Fractal studies on the spatial patterns of trees: A casestudy of Khao Yai National Park, Thailand

摘要

The distribution of the trees in a 30 hectare plot in Khao Yai National Park, Thailand containing 16 375 trees,divided into 63 families and 182 species was studied. The allometric scaling exponent in the relation between number anddiameter of all the trees taken as one group was approximately —2. The spatial heterogeneity of the forest shown by thevariation of this scaling exponent determined for each hectare in the area of study. The box counting method was used todetermine the fractal dimensions (df) of the spatial patterns of the trees. The spatial pattern for all the trees taken as a wholehad a df of 1.81. The fractal dimensions for the patterns of the six most abundant species ranged from 1.73 to 1.75. On theother hand, values of df as measured from each hectare were less than 1.5, suggesting that the pattern is not self-similar overa significant range of length scales.