Statistical challenges in spatial analysis of plant ecology data

Abstract

The scope of spatial statistics problems arising in ecology is substantial. They concern both plant and animal behavior. Here, we discuss only plants. The range of issues is still very large and so we confine ourselves to four challenges, each within the context of model development. These are: species distribution models, both individual and joint; preferential sampling and bias in presence/absence data collection; time to event data across spatial regions; high-dimensional multivariate spatial process model fitting in the context of joint species distribution models.