Diversity and trophic structure of bird’s communities from a Restinga forest in Brazil

The forests along Brazil’s Atlantic coast have undergone extensive transformation from clearing for pastures, eucalyptus forests, agricultural crops, and urban expansion. In this study we described the avian community in a coastal Restinga Forest near the city of Ubatuba, in the São Paulo State, Brazil. The method used to sample the avifauna specimens was the technique of observations per point-counts, and random observations were also carried. The bird’s observations were realized in 84 days during all four seasons out between the years 2005 and 2007 and were registered 142 bird species distributed among 18 orders and 41 families and categorized in 17 trophic guilds. The omnivores and insectivores birds composed most of the community, occupying the edge and different strata of the forest such as canopy and understory. The great abundance of omnivores birds may be directly related to the abundant fruit resources, and also with the great abundance of understory insectivores are indication of the good environmental quality of the studied area.