Raptor community assessment in the Cerrado and Pantanal Biomes of Mato Grosso do S...
| Grant number: | 10/08528-6 |
| Support type: | Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate |
| Effective date (Start): | August 01, 2010 |
| Effective date (End): | August 31, 2014 |
| Field of knowledge: | Biological Sciences - Zoology |
| Principal Investigator: | Luís Fábio Silveira |
| Grantee: | Francisco Voeroes Dénes |
| Home Institution: | Instituto de Biociências (IB). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil |
| Associated scholarship(s): | 12/13195-1 - Raptor community assessment in the Cerrado and Pantanal Biomes of Mato Grosso do Sul state, Central Brazil, BE.EP.DR |
Abstract Diurnal raptors are, among other bird taxa, traditionally considered appropriate environmental quality indicators. Studies suggest, however, that this might not be a general characteristic of the group, but one conditional to each species' natural history (Rodriguez-Estrella et al. 1998). As regards Neotropical birds of prey, the natural history of most species is still poorly known (Olmos et al. 2006, Granzinolli 2009), and the few community level researches have been focused on forest species (Manosa et al. 2003). The incorporation of increasingly precise images and environmental data provided by satellite sensors have enabled remote sensing and ecological niche modeling techniques to enlighten fundamental biodiversity questions (Turner et al. 2003), with important applications in conservation, yet these are still poorly utilized in raptor studies, and even more so for Neotropical species. Alarmingly, Neotropical raptors of open land and savanna habitats are currently threatened by habitat loss (Jensen et al. 2005). The aims of this project are: (1) document and compare the species richness, relative abundance, diversity and distribution of diurnal raptors in the Cerrado and Pantanal biomes of Mato Grosso do Sul state, Brazil, comparing these parameters between the wet and dry seasons; (2) investigate the effects of recent habitat changes in the raptor population of the study area; (3) investigate the suitability of the studied species as environment quality indicators; and (4) evaluate the ecological niche modeling method based on maximum entropy (MaxEnt, Phillips et al. 2006) for studies of biogeography and conservation of Neotropical birds of prey. | |