Forest bird communities of the Hawaiian Islands : their dynamics, ecology, and conservation
- Author:
-
Scott, J. Michael, Mountainspring, Stephen, Ramsey, Fred L., Kepler, Cameron B.
- Title:
- Forest bird communities of the Hawaiian Islands : their dynamics, ecology, and conservation
- Periodical:
- Studies in avian biology ; no. 9
- Year:
- 1986
- Pages:
- xii, 431 p.
- Subject:
-
Birds Hawaii
Forest birds
Surveys
Rare birds
Bird populations
Birds monitoring
- Summary:
- To better preserve the unique Hawaiian avifauna and associated biota would require obtaining basic information on distribution, abundance, habitat response, and limiting factors. In 1975, Eugene Kridler, John L. Sincock, and J. Michael Scott conceived the idea of a state-wide forest bird survey. The Hawaiian Forest Bird Survey (hereafter HFBS) began in 1976 on the southeast slopes of Mauna Loa, Hawaii, and ended in 1983 in the subalpine woodland of Mauna Kea, Hawaii. About one third of the area covered by the HFBS had never been explored by ornithologists. The principal objectives of the HFBS were to determine for each bird species in the forests studied its distribution, population size, density (birds/km2) by vegetation type and elevation, habitat response, and geographical areas where more detailed studies were needed to clarify distributional anomalies and to identify limiting factors of various species. The areas surveyed included all native forests above 1000 m elevation on the islands of Hawaii, Maui, Molokai, and Lanai, and the known distributional area for endangered forest birds on Kauai. The islands of Kahoolawe and Niihau were not surveyed because they lack native forest birds. The island of Oahu was not surveyed either because of the low densities of native birds and the completion of a forest bird survey on military lands (Shallenberger and Vaughn 1978).
- Collection:
- Monographs