Species‐specific responses to habitat conversion across scales synergistically restructure Neotropical bird communities

Abstract

Bird censuses across gradients of deforestation and regional precipitation in northwest Costa Rica reveal that interactions between forest cover at local and landscape scales are prevalent in defining bird community composition. Though most species abundances are driven by local (rather than landscape) amounts of forest, habitat generalists exhibit compensatory dynamics, reaching greatest abundance with high amounts of forest either at the local or at the landscape scale. Further, populations living in agricultural areas benefit from forest edges in the surrounding landscape, while populations within forest suffer from such fragmentation. Understanding the interplay between habitat loss at local and landscape scales will help support biodiversity in both agroecological systems and remaining tropical forests. Photo credit: Daniel Karp. Photo credit: Daniel Karp. Photo credit: Daniel Karp. Photo credit: Daniel Karp. Photo credit: Daniel Karp. These photographs illustrate the article “Species-specific responses to habitat conversion across scales synergistically restructure Neotropical bird communities” by Luke O. Frishkoff and Daniel S Karp published in Ecological Applications. https://doi.org/10.1002/eap.1910