PS 49-145 - The impact of anthropogenic activities on bird assembly structure in a protected area of Indo-Burma biodiversity hotspot

Background/Question/Methods

Anthropogenic activities accelerate the risk of diversity loss by reducing the habitat for bird. The development of road network and human settlement within the proximity of a protected area affect the bird behavior and population dynamics. Besides, the easy accessibility increases the illegal logging and reduce the tree abundance, tree diversity and canopy coverage of a forest area. However, the literature lacks the combined effect of these human activities on the bird assembly within Indo-Burma biodiversity hotspot. The aim of this research is to quantitatively assess the impact of human activities (road network, infrastructure development, illegal logging) on the bird assembly structure in the north-eastern Bangladesh which is located within Indo-Burma biodiversity hotspot. We used point counts to estimate bird diversity and abundance during the dry season of 2016. Distance from the road and human settlement along with plant abundance, plant diversity and canopy openness were considered as the key variables for our study. We applied generalized linear model (GLM) to find the best model to describe bird abundance. Also, we conducted model-based ordination analysis to assess the association between bird community and key variables.

Results/Conclusions

The GLM analysis shows the best model comprises the distance from the road and human settlement for bird abundance and distance from the road along with canopy openness for bird diversity. Our result indicates the distance from the road has a positive influence on bird diversity, whereas this causes a negative impact on bird abundance. We assume the edge effect due to the road establishment enhance bird diversity. The adaptive feeding behaviour of certain bird species, such as – Hill myna (Gracula religiosa), shows increased abundance around human establishments. Our ordination analysis shows the preference towards key variables varies to different species. We firmly believe this study documents how different human activities affect bird abundance and diversity and will contribute to the science-based bird conservation for the Indo-Burma hotspot.