Abstract:

An investigation was conducted on the bird community in restored coniferous plantations in a previous degraded forest ecosystem of Hebei Saihanba area in summers of 2005 and 2006. The bird communities were with those in the natural deciduous forest and the natural mixed forest. Totally 39 bird species in 17 families and 8 orders were recorded. The results of statistics showed that the coniferous plantations restoration had remarkable effect on the bird communities of the degraded forest ecosystem. Both the number of bird species, （4.14±0.60) species·hm^-2 and the bird density，（26.21±7.64) ind·hm^-2 in the coniferous plantations were higher or significantly higher than natural deciduous forest (P=0.018), whereas there was no significant difference in the bird densities between the coniferous forest plantations and natural mixed forest（P=0.902）. The densities of Parus palustris hellmayriand Phylloscopus inornatus inornatus significantly increased in the coniferous plantations, which increased from 2.78±0.67 ind·hm^-2 and (1.21±0.45) ind·hm^-2 to (13.57±5.58) ind·hm^-2 （P=0.027）and (5.95±1.56) ind·hm^-2 （P=0.009，0.002）, but the H′ of the coniferous forest plantations was lower （0.98±0.10） and the J was significantly lower （0.73±0.04）（P=0.003，0.045） than natural forests. There were two bird feeding guilds in the coniferous plantations, in which the composition of bird species was no significant difference with the natural recoveryed forests, but their densities had significant variation. The density of insectivore in coniferous forest plantations could improve significantly （P=0.041）, but the density of omnivore and gramnivore was significantly lower than the natural mixed forest （P=0.007，0.002）.

Key words: bird community, degraded forest ecosystem, coniferous plantations, restoration