Severe declines of understory birds follow illegal logging in Upper Guinea forests of Ghana, West Africa

Scatter-hoarding corvids as seed dispersers for oaks and pines: A review of a widely distributed mutualism and its utility to habitat restoration

“…Furthermore, the 2 forest types (protected and unprotected) that we studied differed in their bird assemblage composition, with a significant change from specialists in protected forests to generalists in unprotected forests. These results support the findings of numerous studies from around the globe that have shown specialist bird species to be among the most susceptible to forest disturbance (e.g., Stouffer and Bierregaard 1995, Arcilla et al 2015, Pavlacky et al 2015. Thus, for the long-term conservation of forest specialists, particularly Ethiopian endemics such as the Abyssinian Woodpecker (Dendropicos abyssinicus), Yellow-fronted Parrot (Poicephalus flavifrons), Whitebacked Black-Tit (Melaniparus leuconotus), and Abyssinian Catbird (Parophasma galinieri), and Afrotropical species more broadly, it is important to (1) manage the drivers with the greatest ecological impact on primary forests, (2) inform, and improve on, policy responsible for habitat restoration targets, and (3) provide much-needed international support for the optimal management of FIGURE 2.…”

Importance of Ethiopian shade coffee farms for forest bird conservation

“…For example, forest had a much higher relative abundance of forest specialists, understory insectivores, and resident understory insectivores. These results corroborate studies from around the world that have shown that understory insectivores are among the most susceptible of groups to forest disturbance and are often the first species to disappear from altered forests (S ßekercioglu et al, 2002;Stouffer and Bierregaard, 1995;Sodhi et al, 2011;Cordeiro et al, 2015;Pavlacky et al, 2014;Arcilla et al, 2015). In order to conserve forest specialists and understory insectivores in the long term, it is necessary to conserve areas of little-disturbed forest in the Afrotropics as well.…”

“…Nonetheless, there are limitations and potential biases associated with mist netting data (Remsen and Good, 1996). For example, habitat modifications, such as removal of canopy trees and clearing of the understory may alter flight height of species, thereby changing their susceptibility to mist-net capture without changing their relative abundance (Arcilla et al, 2015;Remsen and Good, 1996). We recognize that the number of captures by species is therefore a result, at least in part, of how susceptible a species is to be caught by mist nets and of the habitat structure where the nets are placed.…”

Vegetation Dynamics in the Upper Guinean Forest Region of West Africa from 2001 to 2015

“…On the contrary, the reserves, which are managed mainly for the sustainable production of timber and other natural resources, had relatively minor effects on vegetation trends compared to unprotected areas. Although sustainable logging in these reserves would not necessarily cause widespread degradation, our results suggest that combined pressures from overharvesting, illegal logging, fire encroachment and land use change are having an impact [66,76,77]. The impacts of individual reserves on vegetation trends vary considerably, and the effectiveness of any particular reserve will depend on multiple contextual factors, including the destabilizing effects of armed conflicts, the availability of resources to support effective management and enforcement and disputes with local residents over issues, such as access to natural resources and crop damage and livestock depredation by wildlife.…”