Iranian Journal of Applied Ecology

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In Zagros forest ecosystem, spatial variability of soil and vegetation properties are controlled by series of physical and biological parameters including topographical and anthropogenic factors. Distribution patterns of these properties are greatly variable. In the current study, geostatistics and fractal theory were used to assess the spatial variability of tree canopy and soil bulk density in a part of Zagros forests in Kermanshah province. The spatial structure was investigated by calculating the variogram and fractal dimension. The results showed that none of the variables had a spatial autocorrelation and indeed confirmed the lack of any significant spatial structure. Even though the soil bulk density had an intermediate spatial structure with the exponential model, it is not remarkable and autocorrelation did not show any sign of spatial dependency. The study of distribution and fractal behavior of variables showed an intensive variability in the study area, and spatial variability did not have a remarkable structure. Fractal dimension of both variables also were high. Totally, it seems that as a result of disturbance and pressure effect on this ecosystem spatial dependency of the variables has decreased to the level that they could be accepted independent.

Keywords: Spatial structure, Fractal dimension, Geostatistics, Autocorrelation.

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