Identifying high quality habitat for declining grassland birds in an agricultural landscape

整个北美草原鸟类数量急剧下降，主要是由于农业集约化导致的区域栖息地丧失和退化造成的。一个关键的问题是如何改善农业景观的栖息地质量，以使日益减少的草原鸟类受益？大量廉价的鸟类调查研究表明，农业集约化与鸟类物种多样性和丰度呈负相关。然而，这些研究还不足以理解栖息地恢复如何提高生产力或降低敏感物种的存活率。很少有研究测试不同的农业栖息地如何影响草地物种的繁殖成功。此外，迫切需要研究草地鸣禽在农业景观中的栖息地选择，包括筑巢期间和筑巢后的栖息地选择，以更好地了解栖息地质量对繁殖雌性的影响。先前的研究受到

Grassland birds are in steep decline throughout North America and these declines are caused mainly by regional habitat loss and degradation as a result of agricultural intensification. A key question is how can habitat quality be improved in agricultural landscapes to benefit declining grassland birds? Numerous studies have done inexpensive bird surveys to show that agricultural intensification is negatively correlated with species diversity and abundance of birds. However, these studies are insufficient for understanding how habitat restoration could increase productivity or decrease survival of sensitive species. Few studies have tested how different agricultural habitats impact the breeding success of declining grassland species. There is also an urgent need to study habitat selection of grassland songbirds in agricultural landscapes, both during and after nesting, to better understand how habitat quality affects breeding females. Prior studies have been hampered by