Importance of the arboreal-shrubby hedges as habitat for birds in an intensive farming area of the Turin-Cuneo plain (NW Italy).

Abstract

We sampled the bird community of hedges and tree rows along the waterways of a portion of the western Po plain with a surface of about 320 Kmq. Maize fields cover more than 60% of the agricultural surface crossed by many natural and artificial waterways both in the “Piana di Carmagnola” (a flood plain at 235-240 m asl) and in the “Pianalto di Poirino” (a lower plateau at 255-265 m asl). The observations were collected by transect counts during the months of May and June 2009, and expressed as IKA. We detected 45 species and Nightingale, Blackcap and Blackbird were the most abundant of the 34 breeding species that include 2 SPEC 2 (Red Backed Shrike and Turtle Dove) and one SPEC 3 (Green Woodpecker). The low numbers of Tits population and the absence of Wren may be partly due to the effects of the previous hard winters. Hedges in the floodplains were richer than those in the lower plateau and have more bush-nesting birds and more trans-Saharan migrants. The Nightingale population in the hedges of the whole area can be estimated at about 1200 pairs. The research confirmed the importance of the presence of hedges and tree rows within the intensively cultivated plain, which allow a number of species of birds to settle and nest in an area otherwise extremely and increasingly trivialized by monocultures and commercial and industrial settlements.