Research to date has aimed at determining the relationship between environmental patterns at different scales and the abundance of granivorous birds during the wet season. The data will also be used to determine relationships between abundance and vegetation structure for a variety of non-granivorous birds, some of which are declining in parts of their range. Go to Figure One to see a map of the geographic index of decline of granivorous birds across the tropical savannas. This was done in order to be able to map and measure the distribution of grassland patches across this landscape.
Issues surrounding determining scale of patterning in landscapes are very complex.
This research contributes towards the wider body of knowledge in this field. Methods that look at spatial dependence and the level of variability in the landscape may also have potential for modelling the structure of savanna grassland landscapes. This data was used in association with the transect field data to try to examine how the spatial patterning of graminoids varied across the landscape. This should have determined the presence of, and area covered by, the grass species recorded along each transect. The aim being that once a classification had determined location and extent of patches of each of the graminoid species in the area, patch statistics could be applied to measure characteristics that may be relevant to granivorous birds and the health of the landscape.