Data from: Sound settlement: noise surpasses land cover in explaining breeding habitat selection of secondary cavity nesting birds

Birds breeding in heterogeneous landscapes select nest sites by cueing in on a variety of factors from landscape features and social information to the presence of natural enemies. We focus on determining the relative impact of anthropogenic noise on nest site occupancy, compared to amount of forest cover, which is known to strongly influence the selection process. We examine chronic, industrial noise from natural gas wells directly measured at the nest box as well as site-averaged noise, using a well-established field experimental system in northwestern New Mexico. We hypothesized that high levels of noise, both at the nest site and in the environment, would decrease nest box occupancy. We set up nest boxes using a geospatially paired control and experimental site design and analyzed four years of occupancy data from four secondary cavity nesting birds common to the Colorado Plateau. We found different effects of noise and landscape features depending on species, with strong effects of noise observed in breeding habitat selection of Myiarchus cinerascens, the ash-throated flycatcher, and Sialia currucoides, the mountain bluebird. In contrast, percent forest cover less frequently explained habitat selection for those species or had a smaller standardized effect than the acoustic environment. Although forest cover characterization and management is commonly employed by natural resource managers, our results show that characterizing and managing the acoustic environment should be an important tool in protected area management.

在异质景观（heterogeneous landscapes）中繁殖的鸟类，会通过综合多种线索来选择巢址，这些线索涵盖景观特征、社会信息乃至天敌的存在等诸多因素。本研究旨在明确人为噪音（anthropogenic noise）对巢址占用率的相对影响，并将其与已知对巢址选择过程具有显著调控作用的森林覆盖度进行对比分析。本研究依托新墨西哥州西北部一套成熟的野外实验系统，对巢箱处直接测得的天然气井长期工业噪音，以及样点平均噪音水平开展了检测与分析。我们提出研究假设：巢址及周边环境的高噪音水平会降低巢箱的占用率。研究团队采用空间配对的对照与实验样点设计布设巢箱，并分析了科罗拉多高原（Colorado Plateau）常见的4种次生洞栖鸟类为期4年的巢箱占用数据。结果显示，噪音与景观特征的影响效应因物种而异：噪音对灰喉蝇霸鹟（Myiarchus cinerascens，ash-throated flycatcher）和山蓝鸲（Sialia currucoides，mountain bluebird）的繁殖生境选择具有显著影响。相较而言，森林覆盖度对这两个物种的生境选择解释度更低，其标准化效应量也显著低于声学环境。尽管自然资源管理者通常会采用森林覆盖度表征与管理手段，但本研究结果表明，对声学环境进行表征与管理，应当成为保护区管理中的一项重要工具。