Birds pre-adapted to a road in a heterogeneous and contiguous old-growth forest: a point transect study

Graham R. Fulton; Jutta Beher; Hugh P. Possingham

doi:10.1071/ZO22018

RESEARCH ARTICLE (Open Access)

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Birds pre-adapted to a road in a heterogeneous and contiguous old-growth forest: a point transect study

Graham R. Fulton

^A ^B ^* , Jutta Beher ^C and Hugh P. Possingham ^A

+ Author Affiliations

- Author Affiliations

^A Centre for Biodiversity and Conservation Science, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Qld 4072, Australia.

^B Environmental and Conservation Sciences, Murdoch University, South Street, Murdoch WA 6150, Australia.

^C School of Biosciences, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Vic. 3010, Australia.

^* Correspondence to: grahamf2001@yahoo.com.au

Handling Editor: Paul Cooper

Australian Journal of Zoology 71, ZO22018 https://doi.org/10.1071/ZO22018

Submitted: 23 April 2022 Accepted: 17 October 2023 Published: 8 November 2023

© 2023 The Author(s) (or their employer(s)). Published by CSIRO Publishing. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND)

Abstract

Roads are present globally across all habitats and their negative impacts on the landscape are being increasingly reported. Yet often more is known about the identity of roadkill than how avian assemblages are impacted by roads. This study used 100 paired point counts by the road and 400 m into the forest interior to assess if the assemblages were different and determine what species may be impacted by the road. The study was undertaken along a highway cut through one of the world’s tallest forests – old-growth karri (Eucalyptus diversicolor) forest of south-western Australia. There was no overall significant difference in species richness and abundance between road and forest interior sites, although a small number of species (4.3%) did demonstrate preferences. Overall, we suggest that the limited significant differences resulted from: (1) the narrowness of the road with the forest canopy frequently extended fully across and (2) the natural variation found in eucalypt forests, which has aided the birds as a pre-adaptation to the presence of this road – because eucalypt forests are a heterogeneous array of streams and forest heterogeneity.

Keywords: extinction filter, forest birds, forest heterogeneity, karri forest, landscape ecology, population ecology, road ecology.

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