Feathering the Scene: The Effects of Ecological Restoration on Birds and the Role Birds Play in Evaluating Restoration Outcomes

Ecological restoration is a promising strategy to reverse biodiversity loss from habitat degradation worldwide. Historically, animals have received little attention within restoration activities, but in the last decade birds have been widely incorporated into restoration ecology research. Increasing our knowledge regarding birds within the restoration process should aid the development of novel approaches to perform restoration activities that consider all the components of ecosystems. In this review, we compile the literature related to birds and the restoration process, extract its general trends, summarize restoration recommendations, identify knowledge gaps, and suggest areas for future research. We classified the reviewed literature into 4 themes: 1) ecological dynamics; 2) habitat restoration for bird conservation; 3) birds as bioindicators of restoration outcomes; and 4) birds as guides for the restoration process. In general, research from temperate zones has been performed mainly within the United States (67% of reviewed literature), and our understanding of tropical ecosystems is very incomplete. The majority of reviewed literature (64.8%) analyzed the ornithological component of the restoration process from an ecological dynamics approach. Based on our findings, we suggest that particular properties of restoration activities (e.g., size of restored sites, habitat type, characteristics of contiguous habitats) should be contemplated when considering birds within the restoration context.