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Showing 1 to 19 of 19 for “"Bird Atlas"”.
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Statistical analysis of bird atlas data from Swaziland
… the observed geographical distributions of bird species in Swaziland and a number of environmental variables. In 1985 I set out to compile a bird atlas of Swaziland. Data were accumulated between 1985 and 1991 and the bird atlas submitted to a publisher in May 1993. The text of the bird …
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The smooth is better than the rough : an exploitation of reporting rate information in Southern Africa bird atlas data
The Southern African Bird Atlas Project (Harrison at el. 1997a, b) and the Mozambique Bird Atlas Project (Parker 1999) generated data on reporting rates for birds that takes into account the likelihood of species detection in a given area. Our main objective in this thesis is to explore methods for …
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Analysis of distribution maps from bird atlas data: dissimilarities between species, continuity within ranges and smoothing of distribution maps
… for estimating the dissimilarity between two bird atlas distributions is developed. This coefficient is based on the Euclidean distance concept. The atlas distributions are compared over all quarter degree grid cells. Existing coefficients are not suitable for the comparison of distributions …
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The scientific and sociocultural value of citizen science
… science participants contribute to African Bird Atlas Projects in fifteen countries by compiling comprehensive avian species checklists at a fine geographic scale. Two projects are of particular interest for analysis: The Second Southern African Bird Atlas Project (SABAP2), and the Nigerian …
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Birds along a transect across KwaZulu-Natal: altitudinal preference and altitudinal migration
… best places in the world to study altitudinal bird migration. This dissertation uses the bird data from the Second Southern African Bird Atlas Project (SABAP2), and altitudinal data from a Digital Elevation Model to try to understand altitudinal migration in a band of KwaZulu-Natal between 29°S …
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Impacts of environmental change on large terrestrial bird species in South Africa: insights from citizen science data
Large terrestrial bird species, especially cranes and bustards, have adapted to low intensity agriculture to varying degrees, but large-scale industrial agriculture is in general inimical to these species. Cranes are charismatic and well studied, but bustards are retiring and in general cryptically …
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Geographic range dynamics of South Africa's bird species
… and how these are changing through time. For birds there is a special opportunity to undertake studies of range changes, making use of the data collected by the First and Second Southern African Bird Atlas Projects (SABAP1 and SABAP2), which are separated in time by about two decades. In this …
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Bird's response to seasonality: investigating the range dynamics of birds through dynamic occupancy models
Birds can respond to seasonal environmental fluctuations through migration. Among different migratory species and populations, there is varying sensitivity to different seasonal environmental cues, thus leading to different seasonal range dynamics and migration strategies. In this study, I used …
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Efficient Bayesian analysis of spatial occupancy models
… dataset obtained from the 2nd South African Bird Atlas Project database in order to obtain a distribution map of the species. We compare our results with those obtained from the RSR variant of our sampler, those obtained by using the stocc statistical package (written using the R programming …
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Aspects of the biology and conservation status of the blue crane Antropoides paradiseus, and the Ludwig's Neotis ludwigii and Stanley's N. Denhami Stanleyi bustards in southern Africa
… is discussed, largely based on road counts and bird atlas data. The total population size in South Africa is estimated and the previously unrecognised importance to the species of the southern Cape coastal plain between Botrivier and Mossel Bay is highlighted. The scarcity of Blue Cranes in the …
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Investigating the decline of the Martial Eagle (Polemaetus bellicosus) in South Africa
… Africa, using data from two repeated national bird surveys - South African Bird Atlas Projects (SABAP 1: 1987-1993; SABAP 2: 2007-2012). These analyses suggest a relatively uniform decline across South Africa in Martial Eagle reporting rates of 59% over the last 20 years. Alarmingly, these …
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Topics in interpolation and smoothing of spatial data
… used to produce maps for the Southern African Bird Atlas Project in areas where the original presence/absence data is sparse. Although problems of spatial interpolation and smoothing have been the subject of much research in recent years, leading to the development of the specialised discipline …
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The Impacts of Corvids on Biodiversity
… The vast majority of studies were on impacts on birds, and of these passerines were the most frequently studied, followed by waders. Collating the results from both experimental and correlative studies revealed a negative impact for 29% (n=50) of cases, whereas no impact was detected in 63% …
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Woody cover and birds
… structure on the distribution and abundance of birds. Changes in habitats due to an increase or decrease in woody cover has been linked to changes in bird diversity and community structure. This thesis looks at what impacts bush encroachment has had on bird distributions in eastern South Africa, …
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Martial eagles and the national power grid in South Africa: the implications of pylon-nesting for conservation management
… bellicosus is currently estimated at < 800 adult birds , with the bulk of the known population believed to be residing in the larger protected areas. However, Martial Eagles also build nests on pylons that support high voltage transmission lines running through the largely treeless, semiarid …
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Conservation in a changing world: assessing the conservation status of an agriculturally adapted species, the blue crane
… two citizen science datasets: Southern African Bird Atlas Projects (SABAP) and Coordinated Avifaunal Road-counts (CAR). These datasets indicate that Blue Crane numbers have increased over the long term but CAR data show that the population trend changed from positive to negative in 2010. Since …
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Modelling British Columbia’s ecosystems and avian richness using landscape-scale indirect indicators of biodiversity
… to predict the spatial distribution of breeding bird richness and establish the dominant landscape processes controlling vertebrate richness throughout BC. Our models explain approximately 40% of the variation in survey effort stratified breeding bird species richness levels and distinguish …
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Birds and people: studies based on citizen science and census data of Greater Gauteng, South Africa
… of biodiversity. The Second South African Bird Atlas Project (SABAP2) is a citizen science atlas project which commenced in 2007. Over a decade, SABAP2 has produced a rich source of data, capturing bird distributions in South Africa. This makes SABAP2 a powerful tool for monitoring observed …
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Understanding the decline of Martial Eagles Polemaetus bellicosus in the Kruger National Park, South Africa
… African range. Changes in reporting rates from bird atlas surveys suggest declines of up to 60 % over the last 20 years (1987-1982 vs. 2007-2013) across South Africa. Worryingly, large protected areas were not immune to these declines. For instance reporting rates in Kruger National Park (KNP; …