Bird Abundance and Species Richness In Chicago Community Gardens

Rebecca Schnorenberg University of Illinois at Chicago

Introduction

Methods

Conclusion

Acknowledgements

Bird Species

• Community gardens are important refuges for animals

including birds

• Birds can be beneficial to the garden and gardeners

• Birds can act as pollinators and insectivores

• Birds can also negatively affect gardens by being crop

pests

• Bird abundance and species richness can be affected by

garden area and amount of shrubs or woody vegetation

• Research question: How do native and non-native species

respond to various characteristics of urban community

gardens?

• Birds were censuses twice in each garden by ‘point

count’ method

• Birds were identified by song, sight, or both

• Bird sex was identified along with if they were in the

garden or not

• Garden size and distance from water were measured by

Google Earth

• Woody vegetation was counted within the garden

• Garden characteristics were analyzed against native

and all species bird abundance along with species

richness of native species and all species

All of the birds sighted across the 25 Chicago

community gardens along with their overall

abundance

Correlation Between Variables

Garden Size Distance From

Water

Total Woody

Vegetation Count

Abundance of All

Species

+.198 -.345 -.098

Abundance of

Native Species

+.652 -.169 +.240

Species Richness

of All Species

+.847 -.169 +.630

Species Richness

of Native Species

+.892 -.102 +.623

Correlation Table

• Garden size has the greatest effect on bird abundance and

species richness

• Larger gardens have a greater abundance of birds and a

higher richness of native birds in particular

• The most prevalent species was the House Sparrow

appearing at all but one garden

Variables with highest correlation

Correlations with significant differences between bird abundance native

species (+.652) and bird abundance of all species (+.198)

Graphs of Significant Variables

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 6000 7000 8000 9000

Bird

Ab

un

da

nce

Gareden Size (sq m)

Bird Abundance (all species) vs Garden Size

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 6000 7000 8000 9000

Bird

Ab

un

da

nce

Garden Size (sq m)

Bird Abundance (native species) vs Garden Size

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 6000 7000 8000 9000

Sp

ecie

s R

ich

ne

ss

Garden Size (sq m)

Species Richness (native species) vs Garden Size

• Photos of gardens by Paul Bick

• Photos of birds found on Cornell Lab of Ornithology

Photos of Gardens