Re: NANFA-L-- Diversity Indicies

matt ashton (ashtonmj2003 at yahoo.com)
Thu, 29 Sep 2005 06:44:19 -0700 (PDT)

Todd,

I have a copy of the Ohio IBI manual so with the right info, like ecoregion, drainage size I could give you a rough score from it. The few problems I see using that is 1) im assuming you seined and not electroshocked 2) not sampling the entire community, every available habitat thing, so its somewhat bias and 3) unless I have missed some of the updates alot of the subclassifications of species were incomplete. Usually it was for things that were rare or not much known about, which coincidentally is usually things that are dependent upon good water quality so it would effect your scoring. Some of the major western ohio ecoregions go into that area of IN so I think it might cover it, if it didn't it might still be applicable or easily adaptable.

Matt Ashton
Tenneessee Tech University
Cookeville TN

Bruce Stallsmith <fundulus at hotmail.com> wrote:
The limit to IBI use is that different IBIs are designed for different
areas. And not just southeast, midwest, but for different stream or lake
environments, e.g. Appalachian Highland or not. The major advantage of IBI
is that you can give a seemingly strong, scientific number to people like
members of Congress who don't know anything about anything. The use of IBI
out of context can be a serious example of GIGO.

--Bruce Stallsmith
in the diverse Tennessee Valley
Huntsville, AL, US of A

>From: dlmcneely at lunet.edu
>Reply-To: nanfa-l at nanfa.org
>To: nanfa-l at nanfa.org
>Subject: Re: NANFA-L-- Diversity Indicies
>Date: Thu, 29 Sep 2005 07:49:49 -0500
>
>Todd, I'm not sure why you've only "caught rumor" of an index that
>weights species differently. James Karr developed and others
>elaborated a metric called the "Index of Biotic Integrity." It is
>applicable differently in different places, and has been so applied by
>state and other agencies. There is some controversy regarding its
>usefulness, but a good bit of work has used it. Look for it and you'll
>find it.
>
>Dave
>
>David L. McNeely, Ph.D., Professor of Biology
>Langston University; P.O. Box 1500
>Langston, OK 73050; email: dlmcneely at lunet.edu
>telephone: (405) 466-6025; fax: 405) 466-3307
>home page http://www.lunet.edu/mcneely/index.htm
>
>"Where are we going?" "I don't know, are we there yet?"
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