Chapters authored
Simple Models for Describing Ruminant Herbivory
The use of quantitative independent variables in experiments allows the use of regression to explore the functional relationship between treatments applied and measured responses. It provides the opportunity to not only understand the magnitude and importance of the response but also ascertain its nature. The simplest approach is to fit a polynomial. While it is often possible to obtain a very good fit using this approach, it offers in the way of providing insight into the response. At best, you can determine if the response is nonlinear and if so, if it is complex or not. The model parameters are empirical and generally cannot be interpreted as having any biological, chemical, or physical meaning—at least not directly. There are situations, however, when such a meaning can be inferred from a model fit using simple regression. In general, this is true when the relationship is truly linear or when a nonlinear model can be considered to be “intrinsically” linear; that is, it can be linearized by transforming the data in a way that can be fit using simple linear regression. A series of forage quality examples are used to illustrate these concepts in this article.
Part of the book: Herbivores