Dr. Brown (white hat) sampling a steam in the Kisatchie National Forest with state officials looking for endangered mussels

Kenneth M. Brown Professor Ph.D., University of Iowa, 1976 Ecology and conservation of aquatic communities kmbrown@lsu.edu Dr. Ken Brown's Lab Extended CV

One of the oyster reefs we have worked on

My laboratory studies ecological interactions in both freshwater and marine food webs, at both the population and community level. In marine ecosystems, we have studied predator prey interactions between oysters and the southern oyster drill (a snail), the stone crab, and the black drum (a fish). Our work has tested predictions of optimal foraging theory, how environmental factors influence whether predators control the abundance of oysters, and deterrents to limit predation on oyster leases. Current projects include a sea-grant funded study of whether trapping black drum off oyster leases will improve oyster survival, as well as studies of the predator-prey interactions between blue crabs, oysters and mussels. We also studied how settlement and hydrocarbon pollutants affect recruitment in the intertidal fouling assemblage. In freshwater ecosystems, we have shown that habitat productivity is important in explaining snail life history variation, and that predators often control snail prey, indirectly facilitating periphyton production. We are now studying the conservation ecology of freshwater mussels, and have documented causes of intraspecific life history variation in endangered species, and the importance of microhabitat factors and host fish abundance in determining mussel distributions. Currently we are studying how landscape-level factors determine unionid mussel diversity and abundance.

Selected Research Publications

Brown, K. M., S. F. Keenan, and P. D. Banks. 2005. Dominance hierarchies in Xanthid crabs: roles in resource holding potential and field distributions. Marine Ecol. Prog. Ser., 291:189-196

Brown, K. M., and P. D. Johnson. 2004. Comparative conservation ecology of pleurocerid and pulmonate gastropods of the United States. American Malacological Bulletin 19: 57-62.

Brown, K. M., G. W. Peterson, P. D. Banks, B. Lezina, C. Ramacharan, and M. McDonough. 2003. Olfactory deterrents to black drum predation on oyster leases. Journal of Shellfish Research. 22:589-595.

Brown, K. M., and W. B. Stickle.2002. Physical constraints on the foraging ecology of an intertidal snail. Marine and Freshwater Behavior and Physiology 35:157-166.

Bolden, S. R., and K. M. Brown. 2002. The relative importance of transplants, habitat, and density to growth and survival in the Louisiana pearlshell, Margaritifera hembeli. Journal of the North American Benthological Society 21:89 - 96.

Brown, K. M. and P. D. Banks. 2001. The conservation of Unionid mussels in Louisiana rivers: Diversity, assemblage composition and substrate use. Aquatic Conservation 11:189-198.

Brown, K. M., and D. M. Lodge. 1993. The importance of specifying null models: are invertebrates really more abundant in vegetated habitats? Limnol. Oceanogr. 38: 217-225.

Brown, K. M. 1985. Intraspecific life history variation in a pond snail: the roles of population divergence and phenotypic plasticity. Evolution 39(2): 387-395.

Brown, K. M. 1983. Are life history strategies real: Data from fresh water snails. Amer. Natur. 121: 871-879.

Brown, K. M. 1982. Resource overlap and competition in pond snails: An experimental analysis. Ecology 63: 412-422.

Return to the faculty index...