Response of vertebrate scavengers to power line and road rights-of-way and its implications for bird fatality estimates.

Linear infrastructures, such as power lines and roads, are an important source of bird mortality. However, little is known on the potential effect of these infrastructures on local scavenger guilds, their foraging activity and the resulting bird carcass removal patterns. This is an important source of bias in studies aiming to quantify bird fatalities due to linear infrastructures. We used camera-traps to record scavenger identity and persistence patterns of bird carcasses placed close to linear infrastructure and nearby controls in two Mediterranean agricultural regions. We found that linear infrastructure influence on scavenger identity varied depending on the region. Contrary to expectations, linear infrastructure presence had either none or a positive effect on carcass persistence, meaning that carcasses placed within power line or road rights-of-way were not removed faster than the ones placed in controls. We conclude that linear infrastructure effect on vertebrate scavenging patterns is likely to be region-specific, and that reliable correction factors for carcass removal-bias in bird fatality estimates require site-specific experiments to characterize local scavenging processes.

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Bernardino J. Bispo R. Martins R.C. Santos S. y Moreira F. Response of vertebrate scavengers to power line and road rights-of-way and its implications for bird fatality estimates. Nature, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-72059-7

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Retrieved: 22 Jan 2025 22:42:09
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Resource type Text
Date of creation 2024-12-02
Date of last revision 2025-01-22
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Metadata identifier 49786c29-8785-5a24-aa66-04b086d40087
Metadata language Spanish
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ISO 19115 topic category biota
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Name of the dataset creator Bernardino, J., Bispo, R., Martins, R.C., Santos, S. y Moreira, F.
Name of the dataset editor Nature
Other identifier DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-72059-7
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