In recent years, the conservation of tropical forests has received worldwide publicity whereas effective forest management, particularly for timber extraction, has attracted little attention and gained some notoriety. The overall aim of the present paper was to examine how environmental micro-variation in the Chiquibul Forest Reserve of Belize can influence species distribution and thereby inform management strategy. The paper deals first with the background to forest management in Belize, then considers the methodology used in the present study and fin~~ly assesses the preliminary results. The specific objectives are: (1) to assess the effects of changing scale on the variability of selected individual soil properties in forest plots within the same vegetation class; and (2) to examine the variation in soil properties and tree species distribution, and to integrate environmental and ecological data over a range of scales. BACKGROUND Whereas the global and regional distribution of tropical forests is broadly governed by climatic and altitudinal variation, individual forest tracts need to consider a range of other, locally important factors to explain species distribution and change. With very high species diversity, tropical forests present a major challenge in the attempt to unravel controlling factors in distribution and growth (Swaine et aI. 1987). Research that attempts to explain diversity has looked at species distribution according to a range of factors, with a general recognition that soil fertility plays a significant if ill defined role (Swaine 1996).

This new book explores the rapidly expanding applications of spatial analysis, GIS and remote sensing in the health sciences, and medical geography.

This is one of the first books to take an ecological perspective on uncertainty in spatial data. It applies principles and techniques from geography and other disciplines to ecological research, and thus delivers the tools of cartography, cognition, spatial statistics, remote sensing and computer sciences by way of spatial data. After describing the uses of such data in ecological research, the authors discuss how to account for the effects of uncertainty in various methods of analysis.

A leading text for undergraduate- and graduate-level courses, this book introduces widely used forms of remote sensing imagery and their applications in plant sciences, hydrology, earth sciences, and land use analysis. The text provides comprehensive coverage of principal topics and serves as a framework for organizing the vast amount of remote sensing information available on the Web. Including case studies and review questions, the book's four sections and 21 chapters are carefully designed as independent units that instructors can select from as needed for their courses. Illustrations include 29 color plates and over 400 black-and-white figures. New to This Edition *Reflects significant technological and methodological advances. *Chapter on aerial photography now emphasizes digital rather than analog systems. *Updated discussions of accuracy assessment, multitemporal change detection, and digital preprocessing. *Links to recommended online videos and tutorials. ?

Integrating Scale in Remote Sensing and GIS serves as the most comprehensive documentation of the scientific and methodological advances that have taken place in integrating scale and remote sensing data. This work addresses the invariants of scale, the ability to change scale, measures of the impact of scale, scale as a parameter in process models, and the implementation of multiscale approaches as methods and techniques for integrating multiple kinds of remote sensing data collected at varying spatial, temporal, and radiometric scales. Researchers, instructors, and students alike will benefit from a guide that has been pragmatically divided into four thematic groups: scale issues and multiple scaling; physical scale as applied to natural resources; urban scale; and human health/social scale. Teeming with insights that elucidate the significance of scale as a foundation for geographic analysis, this book is a vital resource to those seriously involved in the field of GIScience.