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Ecology & Environment
Pradeep Kumar

30/05/21 14:00 PM IST

Declining forest bird species in Western Himalaya

In news

Invasion by non-native species, land-use changes led to decrease in abundance of important birds.

Highlights
  • With extremely cold winters and pleasant summers, the State of Uttarakhand is home to the Western Himalayan temperate forests which harbour a large number of endemic bird species.
  • A new study that analysed these natural oak-dominated forests and modified forests has noted that there was a drastic loss of bird species in all modified landscapes.
  • The researchers studied an area of about 1,285 square kilometres between the altitudes of 1,700 and 2,400 metres.
  • Six major land-use types which included natural oak forest, degraded oak forest (lightly used), lopped oak forest (intensively used), pine forest, agricultural cultivation area and sites with buildings were studied.
  • The results showed that there was a low diversity of species in monoculture areas and urban sites.
Habitat guilds
  • Habitat guilds are groups of bird species that have common habitat preferences.
  • For instance, forest specialists include species which forage and breed only in dense protected oak forests at this altitude, while forest generalists can adapt to modified habitats such as orchards and degraded forests.”
  • The researchers noticed that many of the species that dropped out of the modified land areas were recognised oak forest specialists such as rufous-bellied woodpecker, greater yellownape, rufous sibia, white-throated laughingthrush and black-faced warbler.
  • Another paper published by the group looked at woodpeckers in the region to understand how they can be used as indicators of bird diversity and also to understand habitat degradation.
Source: The Hindu

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