Abstract
West Pasaman Regency in West Sumatra Province is recently established as an administrative area on 2003, segregated from Pasaman Regency where it was previously affiliated. This regency has been planning to support its structural developments using its main income generated from agricultural sector, which involve vast plantation area for oil-palm and other agricultural products. With the variety of its topography spans from some offshore islands up to 2,912 m mountain area, it is interesting to understand the importance value of this area from the perspective of one of its natural biodiversity: avifuna. Here in this paper, we use Genetic Heat Index (GHI) concept based on avian diversity and their conservation status to compare the significance value among four prominent landscapes in this regency, which include Mount Talamau and Laut Tinggal Lake (mountainous area), Tongar River (lowland-to-hilly riparian agricultural area) and Panjang Island (an offshore island). Despite the difference and similarity of bird species recorded in each site, Panjang Island has comparable GHI value with Tongar River, Mount Talamau and Laut Tinggal Lake (consecutively 4.20, 4.03, 4.14, 4.26). This result implies to the uniqueness of bird species living in each site along with its habitat typicality which also helps in contributing to their GHI value. Therefore, giving attention to this GHI concept while accommodate it into development plan will help in supporting more environmentally-sound development process.
Highlights
Indonesian archipelago, with its very unique and strategic position in between two continents and two oceans, has remarkable natural biodiversity, including 10% of vascular plants, 12% of mammals, 16% of reptiles, 25% of fishes and 15% of insects from all known global species (Sujatnika et al, 1995)
This study aims to address the avifauna diversity in four different landscapes in West Pasaman Regency, which become the basis to calculate sites’ Genetic Heat Index (GHI) value using the conservation status of their avifauna diversity
At GPS coordinate of 0o6’30.97”N 99o56’39.93”E and 850-2600 m elevation, this location was visited for seven days between 27 December 2015 to 2 January 2016; 2Lake Laut Tinggal at GPS coordinate of 00o28.556’N, 99o40.193’E and 1612 m elevation, it was surveyed within the last week of January 2016 for seven days; Tongar River, at 0o 9’12.41”N, 99o54’13.46”E, 100-300 m elevation, it was inspected for its bird diversity in two separate occasion of two days in March 2016 and two days on June 2016; and Panjang Island, at 00o11’7.41”’N and 99o18’31.44”E, 0-30 m above sea level, in where the data collection was conducted for four days between 19-22 May 2017
Summary
Indonesian archipelago, with its very unique and strategic position in between two continents and two oceans, has remarkable natural biodiversity, including 10% of vascular plants, 12% of mammals, 16% of reptiles, 25% of fishes and 15% of insects from all known global species (Sujatnika et al, 1995). It is assessed that around 583 bird species occupy the mainland of Sumatra, with 438 species (approximately 75%) are local inhabitants (MacKinnon et al, 2000). This number can increase into 602 species (of which 450 are local dwellers) if the inhabitants in some offshore islands and inaccessible mountainous spots surveyed thoroughly. This total number counts in 22 Sumatran endemics, 37 Indonesian endemics and 36 species with limited distribution (Novarino et al, 2008). This assumption reflects the necessity to include offshore islands into the scheme of avian survey, as Sumatran species record is possible to increase as more information on species distribution added
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