A method for designing ecological surveys that incorporates pre-existing monitoring sites while maintaining spatial balance, illustrated using a large marine reserve in South-Eastern Australia. The methodology is described in a 2017 publication by Foster et al. in Methods in Ecology and Evolution. An R-package called MBHdesign implements the methods.
Use Cases
- Designing efficient ecological monitoring surveys based on the described spatially balanced method.
- Incorporating legacy time-series data into new survey efforts based on the concept of legacy sites.
- Analyzing biodiversity in marine reserves based on the example application in South-Eastern Australia.
- Reducing uncertainty in population estimates based on the simulation results showing smaller standard errors.
Strengths
- Method is formally described and published in a peer-reviewed journal (Methods Ecol Evol, 2017).
- Includes a practical implementation via an available R-package (MBHdesign).
- Illustrated with a concrete application case for a marine reserve in South-Eastern Australia.
Limitations
- Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.
- Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
- Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
Provenance
- Source
- Australian Ocean Data Network
- Collection Method
- Methodological research and simulation experiments.
- Freshness
- Last updated 2026-05-05 02:48:22.632562; freshness should be verified.
- Geography
- South-Eastern Australia (marine reserve example)