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Ecology and Space: An Approach from Point Patterns

Ramón Pablo and Gusmán Elizabeth

Spatial point patterns in plant ecology are generally defined in two-dimensional space, where each point is denoted by an ordered pair that summarizes the spatial location of a plant. Spatial point patterns are essential because they arise in response to important ecological processes, associated with the structure of a population or community. Such processes basically include seed dispersal, competition for resources, facilitation, and plant response to stress. In this paper, various factors and potential underlying processes are reviewed to explain the importance of spatial patterns in plant biodiversity. An example is provided wherein spatial point patterns area applied to understand the dispersal of a parasitic plant in central Spain in order to infer secondary vectors about the dispersal syndrome.