Predicting plant species richness and vegetation patterns in cultural landscapes using disturbance parameters

A new methodological framework for plant diversity assessment at the landscape scale is presented that exhibits the following strengths: (1) potential for easily standardizable sampling procedure; (2) characterization of disturbance regime; (3) use of selected disturbance descriptors as explanatory variables which probably allow for better transferability than site specific land use types—for example, to evaluate the emerging use of energy plants that pose novel management challenges without historic precedence to many landscapes; (4) analysis of quantitative and qualitative aspects of plant species diversity (alpha and beta diversity). For data analysis, a powerful regression method (PLS-R) was applied. On this basis, after further validation and transferability tests, a practical tool for the development and validation of effective agri-environmental programmes may be developed.