Effects of urbanization on nest habitat selection of Common Magpie(Pica pica)
Urbanization changes wildlife habitats and affects the reproduction and survival of animal populations.Investigating the breeding habitat selection of species in highly urbanized areas is essential for understanding the impact of urbanization on biodiversity.Common Magpie(Pica pica)is a common bird species in both urban and rural areas.Furthermore,it is an ideal candidate for studying the ecological effects of urbanization on the nest habitat selection of birds,because of its large quantity and easily observable nests.In this study,Hefei city was divided into peripheral rural area,edge region of urban expansion,slightly urbanized area,and highly urbanized area according to the coverage rate of buildings within kilometer grid units,comprising a total of 240 sample plots.A total of 60 sample plots were randomly selected in each of the four types of urbanization grades to investigate the number of Common Magpie nests,nest species,and nest sites.The Kruskal-Wallis rank sum test method was used to analyze the habitat characteristics of 692 Common Magpie nests,and the differences in the main habitat factors of Common Magpie nest sites in different urbanization levels were obtained by multiple Wilcoxon tests.The results showed that the number of Common Magpie nests in highly urbanized areas(16.33%)was lower than that in other areas,whereas the number of nests edge region of urban expansion was relatively high(37.14%).Tree species of Common Magpie nests were diverse(25 species),and Salicaceae trees accounted for a certain proportion.Except for tree coverage(χ2=5.069,P=0.167),there were significant differences in nest site and habitat factors among the four types of plots with different urbanization levels.Common Magpie nests in highly urbanized areas with higher human disturbance intensity were closer to food sources and farther from water sources,while the nests in rural area outside cities with lower level of urbanization were the opposite.
Pica picaurbanizationnest site selectionfood sourceswater sources
万方数据
维普
