Natural Windbreaks Sustain Bird Diversity in a Tea-Dominated Landscape

Rachakonda Sreekar,Sandeep Das,Prerna Agarwal,Ramachandran Vivek,Anand Mohan,Lee A Newsom

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0070379

Abstract

Windbreaks often form networks of forest habitats that improve connectivity and thus conserve biodiversity, but little is known of such effects in the tropics. We determined bird species richness and community composition in windbreaks composed of remnant native vegetation amongst tea plantations (natural windbreaks), and compared it with the surrounding primary forests. Fifty-one, ten-minute point counts were conducted in each habitat type over three days. Despite the limited sampling period, our bird inventories in both natural windbreaks and primary forests were nearly complete, as indicated by bootstrap true richness estimator. Bird species richness and abundance between primary forests and windbreaks were similar, however a difference in bird community composition was observed. Abundances of important functional groups such as frugivores and insectivores did not vary between habitat types but nectarivores were more abundant in windbreaks, potentially as a result of the use of windbreaks as traveling routes, foraging and nesting sites. This preliminary study suggests that natural windbreaks may be important habitats for the persistence of bird species in a production landscape. However, a better understanding of the required physical and compositional characteristics for windbreaks to sustain bird communities is needed for effective conservation management.

Highlights

The expansion of production landscapes and the subsequent fragmentation of native habitat in the tropics can alter community assemblages and gene flow in isolated communities [1]
We found ten bird species that are endemic to the Western Ghats (26% of the raw species richness)
Our study shows that a rich pool of birds makes use of natural windbreaks

Summary

Introduction

The expansion of production landscapes and the subsequent fragmentation of native habitat in the tropics can alter community assemblages and gene flow in isolated communities [1]. Windbreaks can potentially act as corridors in deforested landscapes when they connect forest fragments, but the use of windbreaks by native animal communities is poorly known. Numerous studies in tropical agroforests like cocoa and coffee plantations provide a sound foundation concerning the effects of habitat alteration on functional group composition (e.g., [5,6]), but other important habitat structures of a production landscape, including windbreaks, remain understudied. Preliminary studies show that birds may use windbreaks as corridors [7,8], but the responses of different functional groups to windbreaks remain poorly known

Methods

Results

Conclusion