The tidepool alga Cystoseira Humilis on an oceanic island exhibits partial adherence to Taylor's law

Abstract

Taylor's Law is an empirical relationship between the variance (s 2) and the mean (m) of abundance estimates described by the equation s 2 = am b , where b is the aggregation index. From this relationship it is possible to quantify the degree of aggregation. The present study checks the validity of Taylor's Law using a benthic species, Cystoseira humilis in the intertidal pools of the island of Gran Canaria (NE Atlantic Ocean). Eight intertidal pools were sampled in three locations with a 25 x 25 cm grid. Thallus abundance and small, medium and large scale spatial variation were determined. The total number of thalli samples was 24,329 among the eight studied tide pools. The shallower the tide pool, the fewer thalli per stipe were found.