Journal article
Livestock grazing effects on riparian bird breeding behaviour in agricultural landscapes
BD Hansen, HS Fraser, CS Jones
Agriculture Ecosystems and Environment | ELSEVIER | Published : 2019
Abstract
Globally, many bird species that rely on native woodland or forest environments are declining due to vegetation clearing for livestock pastures and cereal cropping. In many landscapes, woodland remnants are restricted to waterways and roadsides in narrow, sometimes degraded patches, and not all patches can necessarily provide the resources required to support bird populations. This study investigated the influence of livestock grazing and vegetation characteristics on bird breeding activity in riparian zones in northern Victoria, Australia, where much of the landscape is used for production and has experienced significant loss of woodland. Birds were broadly categorised as ‘woodland’ or ‘non..
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Funding Acknowledgements
We would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for comments that greatly improved this manuscript. Many thanks to Andrew Bennett for providing a thorough review of an earlier version of this manuscript (done through the Arthur Rylah Institute internal review system). We would like to thank the landholders who kindly allowed access to their properties for surveys. We would also like to thank Geoff Brennan, (the late) Wayne Tennant and Jenny Wilson of the Goulburn Broken Catchment Management Authority, and Susan Sleigh of the Longwood Plains Conservation Management Network for assisting with site selection, access permissions and landholder contacts. Thanks also to Ben Fanson, Nick Golding, Peter Vesk, William Morris and Jian Yen for productive statistical discussions. Financial support for this research was provided to BH under the (then) University of Ballarat Collaborative Research Network program.