We have that the shortest area on the Cleveland mountains is that belonging to Huntington Park (103 acres), whilst the largest area on these mountains is that belonging to Mill Stream Park (3189 acres). The former has a species richness of 9, whilst the latter has a species richness of 16.
The theory of island biogeography helps to explain these variations regarding biodiversity since it can be said that the number of species of a given area is the result of an evolutive process called speciation, which occurs from particular ecological populations of the same species that are exposed to different environmental pressures, or isolated one from another by geographical barriers, for example. So it could happen in the Cleveland Mountains that an only ancient population of, for example, a population of lizards was confined to different areas of the biome, ending eventually, after the pass of the years, in that species radiation.
