Line transect data on birds from Mudumalai and Upper Nilgiris, India

This dataset contains data on bird communities from variable-width line transect surveys carried out in 1995-96 in the Mudumalai Wildlife Sanctuary (now Tiger Reserve) and Upper Nilgiris, Tamil Nadu, India. The data were collected on a project of the Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore.

GEOGRAPHICAL AREA: Mudumalai Wildlife Sanctuary (now Tiger Reserve) and Upper Nilgiris, Tamil Nadu, India

TAXONOMIC SCOPE: Birds

METHODS

Bird data are from 1200 m long (0.75 miles) line transect surveys surveyed typically in about 100-120 min duration in the early morning hours. The methods for bird sampling are as described in Raman (2003) and in this doctoral thesis:Raman, T. R. S. 2001. Community ecology and conservation of mid-elevation tropical rainforest bird communities in the southern Western Ghats, India. PhD thesis, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore.

All transects were censused during the first 3 h after sunrise when bird activity was highest in the area walking at a slow, uniform pace. All birds seen (perched or flying under the canopy) or heard were recorded as to species, number (wherever possible) and perpendicular distance in the following metre classes: 0–5, 5–10, etcwith the further distance classes being wider to minimize errors in distance estimation.

USAGE NOTES

Besides this 00_README.txt file, this dataset contains the following 3 comma-delimited text files with data in columns as explained below.

01_niltrans.csvThis contains information on the line transectsdate: date of survey in year-month-date formattransect: name of transectstratum: habitat stratumdecimalLatitude: latitude in decimal degrees NdecimalLongitude: longitude in decimal degrees EcoordinateUncertaintyInMeters: approximate uncertainty in metres as exact location is unknownduration: duration of survey in minutesstartTime: transect start time in the morning in hh:mm formatendTime: transect end time in the morning in hh:mm formatweather: notes on weatherremarks: other remarks

02_nilbirds.csvThis file contains the transect bird datadate: date of survey in year-month-date formattransect: name of transectstartTime: transect start time in the morning in hh:mm formatendTime: transect end time in the morning in hh:mm formatverbatimID: bird species name as originally identified and usedeBirdIndiaName: bird species common name as per the eBird / Clements India listscientificName: bird species Latin binomial as per the eBird / Clements India listnumber: total number of individuals counted (minimum number in case of aural detections or flocks; for detections noted as 'flock' in remarks, number was assigned a minimum of 3)perpendicularDistanceInMetres: perpendicular distance band in metres heardSeenFlying: H - heard, s - Seen, F - Flyinglocation: additional notes on locationleftRight: L - left, R - rightremarks: notes if anymixedFlock: Yes or No indicating whether the particular detection was in a mixed species flock

03_nilnames.csvThis file contains the bird names: original names matched against current taxonomysequenceNumber: serial numberverbatimID: bird species name as originally identified and usedeBirdIndiaName: bird species common name as per the eBird / Clements India listscientificName: bird species Latin binomial as per the eBird / Clements India list

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: I am grateful to Dr R. Sukumar for the opportunity to survey these transects and to P. Pavithra and Palani for help with data.