Effect of habitat types, vegetation structure, and proximity to forest on insectivorous and non-insectivorous bird abundance

Clearance of tropical forest for agricultural purposes is generally assumed to seriously threaten the survival of birds. In this study, bird species composition, stand level, and landscape level were quantified in three degraded habitat types in Peninsular Malaysia, namely a fruit orchard, rubber tree plantation, and oil palm plantation. The aim of this research was to investigate the effect of habitat types, vegetation structure and proximity to the forest on insectivorous and non-insectivorous bird abundant. 240 points of mist-netting were installed in a fruit orchard, rubber tree plantation, and oil palm plantation. 80 points of mist-netting for each habitat type. There were ten variables used in this study, canopy cover, ground vegetation cover, tree height, tree density, understory vegetation, light intensity, altitude, habitat type, proximity to the forest, and month. A total of 180 birds from 37 species were found in tropical agriculture landscapes. For the insectivorous bird, a total of 86 birds from 18 species were captured while for the non-insectivorous bird, a total of 94 birds were captured. The result shows that from 10 variables used, only four variables were significant for insectivorous (canopy cover, proximity to forest, habitat type and month) and non-insectivorous birds (understory vegetation, tree density, habitat type and month). Further research is required to understand more about the factors of habitat quality that influence the species composition and the benefit that birds can provide to humans such as pollination, natural predator and decomposition.

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