What are the assumptions for logistic growth, and how realistic are they?
Logistic growth assumes that a population will be responsive to the carrying capacity of the environment (“K -recognition”), which is an evolved trait that can be demonstrated in nature for real populations. It also assumes that every individual added to the population has the same impact on growth as every other individual, which implies that all individuals take equal portions of the resource and that adding individuals at low density has the same impact on growth as adding individuals at high density. Since low density populations are unlikely to be resource limited, and since different ages, sexes, and reproductive conditions of individuals will cause variability in resource demand, these assumptions are unrealistic. Finally, r and K are assumed to be constant. Biotic potential may be constant over several generations, but carrying capacity of the environment can vary stochastically in the short term. In spite of these limitations, the logistic is a good ideal model with which to c
