Bird Richness and Abundance in Response to Urban Form in a Latin American City: Valdivia, Chile as a Case Study.

ABSTRACT: There is mounting evidence that urban areas influence biodiversity. Generalizations however require that multiple urban areas on multiple continents be examined. Here we evaluated the role of urban areas on avian diversity for a South American city, allowing us to examine the effects of urban features common worldwide, using the city of Valdivia, Chile as case study. We assessed the number of birds and their relative abundance in 152 grid cells of equal size (250 m2) distributed across the city. We estimated nine independent variables: land cover diversity (DC), building density (BD), impervious surface (IS),municipal green space (MG),non-municipal green space (NG), domestic garden space (DG), distance to the periphery (DP), social welfare index (SW), and vegetation diversity (RV). Impervi

SUBMITTER: Silva CP 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4589359 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature