Inter‐specific variation in avian responses to human disturbance

Abstract

Summary 1.Increasing urbanization and recreational activities around and within biodiversity hotspots require an understanding of how to reduce the impacts of human disturbance on more than a single species; however, we lack a general framework to study multiple species. One approach is to expand on knowledge about the theory of anti-predator behaviour to understand and predict how different species might respond to humans. 2. We reviewed the literature and found that only 21% of studies that used a behavioural approach to study human disturbance focused on multiple species. These studies identified a number of potential predictive variables. 3.We developed a simulation model that investigates interspecific variation in different parameters of disturbance with variation in human visitation. We found that fitness-related responses, such as the quantity of food consumed by a species, are relatively sensitive to the distance at which animals detect humans, the frequency of disturbance by humans and the interaction of these factors, but are less sensitive to other characteristics. 4. We examined avian alert distance (the distance animals first orientated to an approaching threat, a proxy for detection distance) across 150 species, controlling for phylogenetic effects. We found that larger species had greater alert distances than smaller species, which could increase local spatial and temporal limitations on suitable habitat with increasing human visitation. 5. Synthesis and applications . Our results suggest that body size could be a potential predictor of responses to human disturbance across species, and could be used by managers to make conservation decisions regarding levels of human visitation to a protected site. We suggest that three things are essential to develop predictive models of how different species will respond to human disturbance. First, multiple indicators of disturbance should be studied to select those with lower intraspecific variation for a given study system. Secondly, the species-specific nature of responses should be identified. Thirdly, life history, natural history and other correlates with these species-specific responses must be assessed.

Reactions of ground-nesting marine birds to human disturbance in the Canadian Arctic

“…These behaviours could represent gulls defending their nest more intensely by reducing exposure of their eggs from a potential predator -nest defense behaviours are often diverse, and which behaviour is used may change through breeding (Montgomerie and Weatherhead 1988). Collectively, these results highlight the arguments of Blumstein et al (2003Blumstein et al ( , 2005 that there is considerable speciesspecific, and perhaps individual, variation in the FID response of birds to anthropogenic activities.…”

“…My overall goal was to determine an appropriate, minimum setback distance that would not induce significant reactions by nesting birds around the breeding colonies, as a first step in recommending buffer zones in which human activity should be limited around known breeding sites. Previous work has shown that many bird species exhibit species-specific flight initiation distances (FID) (Blumstein et al 2003(Blumstein et al , 2005, meaning that efforts to develop buffer zones around multispecies breeding sites need to consider the reactions of each species to disturbance. Based on earlier work that showed that nest defense ("risk-taking") increases as the breeding season progresses (Forbes et al 1994;Mallory et al 1998), I made two predictions for FID among the sympatrically nesting marine bird species.…”

Forest management and stick-nesting birds: New direction for mitigation in Ontario

“…In contrast, for most species of stick-nesting birds little published information was found on flushing distance. However, the distance at which birds react to human activities is thought to be positively correlated with their body size (Holmes et al 1993, Blumstein et al 2005. This relationship was quantified by plotting the mean flushing distance (m) for 12 species of birds reported in the literature against their respective mean body mass (g) (from Sibley 2000) (Fig.…”

The effect of natural and human-induced habitat conditions on number of roe deer: case study of Vojvodina, Serbia

“…Many researchers have examined these factors and their impact on the number of game (e.g. Stedman et al 2004;Blumstein et al 2005;Borkowski and Ukalska 2008;Jayakody et al 2008;Stankowich 2008;Torres et al 2011). …”