comments on Feb. 1 outline

Overall, I think the outline is strong and in good shape to get us going.  Like some of the previous comments, however, I think its going to be important for us to decide upfront what the scope of the paper will be and ultimately where we plan to send it.  As has been suggested, it could be (1) a short "though piece" or a more formal review; if it were a review it could be (2) a short TREE-length review or (3) a more exhaustive one.  I can see the advantages to any of the three, although personally I would tend to lead toward options 1 or 2.

One motivation that currently seems to be missing from the outline is to better understand the native-exotic dichotomy in order to better predict how ecosystems will function in the future, in the context of global change in which many natives and exotics are likely to shift their geographic distributions and remake existing ecosystems (as discussed in Hobbs et al. 2009 - TREE paper on restoration and novel ecosystems).

One other really informative comparison we could make (or suggest should be made) is whether the impacts vary between natives that expand their range to occupy new areas versus aliens that are transported by humans to a new biogeographic realm.