Article ID Journal Published Year Pages File Type
88564 Forest Ecology and Management 2009 4 Pages PDF
Abstract

Here we present a method for determining whether habitat patches are truly functioning as habitat islands. We do so by assessing if the species distribution pattern across the islands, when compared to a mainland pattern, conforms to the predictions of the theory of island biogeography. The putative islands in our study are a series of hummocks in a swamp in the ES George Reserve, Pinckney, MI. We assess the tree flora on each hummock and find that hummocks that are at a distance from the mainland forest have fewer tree species than subsets of the mainland having the same area as the island. The four hummocks greater than 350 m from the mainland had significantly fewer species than mainland samples of the same size, while those less than 200 m away were not statistically different. These results suggest that at least some of the hummocks function as biological islands for trees.

Related Topics
Life Sciences Agricultural and Biological Sciences Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics
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