A multi-species occupancy modeling approach to access the impacts of land use and land cover on terrestrial vertebrates in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), Western Ghats, India

Urbanization is one of the main drivers in the conversion of natural habitats into different land use and land cover types (LULC) which threaten the local as well as global biodiversity. This impact is particularly alarming in tropical countries like India, where ~18% of the world's population live, and its ever-growing economy (i.e., industrial development) expanded urban areas by several folds. We undertook this study to examine the impacts of urbanization (i.e., LULC) on terrestrial vertebrates (mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians) in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), Western Ghats, India. We sampled different habitats ranged from highly disturbed urban areas to less disturbed forested areas. Multiple sampling methods such as quadrat sampling, line transect, point count, and camera trapping were used to quantify the target taxa. We used multi-species occupancy modeling in the Bayesian framework to estimate detection probability and occupancy and to assess the effect of various LULC on different species. All four groups showed a significant negative impact of increasing anthropogenic habitat cover on occupancy. Out of 213 species detected in this study, 96% of mammals, 85% of birds, 93.75% of amphibians, and 69.43% of reptiles showed a negative effect of anthropogenic habitat cover. Evidence suggests that historical and recent human disturbances could have played an important role in transforming this area from semi-evergreen and moist deciduous forest to open, scrubby, dry deciduous, and fire-prone landscape. This might be the reason for the high occupancy of open and degraded forest habitat preferring species in our study area. We recommend species-rich areas in the MMR, e.g., Karnala Bird Sanctuary (KBS) and Prabalgad-Matheran-Malanggad Hill Range (PMMHR), must be conserved through habitat restoration, ecotourism, public awareness, and policymaking.