Species Composition Relative Abundance And Distribution Of Avian Fauna Of Entoto Natural Park And Escarpment

The present study was carried out to investigate avian species composition, relativernabundance and distribution in Entoto Natural Park and escarpment. It wasrnconducted from July 2009 to March 2010 during wet and dry seasons. The studyrnarea was stratified based on vegetation. Four habitat types: forest, farmland,rnchurch and eucalypts plantation were considered. Point count method wasrnemployed for forest habitat and eucalypts plantation, line transect method wasrnemployed for farmland and total count method was used for church areas. Datarnwere collected in the morning (6:30-10:00 a.m.) and late afternoon (3:30-6:00 p.m.)rnT-test and ANOVA were applied for analysis of the effect of season and habitats onrnabundance of species. A total of 124 avian species belonging to 14 orders and 44rnfamilies were identified in the study area during the wet and dry season surveys.rnDuring the dry season, highest avian diversity was observed in farmland (H’=3.73)rnfollowed by the forest (H’=2.92) whereas during the wet season highest avianrndiversity was observed in forest (H’=3.98) followed by church areas (H’=3.25).rnHighest number of species was recorded on farmland and forest during the dry andrnwet seasons, respectively. Simpson’s Similarity Index showed the highest speciesrnsimilarity between forest and farmland during both wet and dry seasons. The meanrnabundance of species between habitats and seasons showed that between dry andrnwet seasons, forest (t=0.137, P>0.05), farmland (t=-0.70, P>0.05) and churchrn(t=0.662, P> 0.05) did not show significant difference in the avian abundance.rnHowever, season had an effect on the avian abundance in eucalypts plantationrn(t=2.952, P

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