Anthropogenic land‐use change shapes bird diversity along the eastern Himalayan altitudinal gradient

Globally, the conversion of natural forest into agricultural land and human settlement has altered avian diversity and structure often leading to functional and/or phylogenetic homogenisation. While the effects of land-use change on avian functional and phylogenetic diversity is well studied in the tropics, it is poorly understood and scarcely studied in the Himalayas, let alone in the eastern Himalayan bird communities.

This dataset comprises observations of 336 bird species from a replicated point-count transect survey conducted between 2019 and 2020 in Bhutan. We used a multispecies occupancy model to estimate occupancy probability while accounting for detection probability. The detection-corrected z-matrix was used to calculate functional and phylogenetic diversity. 

Our study shows that bird community occupancy along the elevational gradient is negatively associated with human land use (agriculture and settlement). Bird assemblages were functionally and phylogenetically clust...