Spatial heterogeneity in a grassland community: Use of power law

Abstract

A new regression analysis was proposed to evaluate the degree of spatial heterogeneity for individual species comprising a plant grassland community. The weighted average of the heterogeneity value of all the species comprising the community provides a measure of community‐level heterogeneity. A field survey was carried out, as an example, in order to analyze the spatial heterogeneity of a pasture with grazing cows, using 100 quadrats 50 cm × 50 cm, each of which was divided into four smaller quadrats 25 cm × 25 cm, on a 50 m long line‐transect. The frequency of occurrence for all the species in each small quadrat was recorded. The regression associated with the ratio of the theoretical and observed variances of occurence counts was used to analyse the frequency distribution of species in a pasture community. A good fit to the regression for the whole community was obtained. These results indicate that (i) each species in the example was distributed more heterogeneously than a random pattern; and (ii) the regression could well describe the spatial heterogeneity of the grassland plant community. In most of the observed species, spatial heterogeneity is often characterized by species‐specific propagation traits and the architecture of plant bodies. Thus, the spatial patterns of a grassland community can be evaluated in detail by this power‐law approach. This measure is suitable for field surveys and comparative studies of grassland communities, and for other plant communities that are generally short in height.