Advantages and disadvantages
There is a sounder theoretical basis for using point quadrats to assess percentage cover than there is for visual estimates in quadrats, although the two methods seem to give quite similar estimates (Brakenhielm& Liu 1995).Pointquadratsareparticularlyusefulinshortvegetation,suchas grasslands, especially when it is difficult to distinguish individual plants. The vegetation should never over-top the point quadrat and hence the point quadrats needed for some vegetation types such as hay meadows and tall-grass prairies will be too tall to be practical. This technique can be very slow and complex (especially in dense vegetation) and it involves crouching or lying on the ground for long periods. This seems to lead to variation in cover estimates among observers, which has been shown to be as much or more than variation in visual estimates of cover. Because averysmallareaissampled,verymanysamplesareneededwhenonewantstodetecttherarest species. For this reason, the use of point quadrats is quite poor at detecting rare species compared with the expenditure of an equal amount of effort with normal quadrats (Brakenhielm& Liu 1995).Forthesereasons,pointquadratsarenotcommonlyused.