Impacts of Adjacent Land Use and Isolation on Marsh Bird Communities

摘要: Over the next half century human population is expected to grow rapidly, resulting in conversion of rural areas into cities. Wetlands these regions are therefore under threat, even though they have important ecosystem services and functions. Many obligate marsh-nesting birds North America shown declines over past 40 years, it evaluate marsh bird community response increased urbanization. We surveyed 20 coastal marshes southern Ontario, Canada, found that preferred urban wetlands, generalist showed no preference, while synanthropic species a trend towards richness abundance marshes. The Index Marsh Bird Community Integrity (IMBCI) was calculated for each wetland we significantly higher scores compared wetlands. presence forested buffer surrounding not an factor predicting distribution generalists, obligates, species, or IMBCI. More isolated had lower marsh-nesters IMBCI than less Based on our results, recommend land use dominant within 1000 m from any wetland, as negatively affects marsh-nesters, overall integrity avian community. also all existing wetlands be conserved mitigate against isolation effects preserve biodiversity.