Alejandro A. Schaaf‡, Ever Tallei§, Natalia Politi§, Luis Rivera§Corresponding author: Alejandro A. Schaaf ( schaaf.alejandro@gmail.com ) Academic editor: Ana Maria Leal-Zanchet © Alejandro A. Schaaf, Ever Tallei, Natalia Politi, Luis Rivera. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation:
Schaaf AA, Tallei E, Politi N, Rivera L (2019) Cavity-tree use and frequency of response to playback by the Tropical Screech-Owl in northwestern Argentina. Neotropical Biology and Conservation 14(1): 99-107. https://doi.org/10.3897/neotropical.14.e34839 |  |
The Tropical Screech-Owl (Megascops choliba) is a nocturnal raptor with a wide distribution across the Neotropics, which uses cavity trees as nesting and roosting sites. Our objectives were to address cavity use by the Tropical Screech-Owl in the piedmont forest of Argentina and to evaluate if logging affects the availability of suitable cavities for nesting and roosting and the frequency of response of the species to playback. The Tropical Screech-Owl used trees with DBH values > 46 cm of three tree species (69% Calycophyllum multiflorum, 15% Phyllostylon rhamnoides, and 8% Cedrela angustifolia), besides standing dead trees (8%). The density of suitable cavities was significantly lower in logged forests than in the control site. The frequency of response of the species to playback was significantly lower at one logged site. Our results can contribute to delineate sustainable forest management to ensure the conservation of this owl in logged forest.