Effects of habitat and land use on breeding season density of male Asian Houbara Chlamydotis macqueenii

Koshkin, Maxim, Burnside, Robert ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2859-7294, Collar, Nigel, Guilherme, Joao, Showler, David and Dolman, Paul ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9340-2791 (2016) Effects of habitat and land use on breeding season density of male Asian Houbara Chlamydotis macqueenii. Journal of Ornithology, 157 (3). 811–823. ISSN 2193-7192

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Abstract

Landscape-scale habitat and land-use influences on Asian Houbara Chlamydotis macqueenii (IUCN Vulnerable) remain unstudied, while estimating numbers of this cryptic, low-density, over-hunted species is challenging. In spring 2013, male houbara were recorded at 231 point counts, conducted twice, across a gradient of sheep density and shrub assemblages within 14,300 km² of the Kyzylkum Desert, Uzbekistan. Four sets of models related male abundance to: (1) vegetation structure (shrub height and substrate); (2) shrub assemblage; (3) shrub species composition (multidimensional scaling); (4) remote-sensed derived land-cover (GLOBCOVER, 4 variables). Each set also incorporated measures of landscape rugosity and sheep density. For each set, multi-model inference was applied to generalised linear mixed models of visit-specific counts that included important detectability covariates and point ID as a random effect. Vegetation structure received strongest support, followed by shrub species composition and shrub assemblage, with weakest support for the GLOBCOVER model set. Male houbara numbers were greater with lower mean shrub height, more gravel and flatter surfaces, but were unaffected by sheep density. Male density (mean 0.14 km-2, 95% CI, 0.12‒0.15) estimated by distance analysis differed substantially among shrub assemblages, being highest in vegetation dominated by Salsola rigida (0.22 [CI, 0.20‒0.25]), high in areas of S. arbuscula and Astragalus (0.14 [CI, 0.13‒0.16] and 0.15 [CI, 0.14‒0.17] respectively), lower (0.09 [CI, 0.08‒0.10]) in Artemisia and lowest (0.04 [CI, 0.04‒0.05]) in Calligonum. The study area was estimated to hold 1,824 males (CI: 1,645‒2,030). The spatial distribution of relative male houbara abundance, predicted from vegetation structure models, had the strongest correspondence with observed numbers in both model-calibration and the subsequent year’s data. We found no effect of pastoralism on male distribution but potential effects on nesting females are unknown. Density differences among shrub communities suggest extrapolation to estimate country- or range-wide population size must take account of vegetation composition.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© The Author(s) 2016 This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://​creativecommons.​org/​licenses/​by/​4.​0/​), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
Uncontrolled Keywords:	extensive grazing,pastoralism,sustainability,rangeland management, detectability,density estimation,spatial distribution model ,bustard,sdg 15 - life on land ,/dk/atira/pure/sustainabledevelopmentgoals/life_on_land
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Science > School of Environmental Sciences Faculty of Science > School of Biological Sciences
UEA Research Groups:	Faculty of Science > Research Centres > Centre for Ecology, Evolution and Conservation Faculty of Science > Research Groups > Environmental Biology Faculty of Science > Research Groups > Resources, Sustainability and Governance (former - to 2018)
Depositing User:	Pure Connector
Date Deposited:	22 Mar 2016 09:14
Last Modified:	17 Oct 2024 00:12
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/57672
DOI:	10.1007/s10336-015-1320-4

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