User: | Open Learning Faculty Member:
For my field study, I am going to examine whether there is a correlation between available light in a forest and the amount of ground cover in continuously disturbed areas.
Since the vegetation along the footpath in the study area undergoes continual but somewhat random disturbance from pedestrian traffic I am wondering if the amount of available light is the key resource that determines whether the forest floor revegetates after it is trampled by humans and pets.
My field observations consist of light meter readings at each interval and photographs of ground cover along a gradient extending perpendicular to the footpath. The photographs will be digitally process to determine the percentage of ground cover at each interval.
Therefore, my null hypothesis is:
There is no connection between available light levels in the forest and the percentage of forest floor covered by plant leaves.
I predict that there will be a correlation between available light and ground cover.
My explanatory variable is Light level (measured in Lux) and my response variable will be the percentage of ground cover in each delineated area (measured in percentage).
