Scaling Pattern of Occupancy Model for Estimating Species Occupancy

Abstract

The positive relationship in occupancy and area is one of the fundamental aspects of conservation biology. The relationship has been described using different models ranging from spatially explicit to spatially implicit ones. In this paper, we present Individual Based Model for estimating occupancy area relationship numerically. The paper also compares performance of 9 occupancy area relationship parametric models. The performances of the models were examined using akaike information criterion (AIC) and residual standard error (RSE) procedures. Among all the models, Hui model which is spatially implicit and derived based on global and local densities of species distribution performs the best. Though the models we developed lacked generalized formulae due to complexity involved in coming up with it, its numerically solutions prove that occupancy increases with increase in the area, and this pattern in observed on other models.