Toward a better understanding of variation in the amount of leaf area in vegetation

Abstract

An unsolved problem in vegetation ecology is characterizing the variation in leaf area index (LAI). A key limitation is the lack of high-quality, geographically diverse, multi-biome training data sets. Döbert et al., in this issue of the Journal of Vegetation Science, link a classic vegetation description method to LAI. This potentially adds a new tool to the ground and remote approaches.