Species richness

Depending on the purposes of quantifying species richness, the individuals can be selected in different ways.

They can be, for example, trees found in an inventory plot, birds observed from a monitoring point, or beetles collected in a pitfall trap.

Once the set of individuals has been defined, its species richness can be exactly quantified, provided the species-level taxonomy of the organisms of interest is well enough known.

[3][4][5] The observed species richness is affected not only by the number of individuals but also by the heterogeneity of the sample.

[7] Species richness is often used as a criterion when assessing the relative conservation values of habitats or landscapes.