An Improved Measure of Angular Dispersion in Plant Neighborhoods

Authors

Klaus J. Puettmann, University of Minnesota, St. Paul
Dan Rhode, Macalester College
Bruce D. Maxwell, University of Minnesota, St. Paul
John L. Lindquist, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow

Date of this Version

10-1993

Comments

Pubished in American Midlands Naturalist 130:2 (October 1993), pp. 401-404. Published by University of Notre Dame.

Abstract

Spatial distribution is an important factor determining the intensity and outcome of plant competition. The commonly used measure of angular distributions of plants around a target plant (1 - r) is shown to be limited to unimodal distributions. We present a new index which is based on the variance of the differences between the azimuth of neighboring plants. The new index is an improvement as it characterizes the angular dispersion in both unimodal and multimodal distributions.