Is landscape change driving declines in breeding bird populations in the North Central United States?
Breeding Bird populations are declining, and conservationists want to know why. In the North Central Region approximately 25% of bird species surveyed by the North American Breeding Bird Survey have declined significantly in abundance since 1966. International bird conservation efforts such as the North American Bird Conservation Initiative (NABCI) need information on factors causing declines in bird numbers. Previous studies indicate potential negative affects of changes in land use including habitat loss, fragmentation, and urbanization. However, there are no regional scale analyses linking temporal changes in land use and land cover to change in bird populations. The North American Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) is one of the most extensive surveys of any wildlife species. Data from the survey allow large-scale and long-term (>30 years) analyses of population trends. Trend analyses of BBS data were one of the primary factors initially alerting biologists to declines of many bird species
