Conservation of birds in fragmented landscapes requires protected areas
Open accessAbstract
For successful conservation of biodiversity, it is vital to know whether protected areas in increasingly fragmented landscapes effectively safeguard species. However, how large habitat fragments must be, and what level of protection is required to sustain species, remains poorly known. We compiled a global dataset on almost 2000 bird species in 741 forest fragments varying in size and protection status, and show that protection is associated with higher bird occurrence, especially for threatened species. Protection becomes increasingly effective with increasing size of forest fragments. For forest fragments >50 ha our results show that strict protection (International Union for Conservation of Nature [IUCN] categories I–IV) is strongly associated with higher bird occurrence, whereas fragments had to be at least 175 ha for moderate protection (IUCN categories V and VI) to have a positive effect. This meta‐analysis quantifies the importance of fragment size, protection status, and their interaction for the conservation of bird species communities, and stresses that protection should not be limited to large pristine areas.
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Even in highly urbanized settings, eastern national parks and other protected forests support higher-integrity bird communities than the surrounding unprotected lands.
“Even in highly urbanized settings, eastern national parks and other protected forests support higher-integrity bird communities than the surrounding unprotected lands (Goodwin & Shriver, 2014;Timmers et al., 2022).”
From Overabundant deer and invasive plants drive widespread regeneration debt in eastern United States national parks (2023) · cites this paper as Timmers et al., 2022
The Conclusions (page not available in our copy) report higher bird occurrence associated with protection in sufficiently large forest fragments across a global dataset. They do not establish the claim specifically for highly urbanized eastern national parks or measure bird-community integrity relative to surrounding unprotected lands. (LLM, conf=0.87)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
The citation lists haven’t been fetched yet
References 41 · Cited by 79
Research works printed but not linked: 4
- Kellner KF and Swihart RK. 2014. Accounting for imperfect detection in ecology: a quantitative review. PLoS ONE 9: e111436.
- Prevedello JA and Vieira MV. 2010. Does the type of matrix matter? A quantitative review of the evidence. Biodivers Conserv 19: 1205-23.
- UNEP-WCMC and IUCN (UN Environment Programme-World Conservation Monitoring Centre and International Union for Conservation of Nature). 2020. Protected planet: World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA). Cambridge, UK, and Gland, Switzerland: UNEP-WCMC and IUCN.
- Wintle BA, Kujala H, Whitehead A, et al. 2019. Global synthesis of conservation studies reveals the importance of small habitat patches for biodiversity. P Natl Acad Sci USA 116: 909-14. Front Ecol Environ doi:10.1002/fee.2543 · DOI
- Authors
- Timmers, R., van Kuijk, M., Verweij, P. A., Ghazoul, J., Hautier, Y., Laurance, W. F., Arriaga‐Weiss, S. L., Askins, R. A., Battisti, C., Berg, Å., Daily, G. C., Estades, C. F., Frank, B., Kurosawa, R., Pojar, R. A., Woinarski, J. C., & Soons, M. B.
- Affiliations
- Utrecht University (NL)
- Ecology & Biodiversity Group Department of Biology Utrecht University Utrecht The Netherlands
- James Cook University (AU)
- División Académica de Ciencias Biológicas Universidad Juárez Autónoma de Tabasco Villahermosa Mexico
- Connecticut College (US)
- LTER-Italy (IT)
- Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SE)
- Stanford University (US)
- University of Chile (CL)
- Regional Parks Capital Regional District of Victoria Victoria Canada
- The Japan Bird Research Association (JP)
- Biologist and College Instructor Smithers Canada
- Charles Darwin University (AU)
- Corresponding author
- Timmers, Robert
- ORCID
- Venue
- Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2022-03-23
- Volume
- 20
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 361-369
- ISSN
- 1540-9295 (ISSN-L)
- 1540-9309
- OpenAlex
- W4289308563
- Cited by
- 79
- References
- 41
- Citations by year
- 2026: 12 · 2025: 28 · 2024: 23 · 2023: 10 · 2022: 5
- FWCI
- 8.79
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- KNAW Research Portal (The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Repository for Publications and Research Data (ETH Zurich) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- ResearchOnline at James Cook University (James Cook University) (acceptedVersion)
- ResearchOnline at James Cook University (James Cook University) (submittedVersion)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Utrecht University Repository (Utrecht University) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- KNAW research portal (Royal Academy of Art and Sciences (KNAW)) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- ETH Zürich Research Collection
- Funders
- Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Avian ecology and behavior
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Nature and Landscape Conservation › Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management
- Keywords
- bird conservation, forest fragmentation, protected areas, threatened species, bird occurrences, species communities, biodiversity conservation
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
