Seasonal Dynamics of Avian Dietary and Foraging Location Guilds in Relation to Urban Land Cover Structure: A Case Study from Taizhou, China

Understanding how avian assemblages respond to seasonal dynamics within urban land-cover structure is crucial for biodiversity conservation in rapidly urbanizing environments. Here, we investigated seasonal variation in avian dietary and foraging location guilds in central Taizhou City, China. Field surveys were conducted using the line transect method from April to November 2024. We assessed seasonal changes in community composition and the relationships between bird guilds and land cover types using multi-response permutation procedure (MRPP), non-metric multidimensional scaling (NMDS), and fourth-corner analysis. Bird community composition exhibited significant seasonal variations (MRPP, p < 0.05), with NMDS ordination showing a clear seasonal separation. Foraging location guilds exhibited more pronounced seasonal fluctuations in individual abundance than the dietary guilds. The Shannon diversity index for dietary guilds peaked in spring, followed by summer and autumn, whereas foraging location guilds exhibited higher diversity in summer and autumn. Fourth-corner analysis identified significant associations between guilds and land cover types, with foraging location guilds demonstrating stronger and more consistent responses to habitat structure than dietary guilds. Together, these results indicate that in urban landscapes, the spatial arrangement of habitats may shape avian foraging behavior more strongly than food availability alone, highlighting the need to integrate both structural and resource-based habitat features into urban planning and conservation.