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        Delete Resource - Scale-dependent patterns of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon

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        Scale-dependent patterns of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon

        Source

        Smithsonian Libraries

        OBJECT TYPE

        Electronic documents Smithsonian staff publications

        ABSTRACT

        Tropical forests of the Amazon Basin are being rapidly converted to agricultural land uses and fallow land, resulting in accelerating rates of forest loss in one of the world's most biodiverse ecoregions. This process has been extensively described andmodelled, but as yet there has been no formal test ofhowthe spatial patterns of deforested and fragmented areas change with the spatial scale of forest clearings. It was hypothesised that different land-use practices are driving small and large clearings, with small-scale cultivators often creating small, irregularly shaped clearings and largescale ranchers and soy farmers creating larger, more regular-shaped clearings. To quantitatively test this hypothesis,Mandelbrot's theory of fractalswas applied to deforested areas in the Brazilian Amazon to test for scale-invariance in deforestation patterns. The spatial pattern of deforestation differed between small and large clearings,with the former creating more complex landscapes and with a threshold occurring at c. 1200 ha in area. As a consequence, the sizes and shapes of forest clearings, and hence the relative vulnerability of the remaining forest to edge, area and isolation effects, may differ systematically between landscapes with different deforestation drivers. Further tests of this hypothesis are needed to assess its efficacy in other tropical landscapes and geographical locations.

        DOI

        10.1017/S0376892906003250

        CITATION

        Ewers, Robert Mark and Laurance, William F. 2006. Scale-dependent patterns of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. Environmental Conservation, 33(3): 203-211. doi:10.1017/S0376892906003250

        NAMES

        Ewers, Robert Mark Laurance, William F.
        Author : Ewers, Robert Mark
        Author : Laurance, William F.

        Keywords

        Biology Tropics

        DATES

        2000s
        Year : 2006


        Additional Resource Information
        Record Link : https://repository.si.edu/handle/10088/18701 Record Id : SILSRO_110818


        Record Information
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