Avian responses to vegetation structure in tree-covered area in urban parks
2006
Okazaki, J.(Tokyo Univ. (Japan)) | Akiyama, K. | Kato, K.
We examined how vegetation structure and human activities influenced avian fauna in wooded open spaces in urban areas. Canonical Corresponding Analysis (CCA) revealed that factors such as coverage of lawn, pressure of human-utilization, and coverage of deciduous trees were important to determine avian fauna. Areas covered with lawn and used by people tended to hold characteristic fauna in which such species as grey starlings, dusky thrushes and white wagtails were dominant. In particular, grey starlings showed the same tendency in both wintering and breeding seasons. Although abundance of these species decreased as lower layers became too dense, it was also confirmed that lower vegetation layers of intermediate coverage contributed to maintain some species such as black-faced bunting, pale thrushes, Japanese bush warblers, and oriental turtle doves, which has already been known in previous studies. In breeding season, spatial variation in avian fauna could not be explained by these factors well, which may be caused by the absence of the species that tend to use specific vegetation structures such as lower vegetation layers. On the other hand, the area of wooded open space and surrounding land uses influenced avian fauna in some extent.
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