{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/129641"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/129641","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"Evaluating taxonomic surrogates for floristic quality assessment of wetlands","abstract":"Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'U of I Access', the embargo will last until 2027-05-01","abstract_html":"Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'U of I Access', the embargo will last until 2027-05-01","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Finzel, Matthew"],"institution":"University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"M.S.","degree_level":"Thesis","degree_discipline":"Natural Res & Env Sciences","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Jog, Suneeti K.","Bried, Jason T."],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2025,"date_issued":"2025-05-08","date_published":"2025-05-08","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:25:05Z","subjects":["Floristic Quality Assessment","Wetland","Floristics","Fqa","Conservatism","Indicator Species","Rapid Assessment","Taxonomic Surrogates","Plant Ecology"],"languages":["en","eng"],"rights":["Copyright 2025 Matthew Finzel"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://hdl.handle.net/2142/129641","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Jog, Suneeti K.","Bried, Jason T."]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Finzel, Matthew"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2025-05-08","2025-05"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Natural Res & Env Sciences"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["M.S."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Floristic Quality Assessment","Wetland","Floristics","Fqa","Conservatism","Indicator Species","Rapid Assessment","Taxonomic Surrogates","Plant Ecology"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en","eng"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2025 Matthew Finzel"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://hdl.handle.net/2142/129641"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'U of I Access', the embargo will last until 2027-05-01","The student, Matthew Finzel, accepted the attached license on 2025-05-07 at 14:19.","The student, Matthew Finzel, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2025-05-07 at 14:31.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2025-05-08 at 07:33.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #22256 on 2025-10-19 at 19:17:14","Floristic Quality Assessment (FQA) is a popular bioassessment tool, especially in North American wetland ecosystems. The two components of FQA are (1) native species richness and (2) conservatism, the concept that native plant species have varying levels of fidelity to undegraded environmental conditions. FQA generally assumes that entire plant assemblages have been representatively sampled and identified to the species level; this assumption requires a significant level of field botany and taxonomic expertise. Recent findings, however, suggest that FQA metrics (Floristic Quality Index [FQI] and Mean Coefficient of Conservatism [C̅]) do not require full taxonomic coverage, enabling FQA across a wider range of applications and end users and motivating the evaluation of taxonomic surrogates. Quantitatively validated indicator species, singly or in small combinations, have become a popular option for surrogacy. To investigate the potential for indicator species of high floristic quality (“high” meaning the upper quantile of FQI and C̅) I used two wetland plant community datasets, one with 2,800+ sites and one with 250+ sites. Indicator species were identified using a resampling approach to Indicator Value analysis, and then evaluated based on the species’ performance, validity, and robustness. Then, I compared the top indicator species for high FQI and C̅ to other popular floristic quality taxonomic surrogates: dominant species and familiar species. Some high-performing candidate indicator species for C̅ outperformed dominant species in site classification, but no indicator species outperformed the familiar species FQI surrogate. Indicator species mostly performed on-par with dominant species but failed to compete with the 92–96% correct classification provided by 372 expert-assigned familiar species. Overall, except for a few indicator species of high C̅, these findings support the long-standing notion that further ecological information can be gleaned when more species are included in an assessment."]},{"key":"dc:format","label":"Dc Format","values":["application/pdf"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["Evaluating taxonomic surrogates for floristic quality assessment of wetlands"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Jog, Suneeti K.","Bried, Jason T."],"dc:creator":["Finzel, Matthew"],"dc:date":["2025-05-08","2025-05"],"dc:description":["Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'U of I Access', the embargo will last until 2027-05-01","The student, Matthew Finzel, accepted the attached license on 2025-05-07 at 14:19.","The student, Matthew Finzel, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2025-05-07 at 14:31.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2025-05-08 at 07:33.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #22256 on 2025-10-19 at 19:17:14","Floristic Quality Assessment (FQA) is a popular bioassessment tool, especially in North American wetland ecosystems. The two components of FQA are (1) native species richness and (2) conservatism, the concept that native plant species have varying levels of fidelity to undegraded environmental conditions. FQA generally assumes that entire plant assemblages have been representatively sampled and identified to the species level; this assumption requires a significant level of field botany and taxonomic expertise. Recent findings, however, suggest that FQA metrics (Floristic Quality Index [FQI] and Mean Coefficient of Conservatism [C̅]) do not require full taxonomic coverage, enabling FQA across a wider range of applications and end users and motivating the evaluation of taxonomic surrogates. Quantitatively validated indicator species, singly or in small combinations, have become a popular option for surrogacy. To investigate the potential for indicator species of high floristic quality (“high” meaning the upper quantile of FQI and C̅) I used two wetland plant community datasets, one with 2,800+ sites and one with 250+ sites. Indicator species were identified using a resampling approach to Indicator Value analysis, and then evaluated based on the species’ performance, validity, and robustness. Then, I compared the top indicator species for high FQI and C̅ to other popular floristic quality taxonomic surrogates: dominant species and familiar species. Some high-performing candidate indicator species for C̅ outperformed dominant species in site classification, but no indicator species outperformed the familiar species FQI surrogate. Indicator species mostly performed on-par with dominant species but failed to compete with the 92–96% correct classification provided by 372 expert-assigned familiar species. Overall, except for a few indicator species of high C̅, these findings support the long-standing notion that further ecological information can be gleaned when more species are included in an assessment."],"dc:format":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier":["https://hdl.handle.net/2142/129641"],"dc:language":["en","eng"],"dc:rights":["Copyright 2025 Matthew Finzel"],"dc:subject":["Floristic Quality Assessment","Wetland","Floristics","Fqa","Conservatism","Indicator Species","Rapid Assessment","Taxonomic Surrogates","Plant Ecology"],"dc:title":["Evaluating taxonomic surrogates for floristic quality assessment of wetlands"],"dc:type":["text"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["Natural Res & Env Sciences"],"thesis:degree_level":["Thesis"],"thesis:degree_name":["M.S."],"thesis:institution_name":["University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:25:05Z"}