Avifauna asociada a un mosaico de paisajes rurales en la cuenca alta del río Ariari (Cubarral, Meta Colombia) anotaciones sobre su diversidad y conservación

Abstract

The main objective of this work was to describe the diversity of birds associated with a mosaic of rural landscapes in the upper basin of the Ariari River, in the municipality of San Luis de Cubarral, Meta Colombia. With this purpose, we did an inventory of the avifauna present in six sampling stations belonging to three types of vegetation cover, by documenting observations supported by auditory recordings during the months of October 2018, May 2019 and March 2021.The diversity of species was estimated using the Hill number series of the orders q0, q1 and q2 and we grouped species according to their trophic guild using secondary information. We found a total of 166 species distributed in 18 orders and 42 families, with a predominance of Thraupidae (12%), Tyrannidae (9%) and Trochilidae (7.8%). The list includes one endemic species, two species in the Vulnerable threat category (VU) and fifteen boreal migratory species. Nine trophic guilds were reported, with a majority of insectivorous (44%) and frugivorous (25.9%) species without showing significant differences in their distribution between land covers. The stations belonging to dense forest vegetation cover had the highest biodiversity rates in the study, therefore, they require greater sampling efforts. This study provides basic information regarding the diversity of birds in transformed ecosystems of the eastern Andean foothills by highlighting the role of forests in maintaining bird communities,  and offers some important comments concerning to the conservation of these ecosystems.