Reducing Circular Plots to Square Plots

The final 10.8 hectare simulated population covers a single, square, 658 m. by 658 m. plot of land, which is referred to as a pseudoplot. This pseudoplot is theoretically created by placing 841 smaller plots adjacent to each other in a 29 x 29 grid. (Since there are only 835 plots, 6 plots are sampled twice to make the necessary 841 plots.)

If circular plots were `glued' together, there would obviously be large gaps around the corners. On the other hand, square plots can easily be placed next to each other. The obvious solution is to turn circular plots into square plots. Presently, this is done by keeping only the area contained in a square inscribed inside the circular border of the plot. All trees in the circle but outside the inscribed square are thrown out of the data.

This procedure will have to be modified in some manner because of the recent discovery that many of the plots in the original data set are in fact tenth-acre plots. All plots are treated as tenth- acre plots, then after the reduction to square plots, the pseudoplot will span only 5.4 hectares.