Electronic spreadsheets can be used to perform the calculations for the plot sampling lab. The spreadsheets are limited to 10 species. If you have more than 10 species, use the 10 most common species.
1. Click on the spreadsheet program shown in the menu.
2. The cursor should be positioned in cell E1. Enter the area of one sample (plot) in square meters. The sampling rings constructed for the plot sampling lab were 0.1 square meters.
3. Enter the number of samples in cell E2. The default value given is 5. If you took more than 5 samples, enter this number in cell E2.
4. If you measured your plants in millimeters, enter 1000000 in cell E3. If you measured your plants in centimeters, enter 10000. This is because there are 1000000 square millimeters in a square meter and 10000 square centimeters in a square meter.
5. Move the cursor to cell C5 and enter the diameter of the first individual of species #1 in the first sample. If there were no individuals, leave the cell blank. Do not enter zeros. When the spreadsheet calculates frequency, it counts any digit that has been entered, including zeros.
6. Move the cursor to the right one cell and enter the diameter of the second individual of species #1.
7. When all individuals of species #1 in the first sample have been entered, move down one line and enter the data for species #2. Again, do not enter a 0 if there were no individuals.
8. When the data for all of the species in the first sample have been entered, move down to the next sample. Enter the data for all samples in this manner.
9. The calculations are located at the far right end of the spreadsheet near the top beginning in cell Z1. To quickly move there in Excel, press CTRL- HOME, then, press END, and then press ENTER. In Works, press CTRL- HOME, then END.
10. Save your spreadsheets with the data that you have entered on your local hard disk. Click Save As, choose a folder and give the file a name.
If you used the Excel Viewer, you will not be able to save the spreadsheet. Instead, copy the spreadsheet to a word processor document and then save the document.