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Unbalance design in GLMM

Gabriela Agostini <gabrielaagostini18 at ...> writes:
Try making samplday a factor ... In fact, your error is the
second one listed under http://glmm.wikidot.com/faq#errors , and
making the grouping variables a factor is the suggested remedy.
[snip]

 Lack of balance should not be a problem for GLMMs, unless it's
extreme (e.g. some completely missing combinations of fixed effects,
or all zeros or ones in some random-effect levels, i.e. 
complete separation).  In fact, unbalanced designs are one 
reason that people use 'modern' mixed models rather than
classical method-of-moments ANOVA (which has a hard time
with lack of balance).
By the way, studyarea+sp+studyarea*sp is redundant (although
harmless).   Either

studyarea+sp+studyarea:sp  (main effects + interaction) or
studyarea*sp               (ditto, shorthand) 

should be sufficient