title: Multi-scale factors influencing the characteristics of avian communities in urban parks across Beijing during the breeding season.
abstract: Understanding the factors that influence the characteristics of avian communities using urban parks at both the patch and landscape level is important to focus management effort towards enhancing bird diversity. Here, we investigated this issue during the breeding season across urban parks in Beijing, China, using high-resolution satellite imagery. Fifty-two bird species were recorded across 29 parks. Analysis of residence type of birds showed that passengers were the most prevalent (37%), indicating that Beijing is a major node in the East Asian-Australasian Flyway. Park size was crucial for total species abundance, but foliage height diversity was the most important factor influencing avian species diversity. Thus, optimizing the configuration of vertical vegetation structure in certain park areas is critical for supporting avian communities in urban parks. Human visitation also showed negative impact on species diversity. At the landscape level, the percentage of artificial surface and largest patch index of woodland in the buffer region significantly affected total species richness, with insectivores and granivores being more sensitive to the landscape pattern of the buffer region. In conclusion, urban birds in Beijing are influenced by various multi-scale factors; however, these effects vary with different feeding types.
authors.affiliation: University of Science and Technology of China(USTC), Faculty of Life Sciences, Hefei 230026, China.|Chinese Academy of Sciences(CAS), State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Science, Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Shilin
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Xie
authors.affiliation: Chinese Academy of Sciences(CAS), State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Science, Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Fei
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Lu
authors.affiliation: Chinese Academy of Sciences(CAS), State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Science, Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Lei
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Cao
authors.affiliation: Chinese Academy of Sciences(CAS), State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Science, Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Weiqi
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.affiliation: Chinese Academy of Sciences(CAS), State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Science, Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Zhiyun
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Ouyang
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000068476:Beijing; D044822:Biodiversity; D001717:Birds / Q000145:classification / Q000502:physiology*; D001947:Breeding; D005247:Feeding Behavior; D012621:Seasons; D014507:Urbanization