We assessed the abundance and diversity of avian species in two distinct habitats types; main campus area (human inhabited) and adjoining heavily degraded savannah grassland. By employing Jaccard/Tanimoto Coefficient of Similarity, we tested whether bird species assemblage will differ between the two habitats, while Shannon Weiner Diversity Index was used to determine the level of diversity between sites. Line transect assessment generated a total of 1035 individuals of 69 avian species from 53 genera and 32 families. The most diverse avian fa mily was Estrildidae with nine (9) avian species, followed by Columbidae with six (6), while Falconidae, Nectriniidae, and Turdidae families had a record of four (4) species each. Five families (Ardeidae, Malaconotidae, Ploceidae, Silviidae, Sturnidae) and five families (Accipitridae, Bucerotidae, Capitonidae, Viduidaeand Psittacidae) followed with three (3) and (2) species respectively. Seventeen (17) families were each represented by a single species. Jaccard/Tanimoto Coefficient revealed that species composition differed between the two habitats with a similarity coefficient of 66.7 %, while Shannon Weiner Diversity Index was 1.56 and 1.67 for human inhabited (HI) and degraded savannah (DS) habitats respectively. The proximity to a natural savannah habitat albeit degraded has positive implications for avian diversity in the study area. We recommend more exclusion of human activities such as fuel wood harvesting and land grab for farming as this has grave consequences for the thriving population of species that are sensitive to human presence and urbanization.
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