Winter avifauna in the Buzuluksky Pine Forest National Park (Russia) and its landscape-biotopic differentiation

• Published in: Nature Conservation Research: Заповедная наука Vol. 10; no. 2
• Main Authors: Barbazyuk, Evgeny V., Velmovsky, Pavel V.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English; Russian
• Published: 2025
• ISSN: 2500-008X
• DOI: 10.24189/ncr.2025.010

Buzuluksky Pine Forest National Park (Russia) is an isolated forest with a total area of 866 km2, located entirely in the steppe biome in the south-east of the East European Plain. Route quantitative counts during the frosty period were carried out according to the Russian generally accepted methodology of Yu.S. Ravkin in 2012, 2013 and 2024. The total length of the counting route was 160.2 km, including 87.1 km in the deciduous forest and 73.1 km in the pine forest. The assessment of species diversity in two habitats was performed based on the number of species and their abundance using rarefaction curves, ANOSIM, NMDS, SIMPER methods, and the IndVal index. A comparison of the winter avifauna of the pine forest and deciduous forest in the Buzuluksky Pine Forest National Park showed that these two habitats differed in the abundance of birds, but not in the species composition. In general, the abundance and number of species (species richness) were significantly higher in the deciduous forest than in the pine forest, but the species list of the pine forest was only a depleted analogue of the deciduous forest. Despite the considerable representation of Pinus sylvestris in the pool of forest-forming species of the Buzuluksky Pine Forest National Park (50.8%), the pine forest in winter did not have a specific avifauna, i.e. it had no indicator species, which sustainably inhabited its area. Of the 33 bird species found in total, 30 species were recorded in the deciduous forest and 22 species in the pine forest. Non-parametric tests showed that the total abundance of species, both in absolute and average values, was significantly higher in the deciduous forest. Four species made the greatest contribution to the heterogeneity of the two habitats: Parus montanus, Spinus spinus, Acanthis flammea, and Pyrrhula pyrrhula. In total, the contribution of these species was 62.3% according to the SIMPER test results. The comparison of species diversity in two habitats by the ANOSIM test showed a low and statistically non-significant level of differences. The low R value did not allow us to talk about fundamentally different sets of bird species in these two forest types. The IndVal index indicated a very low biotopical relationship of birds with the pine forest. In pine forests, there were not only reliably important indicator species, but also species with an index value above 60%. On the other hand, several statistically significant indicator species were found in the deciduous forest and a group of species with IndVal index values above 60%. In winter, Dendrocopos leucotos, Pyrrhula pyrrhula, Corvus cornix, Sitta europaea, Dryocopus martius, and also Spinus spinus, Acanthis flammea, Parus caeruleus, Parus major, Garrulus glandarius, and Certhia familiaris were well associated with the deciduous forest type. The lack of significant indicator species in the pine forest during the frosty period, which demonstrate strong relationship with this habitat, might probably be explained by the island character of these steppe pine forests, and their isolation from the areas of boreal avifauna. Artificial and structurally deficient pine plantings, compared to well-structured natural forests, the percentage of which was more than half of the total pine forest area, could also contribute to the depletion of the avifaunistic complex of this habitat type.