CHARACTERISTICS OF MOOSE CALVING SITES IN NORTHERN MAINE AS DETERMINED BY MULTIVARIATE ANALYSIS: A PRELIMINARY INVESTIGATION

Abstract

An initial effort was made to describe moose calving sites in Maine using a more quantitative approach than previously has been attempted. Ten calving sites were compared to 20 randomly selected sites in northern Maine. Stepwise discriminant analysis was used to select variables that best described the differences between the two groups. Six variables were important in distinguishing calving sites from random sites. The discriminant function that describes site differences is presented. Calving sites in Maine are characterized as undisturbed and poorly drained areas often dominated by cedar although non-forested calving sites were also represented. They are typically close to water and may have small diameter browse species present on the site. Validation of the model by jackknifed classification procedure demonstrated that the model correctly classified 96.7% of the sites.