who visited the centre over the years, played key roles in defining and advancing the field.
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During his career, Slobodkin made lasting contributions to the theoretical and empirical development of ecology that made an important impact on the direction of ecological research. His basic assumption was “that while facts of simple kinds can be trusted, theoretical speculations are almost always wrong, particularly if accepted by a large majority”.
He helped to transform ecology from a mainly descriptive discipline to a quantitative one, using experimental data to test theoretical models of nature. His book Growth and Regulation of Animal Populations, published in 1961 (with a second enlarged edition published in 1980) was particularly influential in doing so. The establishment of ecology as a quantitative science, making mathematical and conceptual modelling an integral part of the field, attracted to it scientists from a number of disciplines.
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His early efforts to model populations of daphnia were fundamental to the development of mathematical theory in ecology, providing the first experimental evidence for the connections between population and ecosystems. Daphnia are one of several small aquatic crustaceans, commonly called water fleas, which live in lakes, rivers and ponds.
Lawrence (Larrie) B. Slobodkin was born in 1928 in the Bronx, New York. His father, Louis, was a well-known sculptor and children’s book illustrator. His mother, Florence, was a writer. The young Slobodkin was educated at the Bronx High School of Science. He said that by the age of 12, “I knew I wanted to be a biologist, had a mini-menagerie including turtles, a rabbit, a canary, a horned lizard and tropical fish. Summering in Rockport on Cape Ann permitted me to see tide pools and surf organisms.” Visits to a farm belonging to cousins gave him “a feel for meadows, farm animals, hay fields and blueberry marshes”.
He went on to Bethany College, West Virginia, where he taught himself some field botany. He then studied biology at Yale University where, in 1947, he was taught by the leading ecologist G. Evelyn Hutchinson. In 1951 he received his PhD.
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Hutchinson stimulated his interest in ecology. Until Slobodkin met him he did not know that ecology existed. “In those days,” he said, “hardly any one” did.
His first job was with the US Fish and Wildlife Service. After two years he left to join Michigan University as a lecturer in zoology, becoming a full professor. In 1965 he founded the Department of Ecology and Evolution at Stony Brook. He stayed there until he retired, when he was appointed professor emeritus.
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Slobodkin was a top-rate scientist. An eccentric-looking personality, with his mane of white hair, bushy white eyebrows and beard, he was much admired for his quick humour. He had a deep engagement with the arts and a keen interest in Jewish studies and progressive politics. He was a bon vivant with a love of good food and malt whisky.
Slobodkin is survived by his wife, Tamara, two sons and a daughter.
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Lawrence Slobodkin, ecologist, was born on June 22, 1928. He died on September 12, 2009, aged 81