Keywords
Tropical Forests
Indicator Species Analysis
Protectedarea Network
Biomes
Central Indian Highlands.
How to Cite
Abstract
Identification of biomes and their indicator taxa is a key component of spatial conservation plans, including rationalization of Protected Area (PA) network. Here, we seek to demonstrate the potential of Indicator Species Analysis (ISA) in identifying landscape-level biomes and their indicator taxa using birds of Central Indian Highlands in Madhya Pradesh. The study area was gridded into 284 contiguous quarter-degree cells, and data on distribution of 190 species of breeding land birds were collected for all the quadrats using a spatially hierarchical sampling scheme. We used a combination of cluster analysis and ISA to extract ecologically and statistically significant number of clusters that corresponded to distinct avian assemblages representing different biomes. In total, seven biome-restricted avian assemblages were identified along three gradients, namely vegetation, elevation, and rainfall. Among them, high-elevation moist deciduous forest harboured the largest number of biome-specialists with high indicator values. We then assessed the adequacy of the existing PA network with respect to coverage of the four forest biomes. Barring the low-rainfall teak forest, all the other biomes had more than 10% area under PA network. We discuss the conservation implications of this bias for central Indian avifauna and need for evolving multi-species criteria for prioritizing conservation areas.References
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