Species selection to develop an Italian farmland bird index
Campedelli T., Tellini Florenzano G., Sorace A., Fornasari L., Londi G., Mini L.Abstract:
The authors present a trial to identify a species-set on which building up an Italian national farmland bird index. Using the data of MITO2000 project (2000-2003 years), logistic regression functions were built for 98 species, selected from the 103 target species of the project, relating their presence with the surface of Corine land cover categories (II or III level). Each species was associated with a particular land use category according to the frst variable selected in the model through a stepwise procedure, taking into account only positive relationships. Out of the original 98 species, 44 showed a signifcant response to one of the ‘farmland’ land use categories, with a good correspondence with the known ecology of the species.