Biology 3445F Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Species Richness, Biogeography
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Lecture 5 species patterns in space. Whitaker: relative species abundances, loved rank abundance curves. Diversity changes at different spatial scales. Alpha: number of species you observe when you go out and sample local patch (the richness) Gamma: essentially the same as alpha but at a larger spatial scale (region) Beta: describes the variability among local habitat patches. Originally thought the relationship was multiplicative, and lande said it was additive later. Beta in multiplicative becomes independent, has no units. Additive, beta keeps it"s unit, becomes intuitive measure of species dissimilarity. To solve for beta, using additive, it becomes easy math. Says essentially for every patch, we"re missing 1. 6 species from the regional pool. Sars - only real law in ecology, you will find more species when you sample larger areas. Island plot is not an accumulation. See that it"s shallow vs. steep in the z value. If you log the area, you can draw a straight line through your data.