Comparisons of Layman metrics between communities

[noeliagobel]

Hello,

I am currently working on comparing Layman metrics and ellipses between pond food webs (with insects, fish, amphibians, etc) situated in different land use scenarios. My aim is to compare these metrics between land uses, so the ponds are situated in different land use conditions. I have three distinct types of land use, with seven ponds sampled in each land use scenario. To conduct these comparisons within a Bayesian framework, I am using SIBER. In my analysis, I consider that the land use type is my "community", but I am a bit confused on how to use the "group" term. Given my objective of comparing whole food webs, should I define 'group' as the species identity regardless of each pond identity?. Do you think Is this approach correct? My main concern is how to correctly represent the identity of each pond in the model... Would you please help me by providing some guidance on this?

Thank you very much,

Noelia Gobel