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Geographic range dynamics of South Africa's bird species
A key issue in species conservation is a knowledge of the geographic ranges of species, and how these are changing through time. For birds there is a special opportunity to undertake studies of range changes, making use of the data collected by the First and Second Southern African Bird Atlas Projec...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
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Department of Biological Sciences
2022
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| _version_ | 1867613299263143936 |
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| access_status_str | Open Access |
| author | Loftie-Eaton, Megan |
| author2 | Underhill, Les |
| author_browse | Loftie-Eaton, Megan Underhill, Les |
| author_facet | Underhill, Les Loftie-Eaton, Megan |
| author_sort | Loftie-Eaton, Megan |
| collection | Thesis |
| description | A key issue in species conservation is a knowledge of the geographic ranges of species, and how these are changing through time. For birds there is a special opportunity to undertake studies of range changes, making use of the data collected by the First and Second Southern African Bird Atlas Projects (SABAP1 and SABAP2), which are separated in time by about two decades. In this thesis, I first describe the strengths and the weaknesses of the databases collected by these two citizen science projects, and therefore discuss the limitations placed on the analyses. We then undertake two sets of analyses, one focused on species, and one focused on areas. I show that, across all species, the Family to which the species belongs is an explanatory variable which explains approximately 45% of range expansion or contraction of a species. Diet and mass are also significant explanatory variables. For the analyses by areas, we demonstrate that the general encroachment of shrubs and trees in the savanna biome appears to have had a profound impact on the occurrence and abundance of a large suit of bird species, with the small insectivores and frugivores showing the largest increases. |
| format | Thesis |
| id | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/36622 |
| institution | University of Cape Town (South Africa) |
| language | eng |
| last_indexed | 2026-06-10T12:33:55.830Z |
| license_str | Not specified — see source repository |
| provenance_str_mv | Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| publishDate | 2022 |
| publishDateRange | 2022 |
| publishDateSort | 2022 |
| publisher | Department of Biological Sciences |
| publisherStr | Department of Biological Sciences |
| record_format | dspace |
| source_str | UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| spelling | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/36622 Geographic range dynamics of South Africa's bird species Loftie-Eaton, Megan Underhill, Les Altwegg, Res biological sciences A key issue in species conservation is a knowledge of the geographic ranges of species, and how these are changing through time. For birds there is a special opportunity to undertake studies of range changes, making use of the data collected by the First and Second Southern African Bird Atlas Projects (SABAP1 and SABAP2), which are separated in time by about two decades. In this thesis, I first describe the strengths and the weaknesses of the databases collected by these two citizen science projects, and therefore discuss the limitations placed on the analyses. We then undertake two sets of analyses, one focused on species, and one focused on areas. I show that, across all species, the Family to which the species belongs is an explanatory variable which explains approximately 45% of range expansion or contraction of a species. Diet and mass are also significant explanatory variables. For the analyses by areas, we demonstrate that the general encroachment of shrubs and trees in the savanna biome appears to have had a profound impact on the occurrence and abundance of a large suit of bird species, with the small insectivores and frugivores showing the largest increases. 2022-07-06T06:35:52Z 2022-07-06T06:35:52Z 2014 2022-07-06T06:26:21Z Master Thesis Masters MSc http://hdl.handle.net/11427/36622 eng application/pdf Department of Biological Sciences Faculty of Science |
| spellingShingle | biological sciences Loftie-Eaton, Megan Geographic range dynamics of South Africa's bird species |
| thesis_degree_str | Master's |
| title | Geographic range dynamics of South Africa's bird species |
| title_full | Geographic range dynamics of South Africa's bird species |
| title_fullStr | Geographic range dynamics of South Africa's bird species |
| title_full_unstemmed | Geographic range dynamics of South Africa's bird species |
| title_short | Geographic range dynamics of South Africa's bird species |
| title_sort | geographic range dynamics of south africa s bird species |
| topic | biological sciences |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/11427/36622 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT loftieeatonmegan geographicrangedynamicsofsouthafricasbirdspecies |