Predicting Losses of Bird Species from Deforestation in Central Sulawesi

Abstract

Tropical deforestation and forest fragmentation are probably the most serious threats to biodiversity (see Turner 1996) and it has been theoretically stated that even the largest protected areas in the tropics might be too small to sustain populations of all species of the original system (Terborgh 1999). But species loss in forest fragments is a complex process and appears often only after considerable time lags, especially in vertebrates (Brooks et al. 1999b). Therefore, empirical evidence for such extinctions can only be obtained from areas with a long deforestation history and long-known faunal composition (e.g. van Balen 1999). Such empirical data are scarce but are essential in order to convince land use managers of the long-term effects of forest loss on biodiversity. Species area models, however, are a valuable tool in the prediction of tropical vertebrate species loss (van Balen 1999; Brooks et al. 1997, 1999a, c, 2002; Cowlishaw 1999).