Irma Franke
What birds live in the Peruvian territory?
The answer to this question has been accumulating since the beginning of exploration by naturalists and ornithologists in Peru, both strangers in a first stage, as Peruvians then and now a large set of individuals, professionals and amateurs great preparation that constantly roam the Peruvian territory.
In this long period, which started in the Century XVIII, is known as the stage of historical exploration of biodiversity. The main results have resulted in new species descriptions and inventories of the species present in a significant number of locations.
As a result of these activities we know about 1800 species of birds that occur in Peru. This number of species varies according to different authors. These variations are mainly due to the constant revision of the systematics and classification of birds and acceptance or disqualification of records obtained in our territory by observation or not properly documented.
know all the birds of Peru? Certainly the answer is no. Peru is a country where the exploration of biodiversity can not be considered historical. There are still many areas that represent gaps. True, we can not think of devoting the resources and extensive efforts to explore these areas with unknown or known as shallow as in the past. However, as part of the work of ornithologists and serious amateurs, this knowledge that will increase to complete the national inventory of birds. Probably never be a totally complete, because the dynamic nature of nature, climate change and the quality and extent habitats due to both natural causes as human intervention, there will be new records of species and species disappear from our territory.
Where each species of bird live? What is their distribution in the Peruvian territory?
knowledge of the distribution of bird species in the Peruvian territory was accumulating in parallel with the progress of the exploration of biodiversity. In the beginning these skills were quite uncertain, mainly due to the low accuracy of the location of the locations of the records. In the specimens from the early expeditions, the indication of "Peru" the label of a specimen was a sufficiently clear indication that time. The accuracy of the location of the records was improving steadily over time until the present situation, in which each record can be very accurately georeferenced with the help of the expanded use of GPS.
However, the knowledge of their distribution within the Peruvian territory is still very incomplete books and consulted more widely used, field guides (Clements & Shany, 2001, Schulenberg et al., 2007), create the opposite impression, even if this is not his intention. The maps generally used are obtained plotting the locations where a species has been recorded, thus obtaining a map with a number of points in a geographic area of \u200b\u200bvariable size. By joining the boundary points, outline the contours based on the extent of habitat where the species is known or height above sea level curve, you get the general area of \u200b\u200bdistribution of the species. This area, usually represented without the points, it is widely assumed as a continuous range of the species. In reality, these areas include includes large areas where the presence of the species is alleged, unproven, and represent a major information gap. The number of points or locations used for the production of maps is very variable for different species. The density of points is usually also very variable according to areas that have been evaluated or which has reported a list of species. In fact, even for the most common species are numerous areas where its presence is assumed, with large areas without data within the continuous area of \u200b\u200bthe map.
Our knowledge of the distribution of our birds in the Peruvian territory is still quite incomplete.
have many individuals of each species in the Peruvian territory?
The information in relation to the size of the Peruvian bird populations is very low. The only population fully enumerated at the species level is the Junin Grebe. This has been possible due to the fact that it is a small town and found located in one lake. However, even though there have been several surveys in different years, controversy regarding the exact number of existing individuals. Estimates for all individuals of a species also exist for Guan, a species that also has a very limited distribution.
For other species the problem of knowing the population size is more complex due to their greater number and wider distribution. Major efforts have been made for species migration, thanks to international funding for this purpose. Second are non-migratory waterfowl. There is more easily to conduct censuses or estimates for localities as they are more visible and conspicuous. Estimates are primarily for major guano birds and among birds in freshwater environments, the Flemish is the working group. Get
estimates of terrestrial bird populations is more complex. Existing data generally refer to relative density in certain areas than the number of individuals in the population.
Some organizations give values \u200b\u200bthat are obtained by seeking the opinion of those people, professionals or not, who have greater expertise in the field. These values \u200b\u200bare subjective approaches, rough estimates, untested, which could be quite unrealistic. While it is the best thing is today for many species.
Other aspects
For other aspects such as behavior, reproduction, sensitivity to disturbación, etc., The knowledge we have are very basic. Even for important species being endangered and their populations are very accessible to be located on the coast, as is the case of the Peruvian Cortarrama not recently been found in a nest. This is only known by the description of him makes a naturalist For almost a century.
0 comments:
Post a Comment