Keywords
Rajaji National Park
Disturbances
Heterospecific Attraction.
How to Cite
Abstract
Frequent compounded perturbations in terms of lopping, grazing, biological invasions, firewood and non-timber forest product (NTFP) collection gradually alters the habitat, and consequently dependent biotic communities. However, it is quite difficult to quantify these disturbances due to their high frequency, low intensity, and interaction among themselves. In order to quantify and investigate the impact of such disturbances on the habitat of resident and migrant birds, we carried out a study in the dry forest of Rajaji National Park in the Shiwalik landscape. Grazing and firewood collection emerged as the major disturbance in the study area, which decreased linearly from the edge to the interior of the forest. Disturbance altered the structural components of the vegetation; however, we did not find major changes in the vegetation composition. Canopy opening due to lopping disturbance facilitated the growth of Lantana camara in the study area. Ninety percent of the migrant bird community wintering in the study area belonged to the insectivorous guild. Out of 18 migrant species observed during the entire study period, 44% belonged to understorey-insectivores guild and 33% to canopy-insectivores. However, in terms of abundance 67% of the migrants pertained to the canopy- insectivores guild. Guild composition in resident birds was more varied with a total of 11 guilds, and trunk-bark feeder guild comprised the maximum number of species (20%). Species richness of both migrant and resident birds did not change much with any of the disturbance components. However, densities of resident birds increased with increased lopping and timber extraction in the study area during winter. Resident and migrant birds exhibited similar distribution patterns across different disturbance gradients indicating equivalent sensitivity to disturbances.References
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