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The article attempts to document and quantify the decline of the European roller Coracias garrulus in Cyprus. Data used was based on three different methods to census the species in western Cyprus, one being part of the overall bird monitoring programme where breeding birds were censused 2006-2011 along 38 transects covering the full altitudinal range and main land-use types in western Cyprus. It suggests minimal effect on migrant and breeding Roller populations in Cyprus.

Little is known about bee communities and pollination services conservation strategies in sub-Sahara Africa. A study was conducted at 26 different sites with varying local landscape characteristics in farmlands of central Uganda in 2006. Bees were sampled using coloured pantraps, handnet and line transect counts. Overall 80,883 bee individuals from 6 families and 652 species were encountered. The bee fauna was characterized by a lower diversity of Melittidae and Andrenidae and a high diversity of Apidae, Megachilidae and Halictidae. Megachile and Lasioglossum were the two most species-rich genera. The most abundant species was Apis mellifera adansonii Linnaeus (23 % of total individuals) followed by Hypotrigona gribodoi Magretti (19 %), Meliponula ferruginea Lepeletier (13 %), Lasioglossum ugandicum Cockerell (7 %), Apis mellifera scutellata Latreille (6 %), Allodapula acutigera Cockerell (6 %), Ceratina rufigastra Cockerell (5 %), Ceratina tanganyicensis Strand (5 %), Braunsapis angolensis Cockerell (5 %) , Megachile rufipes Fabricius (5 %), Meliponula bocandei Spinola (5 %) and Seladonia jucundus Smith (5 %). The mean number of species recorded per study site per day ranged between 14 and 49, whereas the abundance ranged between 188 and 1,859 individuals. Study sites in areas with intense land-use had species-poor bee communities compared to sites with medium to low land-use intensities. Study sites with riparian forest fragments and wetlands, or with forest fallows in their vicinity had significantly ( P < 0.05) higher species richness and diversity than sites dominated by small-scale monoculture/polyculture fields or sites dominated by either simple or complex traditional agroforestry systems. An ordination analysis also revealed that bee communities were significantly ( P < 0.01) influenced by the presence of semi-natural habitats (woodlands, fallows) and forest fragments in the surrounding of fields. Thus, natural and semi-natural habitats are of great value for afrotropical farmland bee communities. There is a need to put in place strategies and policies for semi-natural and forest fragments preservation for spatio-temporal stability of pollination services in rural landscapes. Farmers are recommended to increase on-farm trees cover to safeguard and enhance pollination function and services in fields. Mimicking natural vegetation through promoting establishment of forest plantations and village community forestry in rural landscapes is also critical for conserving pollination services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports and discusses methods used to ascertain vulture populations in Uganda, Africa, from 2011-2012.

The article discusses counts of vulture carcasses in Uganda and a revised proposal for a monitoring protocol. It says that a note by Pomeroy and colleagues reveal that 319 vultures came to goat carcasses at various sites in Uganda in 2003 which were adopted in 2005 since there were no breeding colonies of the said animal in the country, although Bramford and colleagues described in 2009 that there seems to be potential suitable sites. Moreover, counts in 2009 were in four savanna parks with one cow per site unlike in 2003 wherein site used had two sites each with two goat carcasses. It also mentions comparable results in 2003 were similar in 2009 although there were differences in methods used. It suggests that cows are more suitable as bait and more vultures would have counted.

Comments on implications of bird conservation for biodiversity conservation in South Africa. Measures of bird biodiversity; Enumeration of things for consideration in using biodiversity data for conservation planning; Effect of species diversity on habitat diversity.

In this paper we compare the use of transect counts with a simpler method of investigating bird diversity and numbers, particularly in terrestrial habitats, both natural and non-natural. Transect Counts (TCs) have long been widely used, whereas Timed Species Counts (TSCs), which estimate relative abundance, are comparatively untried. We find that TSCs give results which are comparable to those from TCs in mostrespects, except that they can only be used indirectly for estimating population densities, and they give different measures of diversity. However, TSCs generate data on many more species much faster than do TCs and are therefore more cost-effective in most situations. In particular, TSCs are useful for community studies. We show, for example, that in natural habitats bird populations are positively correlatedwith the amount of woody vegetation, but not with rainfall. Diversity too increases with woody vegetation. Because TSCs are simple, more of them can be made for a given input of time, and hence more distributional data are obtained as an additional benefit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]