Title: Noteworthy records of birds from the Pantanal, Chiquitano dry forest and Cerrado of south-western Brazil
Abstract: South-western Brazil is a very important area for birds in South America, with more than 700 species recorded (Dubs 1992, Tubelis & Tomas 2003), a richness explained by the presence of several major vegetation types (Brown 1986). The Pantanal is one of the largest floodplains in the world, located in the upper rio Paraguay basin (Alho & Goncalves 2005, Harris et al. 2005), and harbours an avifauna of more than 450 species (Tubelis & Tomas 2003), including 133 migrants (Nunes & Tomas 2004). The flora and fauna of the Pantanal possess biogeographical affinities with five South American ecosystems: Amazonia to the north; the Cerrado to the north, east and south; the Chiquitano dry forest to the west; the Chaco to the south-west; and the Atlantic Forest to the south-east (Brown 1986, Rizzini et al. 1991, Dubs 1992, Prado et al. 1992, Pott & Pott 1994, Rizzini 1997, Alho & Goncalves 2005, Vasconcelos & Hoffmann 2006). The Chiquitano is the largest patch of well-preserved dry forest in the Neotropics (Parker et al. 1993). This region was formerly considered as transitional between the Gran Chaco and Amazonia regions, but was recently recognised as a distinctive vegetation type (Parker et al. 1993, Davis et al. 1997). The major part of the Chiquitano dry forest is in Bolivia, with only a very restricted area in extreme western Brazil (Olson & Dinerstein 1998, Vasconcelos & Hoffmann 2006, National Geographic Society 2007, WWF 2007). The Cerrado is by far the largest savanna formation in South America, being central in relation to other biomes in the continent (Rizzini 1997, Gottsberger & Silberbauer-Gottsberger 2006). It is distributed across much of central Brazil, but also reaches extreme north-east Paraguay and eastern Bolivia (Rizzini 1997, Gottsberger & Silberbauer-Gottsberger 2006). Cerrado also occurs on the summits of isolated massifs of preCambriam origin (morrarias in Brazil / serranias in Bolivia) along the rio Paraguay and within the Chiquitano dry forest region (Dubs 1992, Bates et al. 1992, Parker et al. 1993, Pott et al. 2000). Here, we present new and noteworthy records of birds from the Pantanal, Chiquitano dry forest and Cerrado of south-west Brazil, and comment on conservation, geographic ranges, migration and hybridisation of some species.
Publication Year: 2008
Publication Date: 2008-01-01
Language: en
Type: article
Access and Citation
Cited By Count: 17
AI Researcher Chatbot
Get quick answers to your questions about the article from our AI researcher chatbot