Modeling Spatial Trends in Estimated Species Richness using Breeding Bird Survey Data: A Valuable Tool in Biodiversity Assessment

Abstract.We used data from the French breeding bird survey to estimate local bird species richness within sampled sites, using capture–recapture models. We investigated the possible effects of habitat structure and composition (landscape fragmentation, habitat cover and diversity) on estimated species richness at a local scale, and used the identified trends to help with modeling species richness at a large spatial scale. We performed geostatistical analyses based on spatial autocorrelation – cokriging models – to interpolate estimated species richness over the entire country, providing an opportunity to predict species-rich areas. We further compared species richness obtained with this method to species and rarity richness obtained using a national atlas of breeding birds. Estimated species richness was higher in species richness hotspots identified by the atlas. Combining informations on rare species from Atlas and species richness estimates from sound sampling based schemes should help with identifying species-rich areas for various taxa and locating biodiversity hotspots to be protected as high conservation value areas, especially in temperate zones where diversity hotspots are likely to match centers of high species richness because of very few centers of true endemicity.

[1]  Michael J. Conroy,et al.  Mapping of Species Richness for Conservation of Biological Diversity: Conceptual and Methodological Issues , 1996 .

[2]  J. Chilès,et al.  Geostatistics: Modeling Spatial Uncertainty , 1999 .

[3]  J. Andrew Royle.  N‐Mixture Models for Estimating Population Size from Spatially Replicated Counts , 2004, Biometrics.

[4]  P. Legendre.  Spatial Autocorrelation: Trouble or New Paradigm? , 1993 .

[5]  K. Burnham,et al.  Robust Estimation of Population Size When Capture Probabilities Vary Among Animals , 1979 .

[6]  R. Julliard,et al.  Un suivi intégré des populations d'oiseaux communs en France , 2002 .

[7]  N. Myers.  Threatened biotas: "Hot spots" in tropical forests , 1988, The Environmentalist.

[8]  David R. Bellwood,et al.  Biodiversity hotspots, centres of endemicity, and the conservation of coral reefs , 2002 .

[9]  J. Lawton,et al.  Rare species, the coincidence of diversity hotspots and conservation strategies , 1993, Nature.

[10]  Frédéric Jiguet,et al.  Estimating species richness with capture–recapture models: choice of model when sampling in heterogeneous conditions , 2005 .

[11]  H. Gleason,et al.  On the Relation Between Species and Area , 1922 .

[12]  J. Andrew Royle,et al.  ESTIMATING SITE OCCUPANCY RATES WHEN DETECTION PROBABILITIES ARE LESS THAN ONE , 2002, Ecology.

[13]  J. Nichols,et al.  Inference Methods for Spatial Variation in Species Richness and Community Composition When Not All Species Are Detected , 1998 .

[14]  S. T. Buckland,et al.  An autologistic model for the spatial distribution of wildlife , 1996 .

[15]  James D. Nichols,et al.  Monitoring of biological diversity in space and time , 2001 .

[16]  R. Holt,et al.  A Survey and Overview of Habitat Fragmentation Experiments , 2000 .

[17]  Noel A Cressie,et al.  Statistics for Spatial Data, Revised Edition. , 1994 .

[18]  J. Dunham,et al.  Combining Inferences from Models of Capture Efficiency, Detectability, and Suitable Habitat to Classify Landscapes for Conservation of Threatened Bull Trout , 2003 .

[19]  Robert L. Pressey,et al.  A Comparison of Richness Hotspots, Rarity Hotspots, and Complementary Areas for Conserving Diversity of British Birds , 1996 .

[20]  James F. Quinn,et al.  ESTIMATING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF FURTHER SAMPLING INSPECIES INVENTORIES , 1998 .

[21]  H. Andrén,et al.  Effects of habitat fragmentation on birds and mammals in landscapes with different proportions of suitable habitat: a review , 1994 .

[22]  A. Peterson,et al.  Prediction of bird community composition based on point‐occurrence data and inferential algorithms: a valuable tool in biodiversity assessments , 2002 .

[23]  J. Nichols,et al.  ESTIMATING SPECIES RICHNESS: THE IMPORTANCE OF HETEROGENEITY IN SPECIES DETECTABILITY , 1998 .

[24]  T. Brooks,et al.  Habitat Loss and Extinction in the Hotspots of Biodiversity , 2002 .

[25]  L. Fahrig,et al.  Conservation of fragmented populations , 1994 .

[26]  Jason W. Karl,et al.  SENSITIVITY OF SPECIES HABITAT-RELATIONSHIP MODEL PERFORMANCE TO FACTORS OF SCALE , 2000 .

[27]  G. Daily,et al.  Countryside Biogeography of Moths in a Fragmented Landscape: Biodiversity in Native and Agricultural Habitats , 2001 .

[28]  Jean-Paul Chilbs,et al.  Geostatistics , 2000, Technometrics.

[29]  M. Conroy,et al.  Techniques for estimating abundance and species richness: Estimation of species richness , 1996 .

[30]  R. Boone,et al.  MODELING THE OCCURRENCE OF BIRD SPECIES: ARE THE ERRORS PREDICTABLE? , 1999 .

[31]  A New Technique For Predicting Distribution of Terrestrial Vertebrates Using Inferential Modeling , 2000 .

[32]  Therese M. Donovan,et al.  Landscape effects mediate breeding bird abundance in midwestern forests , 2000, Landscape Ecology.

[33]  Robert P. Anderson,et al.  Evaluating predictive models of species’ distributions: criteria for selecting optimal models , 2003 .

[34]  J. Andrew Royle,et al.  Mixture Models for Estimating the Size of a Closed Population When Capture Rates Vary among Individuals , 2003, Biometrics.

[35]  James R. Herkert,et al.  The Effects of Habitat Fragmentation on Midwestern Grassland Bird Communities , 1994 .

[36]  G. Auble.  Wildlife 2000—modeling habitat relationships of terrestrial vertebrates , 1988 .

[37]  K. Burnham,et al.  Estimation of the size of a closed population when capture probabilities vary among animals , 1978 .

[38]  J. Bunge,et al.  Estimating the Number of Species: A Review , 1993 .

[39]  Roger L. H. Dennis,et al.  A comparison of geographical and neighbourhood models for improving atlas databases. The case of the French butterfly atlas , 2002 .

[40]  N. Gotelli.  Predicting Species Occurrences: Issues of Accuracy and Scale , 2003 .

[41]  J. Nichols,et al.  ESTIMATING SITE OCCUPANCY, COLONIZATION, AND LOCAL EXTINCTION WHEN A SPECIES IS DETECTED IMPERFECTLY , 2003 .

[42]  L. Svensson.  The correct name of the Iberian Chiffchaff Phylloscopus ibericus Ticehurst 1937, its identification and new evidence of its winter grounds , 2001 .

[43]  J. Nichols,et al.  Forest fragmentation and bird community dynamics: inference at regional scales , 2001 .

[44]  Noel A. C. Cressie,et al.  Statistics for Spatial Data: Cressie/Statistics , 1993 .

[45]  A. Balmford,et al.  Across‐Country Analyses of Biodiversity Congruence and Current Conservation Effort in the Tropics , 1995 .

[46]  R. Dennis,et al.  Bias in Butterfly Distribution Maps: The Influence of Hot Spots and Recorder's Home Range , 2000, Journal of Insect Conservation.

[47]  A. Peterson,et al.  Geographic analysis of conservation priority: endemic birds and mammals in Veracruz, Mexico , 2000 .

[48]  R. Fisher,et al.  The Relation Between the Number of Species and the Number of Individuals in a Random Sample of an Animal Population , 1943 .