No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

In order to determine the relationships between bird assemblages and forest habitat, we conducted surveys for bird assemblages in different forest habitats in the Khentii Mountain region, Northern Mongolia. A total of 1730 individuals belonging to 71 species from 23 families of 11 orders were recorded. Our findings revealed that passeriformes are the most species-rich order, accounting for 86.2% of the total species. The dominant species were Anthus hodgsoni, Parus major, Poecile palustris, and Sitta europaea in study area. Non-metric multidimensional scaling (NMDS) and permutation multivariate analysis of variance (PERMANOVA) showed that bird assemblages were affected by forest habitat types. Our findings also showed significant relationships between bird assemblages and canopy height and ground cover vegetation structure, whereas there were no relationships between altitude and other habitat variables. Thus, maintaining diverse forest habitats or restoring forest would play a key role in bird conservation and sustainable management of forest areas.

No abstract

Ecological niche modeling is a tool used to determine current potential species’ distribution or habitat suitability models which can then be used to project suitable areas in time. Projections of suitability into past climates can identify locations of climate refugia, or areas with high climatic stability likely to contain the highest levels of genetic diversity and stable populations when climatic conditions are less suitable in other parts of the range. Modeling habitat suitability for closely related species in recent past can also reveal potential periods and regions of contact and possible admixture. In the east palearctic, there are five Dryophytes (Hylid treefrog) clades belonging to two groups: Dryophytes japonicus group: Clades A and B; and Dryophytes immaculatus group: Dryophytes immaculatus, Dryophytes flaviventris, and Dryophytes suweonensis. We used maximum entropy modeling to determine the suitable ranges of these five clades during the present and projected to the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) and Last Interglacial (LIG) periods. We also calculated climatic stability for each clade to identify possible areas of climate refugia. Our models indicated suitable range expansion during the LGM for four clades with the exclusion of D. immaculatus. High climatic stability in our models corresponded to areas with the highest numbers of recorded occurrences in the present. The models produced here can additionally serve as baselines for models of suitability under climate change scenarios and indicate species ecological requirements.

The National University of Mongolia, the Mongolian State University of Education, the University of Nebraska, and the University of Kansas conducted four collaborative expeditions between 2010 and 2014, resulting in accounts for all species of lacertid and agamid, except Phrynocephalus kulagini. These expeditions resulted in a range extension for Eremias arguta and the collection of specimens and tissues across 134 unique localities. In this paper we summarize the species of the Agamidae (Paralaudakia stoliczkana, Ph. hispidus, Ph. helioscopus, and Ph. versicolor) and Lacertidae (E. argus, E. arguta, E. dzungarica, E. multiocellata, E. przewalskii, and E. vermiculata) that were collected during these four expeditions. Further, we provide a summary of all species within these two families in Mongolia. Finally, we discuss issues of Wallacean and Linnaean shortfalls for the herpetofauna of the Mongolian Gobi Desert, and provide future directions for studies of community assemblages and population genetics of reptile species in the region.

Lakes and wetlands provide top-priority hotspots that play a key role in maintaining and protecting threatened and migratory waterfowl. Identifying seasonal and spatial variations in aquatic bird communities and their responses to environmental factors is vital conservation efforts. However, there is a lack of information on waterfowl in Mongolian lakes and their associated wetlands. The purpose of this study was to investigate the spatial–seasonal changes in waterfowl assemblage structures in Mongolian lakes, as well as to determine how they respond to various environmental factors (lake surface area, elevation, and geographical distribution). Statistical analyses were performed using seasonal data (May, July, and September) for 28 waterfowl collected from 54 lakes across the country between 2016 and 2018. Seasonal heterogeneity in species richness and abundance was observed in lakes in each geographical region (Eastern, Central, and Western Mongolia). The composition of waterfowl in the lake was also relatively similar between May and September compared to July. This was due to the overlapping migration seasons in spring and autumn. Regionally, the number of waterfowl was much higher in the Eastern Mongolian lakes, followed by Central Mongolian lakes and then Western Mongolian lakes. This is likely due to differences in habitat availability and water levels between the regions. Eastern Mongolian lakes tend to have more wetlands and shallow water habitats, while Central and Western Mongolian lakes tend to have deeper open-water habitats. These differences in habitat types could contribute to the observed differences in waterfowl abundance among the regions. Additionally, some small lakes and the group of small lakes supported a greater abundance and diversity of waterfowl compared to some medium-sized and large lakes, suggesting that they are important for conservation. Indices of diversity (H’) and species dominance (D’) showed positive and negative correlations with lake surface area, respectively. Perhaps the increased surface area of the lake decreases the habitat overlap for designated waterfowl due to habitat heterogeneity. Accordingly, the indices (H’ and EH) increased as the waterfowl species composition became relatively equivalent in large lakes. Overall, spatial variations among the lakes were primarily attributable to the individual features of the lakes (shallowness, small lake groupings, and surface area), and seasonal variation in the lakes depended majorly on the compositional changes of the waterfowl due to migration.