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§ Theoretical basis of the categorisation | 79
können deshalb stets nur durch ihren Tierbestand gekennzeichnet werden,
nicht aber durch Vegetation Boden oder andere Standorts-faktoren”). This
standpoint can easily spill over to the other extreme, separating the animal
and the plant associations from each other. The greatest point of contention
is due to authors who, without exception, use the characteristics of plant
sociology to categorise animal associations, although these characteristics
have a different importance.
So, we break new ground when we try to dissect animal associations by
their structure, and as structural elements of all animal associations, we
identified four coeti (corrumpent, sustinent, intercalary, and obstant elements);
for these categories, only three published terms show similarity. One ofthese
is Deegener’s (1918) heterosynphagium that he used to name animals of
different species that congregate on the same food (coprophages, flower
visitors). This term is too narrow for intercalary elements (as more than just
coprophages belong in this category), but too wide for sustinents (not all
flower visitors are sustinents). Another term is Balogh’s (1946, 1953)
syntrophium that was discussed already. The third is Elton’s niche (1927) that
is identical with the coetus, and can be considered its English translation.
There are minor points of difference between the two: Elton does not
distinguish sustinents, and does not restrict the term to populations; he refers
to species and, therefore, the niche has an idiobiological overtone. Otherwise,
though, Elton also considers the niche a structural element of all zoocoenoses,
as we do with the coetus (p. 63. “...although the actual species of animals are
different in different habitats, the ground plan of every animal community
is much the same”. “It is therefore convenient to have some term to describe
the status of an animal in its community, to indicate what it is doing and not
merely what it looks like, and the term used is »niche«...”; p. 64.: “The
importance of studying niches is partly that it enables us to see how very
different animal communities may resemble each other in the essential
organisation”).
These clear thoughts were written in vain, because zoocoenologists continue
to describe “zoocoenoses” based on “dominance”, without considering the
coetus aspect of populations. A zoocoenosis can only appear if it contains at
least two coeti, and the most populous zoocoenosis can only contain four of
them. By stating this, we are in opposition to authors who built animal
associations considering plant layers (Brundin, 1934; Balogh, 1946, 1953;
Tischler, 1947, 1950). We strongly disagree that levels of vegetation have any
role in the structure of animal associations. Biorophs, being energy sources
of different quality, bring new associational opportunities, but the structure
of the animal associations of different vegetation layers is identical. A space
becomes richer in zoocoenoses, rather than the zoocoenosis of a space
growing richer.