Enhancing bird diversity via species differential analysis at the Haizhu National Wetland Park in Guangzhou, China: a case study

The Haizhu National Wetland Park (HNWP) is the only national wetland park in a central megalopolis area in China. It was established to restore and conserve a damaged composite wetland ecosystem comprising urban rivers, inner lakes, and semi‐natural forests with fruit trees in central Guangzhou. In 2013, our survey at HNWP revealed that the bird diversity was poor, which indirectly reflected the low habitat quality. Therefore, we proposed a restoration workflow based on species differential analysis (SDA) and implemented it in this area in 2013. The SDA method determined the bird species (i.e. target species) for which habitat could be restored by analyzing the existing, surrounding, and historical bird community in the area. We screened for target species using SDA and used these species as a basis for site zoning, habitat restoration projects, and recruitment measures. Both species richness and species diversity of the birds in the HNWP increased rapidly from 2014 to 2016 and remained stable in 2017 to 2018. In contrast, the species richness and species diversity in the control area where the SDA method was not used only reached the values of the area where this method was used in 2017. This shows that the SDA‐based method could improve bird diversity effectively and rapidly. In addition, the proportion of waterbirds and migratory birds in the park also increased, indicating that the habitats that were restored for the waterbirds showed an improvement in quality.