Estimation of bird species diversity recovery on post-burnt land in PT Waimusi Agroindah, South Sumatera

Abstract

Currently, one of the events that are suspected to be the main cause of environmental damage is land fires, that are also a fairly routine event in Indonesia. One of the most highlighted fire issues is the fire in oil palm plantations. These fires have increased community assumptions regarding the impact of fires on ecosystems and biodiversity, including bird species diversity. The impact of the fire which was considered to have only a negative impact, led to various demands so that several palm oil industry companies were charged with paying recovery costs. There was a fire in 2015 at PT Waimusi Agroindah. The accusation that fires have only a negative impact requires further research to determine the potential recovery of bird species diversity on post-fire land, particularly in oil palm plantations. The method for estimating land restoration is to compare the diversity of bird species at 2 years after burning (2017) and 4 years after burning (2019). The observational method used was a line transect every morning and afternoon with three repetitions to inventory bird species diversity. The results showed as many as 40 species of birds found in the soil 4 years after burning, higher when compared to the land 2 years after burning found as many as 36 species of birds. This number is higher than the number of species found in unburned land by 25 species in 2017, and 36 species in 2019. The Margalef index equal to 6.11 in 2019 which increased 5.44 in 2017. Evenness index was 0.89 in in 2019 which was originally amounted to 0.83 in 2017. Overall there was a recovery in post-burnt land due to the gain of 12 species and a loss of 7 species. There are 2 species of gained bird included into protected species according to Permen LHK P N0.106 of 2018. An inncrease bird species diversity indicates the ability of the land to gradually recover.