Rarefaction in Excel

[Manjishtha]

Hi,

I am trying to compare the efficiency of three different insect trapping methods, but my catch size (monthly abundance data) from each of the three trap types is hugely different (as expected). I read somewhere that rarefying the data down to a common number across all the three trap types would help in comparing diversity etc. among the trap types. Can anyone suggest if that is correct, and how to do so in MS Excel?

Thanks

[MrShorty]

I don't expect that any of us on this forum are expert enough to suggest how correctly or incorrectly the rarefaction techniques would apply to your specific example. I might suggest that you review this Wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rarefaction_(ecology) ), perhaps click through to the references and external links, and inquire with your professor or other professional in the field of ecology to determine how these techniques will apply to your sample.

As for programming it in Excel, I do not immediately recognize some of the notation used by Wikipedia (specifically, how they are defining the E[Xn] function. I'm sure we can help you program this into Excel, if you can help us understand the math functions that you would need to program into Excel.

[FDibbins]

As MrShorty pointed out, this is more of a statistical, methodology concern, rather than a direct excel problem.

If you can give the mathematical construct behind what you are doing, Im sure some members can get excl to run the calcs for you