Habitat inventory at a regional scale: a comparison of estimates of terrestrial Broad Habitat cover from stratified sample field survey and full census field survey for Wales, UK |
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Authors: | Blackstock T H Burrows C R Howe E A Stevens D P Stevens J P |
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Institution: | Countryside Council for Wales, Maes-y-Ffynnon, Penrhosgarnedd, Bangor, Gwynedd LL57 2DW, UK. |
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Abstract: | Estimates of terrestrial Broad Habitat cover for Wales from the Countryside Survey 2000 stratified sample field mapping programme in Britain are compared with the findings of a full census field mapping project, the Habitat Survey of Wales. The Countryside Survey sampling regime comprised a stratified random sample of 1 km squares corrected] covering <0.5% of the land surface. Comparative assessment indicates that although few of the sample-derived estimates for individual Broad Habitats are within 30% of the full census survey results, relative extents accord with data from the complete census survey for all Broad Habitats apart from Arable & Horticultural. The accuracy of this estimate is improved when the national boundary of Wales is taken into account in the sample stratification scheme. It is suggested that cultural land-use differences between countries render cropland habitat extent less predictable from physical environmental parameters than semi-natural habitat extent. It is also shown that the precision of sample-derived cover estimates is influenced by habitat pattern: the error term associated with habitats of broadly equal extent is greater for those with the most clumped distributions. |
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Keywords: | Broad habitat Clumpiness index Countryside Survey 2000 Regional habitat inventory |
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