A Holistic Landscape Description Reveals That Landscape Configuration Changes More over Time than Composition: Implications for Landscape Ecology Studies.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Space-for-time substitution-that is, the assumption that spatial variations of a system can explain and predict the effect of temporal variations-is widely used in ecology. However, it is questionable whether it can validly be used to explain changes in biodiversity over time in response to land-cover changes.

Hypothesis

Here, we hypothesize that different temporal vs spatial trajectories of landscape composition and configuration may limit space-for-time substitution in landscape ecology. Land-cover conversion changes not just the surface areas given over to particular types of land cover, but also affects isolation, patch size and heterogeneity. This means that a small change in land cover over time may have only minor repercussions on landscape composition but

SUBMITTER: Mimet A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4784918 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature