Bird species composition and diversity in habitats with different disturbance histories at Kilombero Wetland, Tanzania

Abstract

Wetland natural grasslands are important habitats for avianpopulations throughout the world. Unfortunately the increase of human populationand rise in demand for settlements and agricultural land have degraded these habitatsin many tropical wetlands. To effectively restore these natural grasslands and conserveavifaunal biodiversity, understanding of the relationships between habitat conditionsand bird community structure are central. We used a combination of information fromnearby villagers and field surveys to establish two important grassland habitatswith low and high disturbance histories, and related the habitats to bird communitystructure. We surveyed a total of 119 sites in the two habitats to examine variationin the abundance, richness, diversity and composition of birds at Kilombero WetlandTanzania. In total, 3049 individuals, 126 species, 88 genera and 45 families wererecorded from Kilombero grasslands. Our results show that grasslands with low humandisturbance had more number of bird species, genera, families and diversity (bothShannonWiener and Simpson) than the most disturbed grasslands atp 0.05) between low and highly disturbed grassland habitats suggesting that otherfactors including variety of foraging sites are important. This study confirms thatthe wetland grasslands of Kilombero are important for conservation of birds includingrare and endemic species. It is recommended that anthropogenic disturbancesshould be minimized including control of fire,regulation of agricultural activities and population of cattle within the wetlandsystem to restore and conserve biodiversity.