Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-lnqnp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T08:20:12.187Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Local migrations of insectivorous birds in western Mexico: implications for the protection and conservation of their habitats

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 May 2010

Jorge Nocedal
Affiliation:
Instituto de Ecologiá, Apartado Postal 632, 34000 Durango, Dgo., Mexico
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Summary

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

In this study I present data suggesting altitudinal movements of some species of foliage-gleaning insectivorous birds and related species of an oak-pine woodland of western Mexico. These movements can be regarded as short-distance or local migrations because the species involved breed in the woodlands and forests of the Sierra Madre Occidental highlands and winter in the tropical forests of the Pacific lowlands. Nine species of insectivorous birds out of 17 breed at the study site in the mountains of southern Durango and move to the lowlands in the winter; these can be regarded as short-distance or local migrants. In Mexico tropical deciduous and semi-deciduous forests are distributed mostly in the Pacific lowlands in the states of Sinaloa, Durango, Nayarit and Jalisco. Tropical forests of the Pacific lowlands are very important as wintering grounds for both North American and local west-Mexican migrants; however, there is only one protected area in western Mexico which to some degree includes these two types of tropical forests, and it is not located in the Sierra Madre Occidental, the most important mountain range in Mexico in terms of length and area covered. In addition, these tropical forests are the northern limit of the range for many tropical species. At present, these habitats are not threatened seriously by human activities (mainly forestry and cattle-raising) but this might change at any moment. At the study site the temperate highlands of southern Durango are already under the protection of “La Michilía” Biosphere Reserve, but a proposal to enlarge the area of the reserve to include the valley of the Río Mezquital and the western slope of the valley will increase the diversity of habitats, both temperate and tropical. As a consequence more bird species, as well as other taxa, will be protected in their natural environments. Such a proposal must be supported by field evidence on actual habitat use both during the breeding and wintering season, by local and long-distance migrants, in order to assess accurately the importance of this area as a representative place of western Mexico.

Type
Growing Points in Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation
Copyright
Copyright © Birdlife International 1994

References

AOU (1983) Check-list of North American birds. Sixth Edition. American Ornithologists' Union.Google Scholar
Flores, V. O. and Gerez, P. (1988) Conservación en México: síntesis sobre vertebrados terrestres, vegetación y uso del suelo. Mexico: Institute Nacional de Investigaciones sobre Recursos Bioticos.Google Scholar
Gauthreaux, S. D. (1982) The ecology and evolution of avian migration systems. Pp.93168 in Farner, D. S., King, J. R. and Parkes, K. C., eds. Avian biology, 2. New York: Academic Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
González-Elizondo, S., González-Elizondo, M. and Cortes-Ortiz, A. (1993) Vegetacion de la reserva de la biosfera “La Michilia”, Durango. Ada Bot. Mex. 22: 1104.Google Scholar
Halffter, G. (1978) Las reservas de la biosfera en el estado de Durango: una nueva política de conservación y estudio de los recursos bióticos. Pp. 1245 in Halffter, G., ed. Reservas de la biosfera en el estado de Durango. Mexico: Instituto de Ecología (Publ. 4).Google Scholar
Hill, M. O. (1973) Diversity and evenness: a unifying notation and its consequences. Ecology 54: 427432.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hutto, R. L. (1980) Winter habitat distribution of migratory land birds in western Mexico, with special reference to small foliage-gleaning insectivores. Pp.181203 in Keast, A. and Morton, E. S., eds. Migrant birds in the Neotrapics: ecology, behavior, distribution, conservation. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press.Google Scholar
Hutto, R. L. (1989) The effects of habitat alteration on migratory land birds in a west Mexican tropical deciduous forest: a conservation perspective. Conserv. Biol. 3: 138148.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keast, A. and Morton, E. S., eds. (1980) Migrant birds in the Neotropics: ecology, behavior, distribution, and conservation. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press.Google Scholar
Lack, D. (1954) The natural regulation of animal numbers. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Moreau, R. E. (1972) The Palaearctic-African bird migration systems. London: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Pearson, D. L. (1980) Bird migration in Amazonian Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia. Pp.273283 in Keast, A. and Morton, E. S., eds. Migrant birds in the Neotropics: ecology, behavior, distribution, and conservation. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press.Google Scholar
Ramsey, F. L. and Scott, J. M. (1979) Estimating population densities from variable circular plot surveys. Pp.155181 in Cormack, R. M., Patil, G. P. and Robson, D. S., eds. Sampling biological populations. Fairland, Maryland: International Co-op Publishing House (Stat. Ecol. Ser. 5).Google Scholar
Ramsey, F. L. and Scott, J. M. (1981) Analysis of bird survey data using a modification of Emlen's method. Pp.483487 in Ralph, C. J. and Scott, J. M., eds. Estimating bird numbers of terrestrial birds. Lawrence: Allen Press (Studies Avian Biol. 6).Google Scholar
Rappole, J. H., Morton, E. S., Lovejoy, T. E. and Ruos, J. L., eds. (1983) Nearctic avian migrants in the Neotropics. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of the Interior, Fish and Wildlife Service.Google Scholar
Reynolds, R. T., Scott, J. M. and Nussbaum, R. A. (1980) A variable circular-plot method for estimating bird numbers. Condor 82: 309313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rzedowski, J. (1978) Vegetación de México. Mexico: LIMUSA.Google Scholar
Simpson, E. H. (1949) Measurement of diversity. Nature 163: 688.CrossRefGoogle Scholar