Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, USA.
Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, USA.
Proc Biol Sci. 2020 Jun 10;287(1928):20200278. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2020.0278. Epub 2020 Jun 3.
Migratory animals play vital ecological roles in ecosystems worldwide, yet many species are threatened by human activities. Understanding the detailed patterns of habitat use throughout the migration cycle is critical to developing effective conservation strategies for these species. Migratory shorebirds undertake some of the longest known migrations, but they are also declining precipitously worldwide. To better understand the dynamics of shorebird declines along the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, we quantified the spatiotemporal foraging distribution of 17 migratory shorebirds at two critical stopover sites. We found that shorebirds exhibit substantial interspecific and site-specific differences in their foraging distributions. Notwithstanding these differences, however, the upper tidal flats appear to be especially important to most shorebirds by providing more than 70% of the birds' cumulative foraging time, twofold greater than their proportional area. Because the upper tidal flats are also more prone to coastal development, our findings may help to explain why shorebird populations along the flyway have declined much faster than the overall rate of tidal flat loss. Our work highlights the importance of protecting upper tidal flats to conserve migratory shorebirds and demonstrates the value of a detailed ecological understanding of habitat usage by migratory animals for conservation planning.
迁徙动物在全球生态系统中发挥着至关重要的生态作用，但许多物种正受到人类活动的威胁。了解迁徙周期中栖息地利用的详细模式对于为这些物种制定有效的保护策略至关重要。迁徙涉禽进行着已知的最长距离的迁徙，但它们在全球范围内也在急剧减少。为了更好地了解东亚-澳大拉西亚飞行路线上涉禽减少的动态，我们在两个关键的中途停留点量化了 17 种迁徙涉禽的时空觅食分布。我们发现，涉禽在觅食分布上表现出明显的种间和站点间差异。然而，尽管存在这些差异，高潮滩似乎对大多数涉禽特别重要，提供了超过 70%的鸟类累计觅食时间，是其比例面积的两倍。由于高潮滩更容易受到沿海开发的影响，我们的发现可能有助于解释为什么沿飞行路线的涉禽种群下降速度远远快于潮滩整体损失速度。我们的工作强调了保护高潮滩对于保护迁徙涉禽的重要性，并展示了对迁徙动物栖息地使用进行详细生态理解对于保护规划的价值。
