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Title
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The effects of water depth and vegetation on wading bird foraging habitat selection and foraging succes in the Everglades.
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Creator
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Lantz, Samantha., Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Biological Sciences
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Abstract/Description
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Successful foraging by avian predators is influenced largely by prey availability. In a large-scale experiment at the Loxahatchee Impoundment Landscape Assessment project within the Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge, I manipulated two components of prey availability, water depth and vegetation density (submerged aquatic vegetation and emergent vegetation), and quantified the response by wading birds in terms of foraging habitat selection and foraging success. Manly's...
Show moreSuccessful foraging by avian predators is influenced largely by prey availability. In a large-scale experiment at the Loxahatchee Impoundment Landscape Assessment project within the Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge, I manipulated two components of prey availability, water depth and vegetation density (submerged aquatic vegetation and emergent vegetation), and quantified the response by wading birds in terms of foraging habitat selection and foraging success. Manly's standardized selection index showed that birds preferred shallow water and intermediate vegetation densities. However, the treatments had little effect on either individual capture rate or efficiency. This was a consistent pattern seen across multiple experiments. Birds selected for certain habitat features but accrued little benefit in terms of foraging success. I hypothesize that birds selected sites with shallow water and intermediate vegetation densities because they anticipated higher prey densities, but they did not experience it here because I controlled for prey density.
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Date Issued
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2008
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PURL
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http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/2788592
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Subject Headings
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Water birds, Habitat, Wetland ecology, Habitat selection, Avian ecology, Wildlife management
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Format
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Document (PDF)
