Resistance of a sub-arctic bird community to severe forest damage caused by geometrid moth outbreaks
Outbreaks by geometrid moths periodically cause mass mortality of trees and state changes in understorey vegetation in sub-arctic mountain birch forest in northern Scandinavia. In order to assess the short-term impacts of such disturbance on forest bird communities, we took bird censuses in forest w...
Published in: | European Journal of Forest Research |
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Language: | English |
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Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/11250/2396538 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10342-015-0886-y |
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ftninstnf:oai:brage.nina.no:11250/2396538 2023-05-15T14:55:44+02:00 Resistance of a sub-arctic bird community to severe forest damage caused by geometrid moth outbreaks Laksforsmo Vindstad, Ole Petter Jepsen, Jane Uhd Ims, Rolf Anker Northern Scandinavia 2015 application/pdf http://hdl.handle.net/11250/2396538 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10342-015-0886-y eng eng European Journal of Forest Research 2015 urn:issn:1612-4669 http://hdl.handle.net/11250/2396538 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10342-015-0886-y cristin:1240340 Navngivelse-Ikkekommersiell-DelPåSammeVilkår 3.0 Norge http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/no/ CC-BY-NC-SA 134 European Journal of Forest Research 4 Disturbance Mountain birch Operophtera Epirrita Transect Hierarchical model Journal article Peer reviewed 2015 ftninstnf https://doi.org/10.1007/s10342-015-0886-y 2021-12-23T07:17:22Z Outbreaks by geometrid moths periodically cause mass mortality of trees and state changes in understorey vegetation in sub-arctic mountain birch forest in northern Scandinavia. In order to assess the short-term impacts of such disturbance on forest bird communities, we took bird censuses in forest where almost all birch trees had been killed by moth outbreaks 2–4 years before the study and in undamaged forest. The study was repeated in two locations (Kirkenes and Tana) with contrasting forest structure and fragmentation. Using a hierarchical community model, we show that the total abundance of birds in Kirkenes was only about 25 % lower in damaged than undamaged forest and that species richness differed even less between the two forest types. Meanwhile, neither bird abundance nor species richness differed between damaged and undamaged forest in Tana. The observed patterns in abundance were mainly driven by a few very common species. Only a single species showed indication of being more abundant in damaged forest. Thus, our findings indicate that bird communities in sub-arctic mountain birch forest have a high degree of resistance to forest damage caused by moth outbreaks. We suggest that bird populations in outbreak-affected forest may be maintained by surviving trees and by standing dead tree trunks, which help maintain the vertical structure of the forest habitat. The fact that many of the studied bird species are habitat generalists may also explain their apparently weak responses to the damage caused by the outbreak. Our results do not point towards forest damage caused by moth outbreaks as a major driver of change in bird communities in the study system, although more long-term research is needed to substantiate this conclusion. Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Kirkenes Norwegian Institute for Nature Research: Brage NINA Arctic European Journal of Forest Research 134 4 725 736 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
Norwegian Institute for Nature Research: Brage NINA |
op_collection_id |
ftninstnf |
language |
English |
topic |
Disturbance Mountain birch Operophtera Epirrita Transect Hierarchical model |
spellingShingle |
Disturbance Mountain birch Operophtera Epirrita Transect Hierarchical model Laksforsmo Vindstad, Ole Petter Jepsen, Jane Uhd Ims, Rolf Anker Resistance of a sub-arctic bird community to severe forest damage caused by geometrid moth outbreaks |
topic_facet |
Disturbance Mountain birch Operophtera Epirrita Transect Hierarchical model |
description |
Outbreaks by geometrid moths periodically cause mass mortality of trees and state changes in understorey vegetation in sub-arctic mountain birch forest in northern Scandinavia. In order to assess the short-term impacts of such disturbance on forest bird communities, we took bird censuses in forest where almost all birch trees had been killed by moth outbreaks 2–4 years before the study and in undamaged forest. The study was repeated in two locations (Kirkenes and Tana) with contrasting forest structure and fragmentation. Using a hierarchical community model, we show that the total abundance of birds in Kirkenes was only about 25 % lower in damaged than undamaged forest and that species richness differed even less between the two forest types. Meanwhile, neither bird abundance nor species richness differed between damaged and undamaged forest in Tana. The observed patterns in abundance were mainly driven by a few very common species. Only a single species showed indication of being more abundant in damaged forest. Thus, our findings indicate that bird communities in sub-arctic mountain birch forest have a high degree of resistance to forest damage caused by moth outbreaks. We suggest that bird populations in outbreak-affected forest may be maintained by surviving trees and by standing dead tree trunks, which help maintain the vertical structure of the forest habitat. The fact that many of the studied bird species are habitat generalists may also explain their apparently weak responses to the damage caused by the outbreak. Our results do not point towards forest damage caused by moth outbreaks as a major driver of change in bird communities in the study system, although more long-term research is needed to substantiate this conclusion. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Laksforsmo Vindstad, Ole Petter Jepsen, Jane Uhd Ims, Rolf Anker |
author_facet |
Laksforsmo Vindstad, Ole Petter Jepsen, Jane Uhd Ims, Rolf Anker |
author_sort |
Laksforsmo Vindstad, Ole Petter |
title |
Resistance of a sub-arctic bird community to severe forest damage caused by geometrid moth outbreaks |
title_short |
Resistance of a sub-arctic bird community to severe forest damage caused by geometrid moth outbreaks |
title_full |
Resistance of a sub-arctic bird community to severe forest damage caused by geometrid moth outbreaks |
title_fullStr |
Resistance of a sub-arctic bird community to severe forest damage caused by geometrid moth outbreaks |
title_full_unstemmed |
Resistance of a sub-arctic bird community to severe forest damage caused by geometrid moth outbreaks |
title_sort |
resistance of a sub-arctic bird community to severe forest damage caused by geometrid moth outbreaks |
publishDate |
2015 |
url |
http://hdl.handle.net/11250/2396538 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10342-015-0886-y |
op_coverage |
Northern Scandinavia |
geographic |
Arctic |
geographic_facet |
Arctic |
genre |
Arctic Kirkenes |
genre_facet |
Arctic Kirkenes |
op_source |
134 European Journal of Forest Research 4 |
op_relation |
European Journal of Forest Research 2015 urn:issn:1612-4669 http://hdl.handle.net/11250/2396538 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10342-015-0886-y cristin:1240340 |
op_rights |
Navngivelse-Ikkekommersiell-DelPåSammeVilkår 3.0 Norge http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/no/ |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY-NC-SA |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10342-015-0886-y |
container_title |
European Journal of Forest Research |
container_volume |
134 |
container_issue |
4 |
container_start_page |
725 |
op_container_end_page |
736 |
_version_ |
1766327763338264576 |