Measuring Plant Diversity: Lessons from the Field

摘要: Most textbooks on measuring terrestrial vegetation have focused the characteristics of biomass, cover, and density or frequency dominant life forms (trees, shrubs, grasses, forbs), classifying, differentiating, evaluating monitoring plant communities based a few common species. Sampling designs for species richness diversity, patterns species-environment relationships, distributions received less attention. There are compelling, urgent reasons ecologists to do far better job diversity in this new century. Rapidly invading from other countries affecting rangeland condition wildlife habitat, placing more threatened endangered lists, increasing wildfire fuel loads. Attention has shifted classification accurately mapping rare assemblages management concern afford them protection. More ecologists, biologists, local regional planners recognize value understanding patterns, dynamics, interactions habitats manage grazing, fire, invasive species, forest practices, restoration activities. Thus, revised sampling approaches, designs, field techniques needed assess critical emerging issues facing land managers. This book offers alternatives past that were chiefly designed purposes. The author focuses move beyond mapping, relatively homogeneous communities. complements methods biomass cover sparse, rare, patchily distributed. It empowers reader take an experimental approach science understand native non-native long-lived short-lived