Nesting Site and Plumage Color Are the Main Traits Associated with Bird Species Presence in Urban Areas

Leveau, Lucas M.; Ibáñez, Isis

doi:10.3390/ani12091148

Cited by 7 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 71 publications

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“…Our results are in accordance with other studies, which have shown that, in urbanized environments, noise reduces species richness [61][62][63][64][65][66] and functional diversity [8,64]. Urbanization, without specifically considering noise, has been shown to lower habitat specificity [5], color number [6,7], functional diversity [6,8], diversity, frugivory, and invertivory, and it has also been shown to increase size, granivory [8][9][10][11], and commonness [12,13], as shown in this study.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

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Artificial Green Corridors in an Andean City as Effective Support of Avian Diversity

et al. 2023

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Ensuring connectivity in the countryside and cities is a key element of nature protection, allowing genetic fluxes between populations in fragmented ecosystems. We tested the hypothesis that artificial green corridors are effective for birds in the city of Cochabamba (Bolivia). We compared the following aspects of natural corridors, with generally preserved vegetation, to those of artificial corridors, constituting parks and gardens in a matrix of streets densely planted with trees: species abundance and richness, functional diversity, and the traits of bird communities. We used canonical redundancy analysis to relate species abundance to the corridor type, noise, tree vegetation structure, richness, and functional diversity. We also tested the explanatory factors for relationships with bird species richness, functional diversity, and traits. We found that most species were shared between the corridor types; the corridor type, nevertheless, had significant effects, with bird species in the green corridors being more common and heavier and having a lower beak depth/mass. By contrast, noise-reflecting urbanization deeply affected all of the studied traits, indicating large shifts in species composition. In conclusion, green corridors seem reliable enough to maintain birds at a level almost comparable to that in linear corridors, but noise is a limiting factor for efficiency for both types.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

“…Tail elongation is considered a marking attribute but has an aerodynamic cost [32]. Because birds in cities seem more discrete with less color [6,7] and are more exposed to flight crashes [3], we assumed that they may have shorter tails. Tarsus and wing lengths and masses allowed us to estimate bird size.…”

Section: Data Analysesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Artificial Green Corridors in an Andean City as Effective Support of Avian Diversity

et al. 2023

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“…Since melanin production per se is supposed to bear no cost in vertebrates (McNamara et al 2021; for other taxa, Stoehr 2006), other disadvantages must be responsible for costly melanin‐based colouration in less urbanized habitats. In Argentinian cities, camouflage has been proposed as a main factor responsible for the predominance of species with grey plumage and uniform plumage lightness, potentially in response to predators and pedestrians (Leveau 2019, Leveau and Ibáñez 2022). In Paris, predators likely do not represent the main factor in environmental filtering because they are scarce (mainly restricted to some peregrin falcons Falco peregrinus , Eurasian sparrowhawk Accipiter nisus , common kestrel Falco tinnunculus , European herring gull Larus argentatus , carrion crow Corvus corone , as well as cats and dogs).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Urbanization shapes the relation between density and melanin‐based colouration in bird communities

Turak

Monnier‐Corbel

Gouret

et al. 2022

Oikos

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Growing urbanization increasingly influences ecosystems worldwide. While the effects of urban conditions within species (through either plastic or evolutionary responses) have been widely studied, their potential influences among species (through environmental filter), especially concerning their colouration, remain poorly known. Here, we investigated whether avian communities breeding inside and outside a major European city (Paris) differ with regards to melanin‐based plumage colouration. Melanins are heritable pigments present in many taxa and have a series of unique properties that may allow coping with urban conditions. Using melanic‐based colouration as an integrative phenotypic marker, we predicted 1) that the probability of breeding inside the city should increase with the intensity of species melanin‐based colouration, 2) that for species breeding both inside and outside the city, density should increase with the intensity of dark colouration inside the city, but not outside the city and 3) that species not breeding inside the city should not exhibit this positive relation between density and colouration. Our results confirmed these predictions. In addition, the density of species not breeding inside the city decreased with the darkness of their plumage. Altogether, these results suggest that bird species experience a balance between costs and benefits of melanin‐based colouration shaped by environmental conditions. Both the environmental filtering and the urbanisation‐shaped relation between density and colouration evidenced here are likely a general trend, however possibly modulated by additional local environmental conditions. Their importance may even be underestimated given the restricted geographical scale and the overall urbanization rate of the region studied. Further studies involving regions with contrasted environmental conditions should gain insight into the consequences of urbanization worldwide on traits associated with melanin‐based colouration.

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“…Due to urban parks being heavily designed and managed, their habitat diversity may be independent of their area size. Therefore, urban parks are excellent places to test the relative roles of area size, isolation, and habitat diversity molding bird diversity (Leveau and Leveau, 2016;Yang et al, 2020). Moreover, human distur-bances such as noise or pedestrian traffic may also negatively impact species diversity and influence species composition (Fernández-Juricic, 2002;González-Oreja et al, 2012;Zhou and Chu, 2012).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bird color and taxonomic diversity are negatively related to human disturbance in urban parks

Leveau,

Kopp

2024

Web Ecol.

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Abstract. Recently, studies have shown that highly urbanized areas are numerically dominated by birds with grey plumage, probably favoring camouflage with impervious grey surfaces. However, patterns of bird color diversity in urban green areas remain unexplored. In urban parks, sites surrounded by highly urbanized areas may be dominated by grey bird species, whereas urban parks with pedestrians that feed birds may favor commensal birds which also have grey plumage. Thus, we explore the relationship between environmental variables and bird taxonomic and color diversity in urban parks. Bird surveys were conducted twice by fixed points in urban parks of six cities in central Argentina. Bird color diversity was assessed by characterizing bird plumage coloration in different parts of the bird body and the presence of plumage sexual dimorphism, polymorphism, and iridescence. Then, color richness and color diversity (abundance-based) were calculated with species mean pairwise distance. Null models were used to quantify richness-corrected color diversity. Bird species richness and diversity increased with green-area size, and bird diversity decreased with increasing pedestrian traffic. Color richness decreased with increasing car traffic, whereas color diversity was positively related to green-area size and negatively related to car and pedestrian traffic. Richness-corrected color diversity related negatively to car and pedestrian traffic. The abundance of grey birds increased in parks near the urban centers and related positively to pedestrian and car traffic. The abundance of yellow birds increased in parks near rural areas or small cities. Color diversity increased with green-area size, but richness-corrected color diversity ceased to be related to area size. Therefore, the increase in color diversity with area size was mediated by increases in species richness. Color diversity was clustered in parks with the highest human disturbance, favoring the abundance of grey species which probably took advantage of food discarded by humans.

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Nesting Site and Plumage Color Are the Main Traits Associated with Bird Species Presence in Urban Areas

Cited by 7 publications

References 71 publications

Artificial Green Corridors in an Andean City as Effective Support of Avian Diversity

Artificial Green Corridors in an Andean City as Effective Support of Avian Diversity

Urbanization shapes the relation between density and melanin‐based colouration in bird communities

Bird color and taxonomic diversity are negatively related to human disturbance in urban parks

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