Landscape Fragmentation Assessment Using a Single Measure. Bogaert, J., van Hecke, P., Salvador-Van Eysenrode, D., & Impens, I. 28(4):875–881.
abstract   bibtex   
Measurement of fragmentation is crucial for determining its consequences and to develop policy for nature conservation. We propose a fragmentation measure |Φ| which combines, using a multidimensional Euclidean distance, 4 main characteristics of frag-mented landscapes: total habitat area, total habitat perimeter, number of patches, and patch isolation. Its properties can be summarized as: 1) |Φ| reflects the overall fragmen-tation status; 2) every component of |Φ| is accepted as a measure of fragmentation; 3) every component of |Φ| is a normalized variable; 4) every component of |Φ| is easy to compute; 5) average patch size, interior habitat, and habitat connectedness are includ-ed indirectly in |Φ|; |Φ| is independent of the land-use type; and 7) |Φ| can be calcu-lated for raster and vector data. We show that the normalized values composing |Φ| pre-vent misinterpretation of features as fragment number or boundary length. A sensitivity analysis, based upon artificial patterns, showed that increasing fragmentation is correlat-ed with smaller values of |Φ|. Wildlife managers are encouraged to use |Φ| for objective evaluation of fragmented landscapes.
@article{bogaertLandscapeFragmentationAssessment2000,
  title = {Landscape Fragmentation Assessment Using a Single Measure},
  author = {Bogaert, J. and van Hecke, P. and Salvador-Van Eysenrode, D. and Impens, I.},
  date = {2000},
  journaltitle = {Wildlife Society Bulletin},
  volume = {28},
  pages = {875--881},
  abstract = {Measurement of fragmentation is crucial for determining its consequences and to develop policy for nature conservation. We propose a fragmentation measure |Φ| which combines, using a multidimensional Euclidean distance, 4 main characteristics of frag-mented landscapes: total habitat area, total habitat perimeter, number of patches, and patch isolation. Its properties can be summarized as: 1) |Φ| reflects the overall fragmen-tation status; 2) every component of |Φ| is accepted as a measure of fragmentation; 3) every component of |Φ| is a normalized variable; 4) every component of |Φ| is easy to compute; 5) average patch size, interior habitat, and habitat connectedness are includ-ed indirectly in |Φ|; |Φ| is independent of the land-use type; and 7) |Φ| can be calcu-lated for raster and vector data. We show that the normalized values composing |Φ| pre-vent misinterpretation of features as fragment number or boundary length. A sensitivity analysis, based upon artificial patterns, showed that increasing fragmentation is correlat-ed with smaller values of |Φ|. Wildlife managers are encouraged to use |Φ| for objective evaluation of fragmented landscapes.},
  eprint = {3783842},
  eprinttype = {jstor},
  keywords = {*imported-from-citeulike-INRMM,~INRMM-MiD:c-13555944,conservation,fragmentation,indices,integration-techniques,landscape-modelling},
  number = {4},
  options = {useprefix=true}
}

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