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Aim  To test the performance of the choros model in an archipelago using two measures of environmental heterogeneity. The choros model is a simple, easy‐to‐use mathematical relationship which approaches species richness as a combined function of area and environmental heterogeneity.

Location  The archipelago of Skyros in the central Aegean Sea (Greece).

Methods  We surveyed land snails on 12 islands of the archipelago. We informed the choros model with habitat data based on natural history information from the land snail species assemblage. We contrast this with habitat information taken from traditional vegetation classification to study the behaviour of choros with different measures of environmental heterogeneity. R² values and Akaike's information criterion (AIC) were used to compare the choros model and the Arrhenius species–area model. Path analysis was used to evaluate the variance in …