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Vegetation Description and Data Analysis: A Practical Approach, Second Edition is a fully revised and up-dated edition of this key text. The book takes account of recent advances in the field whilst retaining the original reader-friendly approach to the coverage of vegetation description and multivariate analysis in the context of vegetation data and plant ecology.
Since the publication of the hugely popular first edition there have been significant developments in computer hardware and software, new key journals have been established in the field and scope and application of vegetation description and analysis has become a truly global field. This new edition includes full coverage of new developments and technologies.
This contemporary and comprehensive edition of this well-known and respected textbook will prove invaluable to undergraduate and graduate students in biological sciences, environmental science, geography, botany, agriculture, forestry and biological conservation.
- Fully international approach
- Includes illustrative case studies throughout
- Now with new material on: the nature of plant communities; transitional areas between plant communities; induction and deduction of plant ecology; diversity indices and dominance diversity curves; multivariate analysis in ecology. - Accessible, reader-friendly style
- Now with new and improved illustrations
Preface to the second edition ix
Acknowledgements xi
Safety in the field xiii
Chapter 1 The nature of quantitative plant ecology and vegetation science 1
Chapter 2 Environmental gradients, plant communities and vegetation dynamics 23
Chapter 3 The description of vegetation in the field 49
Chapter 4 The nature and properties of vegetation data 101
Chapter 5 Basic statistical methods for understanding multivariate analysis 139
Chapter 6 Ordination methods 171
Chapter 7 Phytosociology and the Zurich-Montpellier (Braun-Blanquet) School of subjective classification 273
Chapter 8 Numerical classification, cluster analysis and phytosociology 307
Chapter 9 Computer software for the analysis of vegetation and environmental/biotic data 359
Chapter 10 Future developments in vegetation science and quantitative plant ecology 369
References 371
Index 403
Martin Kemp is the Emeritus Professor of Biogeography, School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Plymouth, Devon, UK.