Table of Contents
Aim
To study the plant population density by the quadrant method.
Materials Required
- Nail.
- Thread
- Hammer
Procedure
- Select a site for the study and hammer the nails on the site without harming the vegetation.
- Fix four nails in the form of a square.
- Each end of the nail is tied with the help of a thread making a 1m*1m quadrant.
- Nine more similar quadrants are made at the site of the study.
- The number of individuals of species A present in the first quadrant is counted and the data is recorded in the table.
- The number of individuals of species A in other quadrants is also counted and the data is recorded in the table.
- Similarly, count the number of individuals of species B and C present in all the quadrants and record the data in the table.
- The density of the plant population is then calculated by the following equation:
\(\begin{array}{l}Density =\frac{Total \ number \ of \ individuals \ of \ the \ species \ in \ all \ sampling \ units (S)} {Total \ number \ of \ sampling \ units\ studied (Q)}\end{array} \)
D = S/Q
Observations
| Plant Species | Number of individuals in each quadrant | Total number of individuals (S) | Total number of quadrants (Q) | Density (D)=S/Q | |||||||||
| I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX | X | ||||
| A | 2 | 0 | 5 | 7 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 27 | 10 | 2.7 |
| B | 1 | 0 | 4 | 0 | 8 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 20 | 10 | 2 |
| C | 4 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 19 | 10 | 1.9 |
Conclusion
The population density is the highest for species A and the lowest for species C. The density value is expressed as the number of individuals per unit area.
Also Read: Parts of Plants
Learn more in detail about the plant population density, other related topics and experiments at BYJU’S Biology.
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