Effects of Different Land use Practices on Bird Communities

David Farris Dr. Jianqian Li

Dr. Yong Wang

Introduction

• Why study bird communities Importance to ecosystem –niche, ecosystem services Importance to humans-bird watching Sensitive to habitat change Birds are effected worldwide by urbanization and city

sprawl and other human changes to the environment • Why Nanjing?

Nanjing is one of the oldest Chinese cities large urban population-roughly 8 million examples of different types of land use are present around

the city

Research-Introduction

The main question:How are bird communities affected by different types of land use and anthropogenic change?

Methods

• Point counts were done to survey the species found in different land use types

• Points were selected at random by Ms. Dawn Lemke and grouped by type: Forest (27), Agriculture (15), Urban (52), and Park (12) in proportion to availability using Google Earth

Methods-2

• Points were surveyed in June 2012 early morning and late afternoon

• Birds were counted by audio and visually (a/v) for 10 minutes at each point No capture needed!

• Behavior, sex/age, and distance information was recorded when available

Some points were harder to get to than others…

Methods 3

• After the point counts data entered into Microsoft Excel statistical analysis with SPSS

• We examined: Total species detected total numbers of detections how affected by land use type and diversity change Compared habitat types

Results: Abundance • Total number of points: 109• Total individuals detected: 1595

-Audio:39.5% -Visual: 60.5%

0 1 2 3 4 50

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

Distance Zone

Freq

uenc

y

Figure 2.

Figure 1.

39.5

60.5

AudioVisual

Results: Species Richness

• Total number of species: 53+• Average number of detections per

point:14.63±8.2• Average number of species detected per

point: 6.22±3.1 (sd)• Top 10 species accounted for ~80% of total

detections • >25 species had ≤ 5 detections

Tree S

parrow

Light-v

ented

Bulbul

Black-b

illed M

agpie

Red-ru

mped Sw

allow

Turtl

e Dove

Euras

ian Blac

kbird

White

-chee

ked St

arling

Spotted

DoveMyn

a

Masked

Laugh

ingthru

sh

Azure-

winge

d mag

pie

Large

Hawk-C

uckoo

Great T

it

Barn Sw

allow

Indian Cuck

oo

Common Koel

Vinous-thro

ated Parr

otbill

White

Wag

tail

Chinese Pond- H

eron

Brownish

-flanke

d Bush W

arbler

Black-c

rowned

Night H

eron

Ashy D

rongo

Red-bille

d Blue Mag

pie

Yello

w-rumped

Flyc

atcher

Common Pheasan

t

Long-t

ailed

Shrik

e

Swinhoe's

Minive

t

Yello

w-billed Gro

sbea

k

Black-n

aped

Oriole

Grey-ca

pped Gree

nfinch

Black D

rongo

Common Moorh

en

Grey-ca

pped W

oodpecke

r

Black B

ulbul

Black-t

hroate

d Tit

Common Kingfish

er

Hwamei

Japan

ese W

hite-ey

e

Little

Grebe

Yello

w Bittern

Euras

ian Cuck

oo

Great S

potted W

oodpecke

r

Manch

urian Bush

Warb

ler

Silky

stan

ling

Black-e

ared Kite

Brown Sh

rike

Cattle

Egret

Dollarb

ird

Grey-hea

ded La

pwing

Hair-cr

ested

Drongo

Large

Egret

woodpecke

r-a0

100

200

300

400

500

600

Graph 1. Species detections (number of individuals counted) in Nanjing, China. June 2012.

How Land Use Type Affects Abundance

ANOVA TEST: F=12.72; DF=4, 104; p< .001Forest (27), Agriculture (15), Urban (52, Park (12), and Wetlands (3)

How Land Use Type Affects Species Richness

Forest (27), Agriculture (15), Urban (52), Park (12), and Wetlands (3)

Effect of land use • Relative Abundance of the top 10 species

Agriculture Forest Park Urban Wetlands0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

Tree Sparrow

Light-vented Bulbul

Black-billed Magpie

Red-rumped Swallow

Turtle Dove

Eurasian Blackbird

White-cheeked Starling

Spotted Dove

Myna

Masked Laughingthrush

Habitat

Rel

ative

Abu

ndan

ce

Effects of land use on bird communities

Agriculture Forest Park Urban0

5

10

15

20

25

30

Azure- winged magpieLarge Hawk-CuckooSpotted DoveBarn SwallowGrey-capped Woodpecker

Land type

Num

ber o

f ind

ivid

uals

Simpson Diversity Index

Agriculture Forest Park Urban

0.88 0.93 0.93 0.73

Ds = 1 - Sum1i [ni*(ni-1)]/[N*(N-1)]

Proportional Similarity Measurement

Forest Agriculture Urban Park

Forest --- 0.61 0.55 0.7

Agriculture 0.61 --- 0.71 0.62

Urban 0.55 0.71 --- 0.57

Park 0.7 0.62 0.57 ---

Community Similarity-what percent of the bird community is the same in two different habitats?

Behavior of birds

c fl fo r s sw0

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

Behavior

Num

ber o

f ind

ivid

uals

Conclusions/Discussions

• Land type use affects the bird community -some birds thrive, while others decline

and will not be found in urban settings • Transition habits-wetlands and agriculture

have a higher species richness than urban, forest, and parks

Conclusions

• The most common birds detected were those that have a preference or at least can thrive in an urban setting

• It is also important to see what type of behavior different birds exhibit-whether or not they are using the habitat or merely flying over

Cultural Differences and Similarities

• Different ways of thinking • Language• Food• Beauty is in the eye of the beholder (Bronzer

vs. Whitener)

Experiences in China

• Shanghai, China

Living at NFU and Nanjing

Getting Around

Acknowledgements

• Dr. Yong Wang • Dr. Jianqiang Li• Lisa Gardner • Dawn Lemke• Dr. Changhu Lu • Yang Pan• Yeduo Ding• Tianshi Xiong• Nanjing Forestry University• Alabama A&M University • National Science Foundation