Scientific background - VIII Spanish Congress of Biogeography

By Rafael Cámara Coordinator of the VIII Congress

Field Workshops on Biogeography ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

The Field Workshops on Biogeography were born as part of an initiative from Professor José Manuel Rubio Recio, of the University of Seville, to spread Biogeography among experts in diverse disciplines, and students, gathering professors who carry out their research and teaching activity on Biogeography at several Spanish Universities.

The first of these workshops takes place in Huelva at Doñana National Park and continue in Sedano (Burgos) by Professor Jesús García Fernández’s invitation, of the University of Valladolid, annually until 1994. That concludes the First Period of meetings, using a methodology of working groups organized by topics. The Second Period starts in 1996 and ends in 2005, during which the results of the Field Workshops are published in typewriting newspapers. Meetings in this period started in Sagardelos (Galicia) to be followed by Moncayo (Aragon), Cabo de Gata-Almería (Andalusia), Sierra de Aitana-Alicante (Valencia), Sierra del Teleno-León (Castile and Leon), Valle del Roncal-Navarra (the Basque Country), El Genal-Málaga (Andalusia), Delta del Ebro (Catalonia), Montes de Toledo (Castile-La Mancha) and Sedano in 2005.

In Sedano, a period of stagnation of the Field Workshops of Biogeography meetings coincides with a biannual proposition of said meetings. It will be later, in 2009, when the Group of Biogeography from the Basque Country, at Espinosa de los Monteros (Burgos), revived them. Then a Third Period is propelled, whose leading contribution is a change in the work methodology used during the Field Workshops. From this point forward, they have been biannual and alternate with the celebration of the Spanish Congress of Biogeography. The last two Field Workshops have been those of Doñana National Park (Andalusia) in 2011 and Collsacabra-Girona (Catalonia) in 2013.

The next meeting proposition is for 2015, in the Caatinga-Paraiba (Brazil).

Source: Peio Lozano

Spanish Congress of Biogeography //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

The Spanish Congress of Biogeography appears as an initiative of the Biogeography Group participating in the  Fieldtrip Workshops. It begins in September 2000 in the Valley of Nuria (Girona, Catalonia) organized by the University of Barcelona. Since then seven Congresses have been celebrated with a biannual distribution in La Gomera (Canary Islands) by the University of Las Palmas, Urdaibai (Basque Country) by the University of  the Basque Country , Ávila (Castile and Leon) by the Complutense University of Madrid, Málaga (Andalusia) by the University of Málaga, Alicante (Valencia) by the University of Alicante and Planes de Son (Alt Aneu, Lleida, Catalonia), by the Autonomous University of Barcelona.

The average number of oral communications and posters presented has been 44, with an average attendance of 60 people. Applied Biogeography, the subject with a wide range of contributions, with 153 (among which 49 were on conservation, 33 on using changes and 32 on management landscape), is followed by Structural studies of vegetation and fauna communities (60), 52 on Dynamic Biogeography (factors of distribution and successions), 38 on chorology and 6 methodological.

Source: Peio Lozano