Spatial distribution of the Greater Rhea, Rhea americana (Linnaeus, 1758), in Rio Grande do Sul, southern Brazil: citizen-science data, probabilistic mapping, and comparison with expert knowledge

Autor: Andre Luza, Arthur Rodrigues, Louisa Mamalis, Viviane Zulian
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2023
Předmět:
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.8110725
Popis: The popularization of citizen-science platforms has increased the amount of data available in a fine spatial and temporal resolution, which can be used to fill distribution knowledge gaps through probabilistic maps. In this study we gathered expert-based information and used species distribution models to produce two independent maps of the Greater Rhea (Rhea americana, Rheiformes, Rheidae) distribution in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. We integrated municipality level detection/non-detection data from five citizen science datasets into a Bayesian site occupancy model, accounting for false negatives, sampling effort, habitat covariates, and spatial autocorrelation. We addressed whether habitat (grassland and crop field cover, number of rural properties) and spatial autocorrelation explains the realized occurrence of the species, and compared model-based and expert-based occurrence maps. The mean estimated percentage of occupied municipalities was 48% (239 out of 497 municipalities), whereas experts declared 21% of the municipalities (103) as occupied by the species. While both mapping approaches showed Greater Rhea presence in most municipalities of the Pampa biome, they disagreed in the majority of the municipalities in the Atlantic Forest, where more fieldwork must be undertaken. The Greater Rhea distribution was exclusively explained by the spatial autocorrelation component, suggesting that the Greater Rhea expanded its distribution towards the north of the state, reaching the Atlantic Forest, following deforestation and agriculture expansion. 
Databáze: OpenAIRE
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