Comparative study of bird communities in green areas of the Porto Alegre metropolitan region, South of Brazil
2010
Marcelo Fischer Barcellos dos Santos | Cristina Vargas Cademartori
Our goal was to compare the bird richness and composition among different urban green areas in the metropolitan region of Porto Alegre. Data on the composition of species in 14 green areas were collected from the literature. Similarity analysis (Jaccard’s) was used to compare the areas in relation to bird composition. We used multiple regression analysis in addition to the stepwise method in order to establish whether bird richness in the urban green areas was influenced by the following factors: dimension, variety of habitats, area and distance of the nearest neighbor. Our data compilation registered 224 bird species in the consulted areas. Jaccard’s analysis showed that larger green areas are more similar in their composition of bird species than smaller ones. Multiple regression analysis demonstrated positive correlations between bird richness and the analyzed factors (except for distance between areas). We concluded that, despite the importance of small green areas to certain bird species, larger ones with higher habitat heterogeneity are able to support significant bird richness, and that these areas are important to the maintenance of many bird species in urban areas.
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