Patterns in Wildlife-Vegetation Association Matrices

摘要

We explored patterns in species-vegetation associations for vertebrate species found in forest communities in the northeastern U.S. Associations compiled by Degraaf et al. were used as the basis for our analyses. Three hundred and thirty-six vertebrate species and 45 vegetative cover types were investigated. Vertebrates were grouped as mammals, amphibians, reptiles and birds, and vegetation classes were aggregated hierarchically into 3, 6, 11 or 45 vegetation cover types. We used correspondence analysis to explore these data for patterns, with the objective of identifying dual ordinations of species and vegetation cover types expressing the strongest possible pattern of association between species and vegetation.