Abstract Agricultural intensification has resulted in the homogenization of landscape structure and a massive loss of farmland biodiversity. Despite various conservation attempts, farmland bird populations are continuously declining leading to local extinctions and range contractions of many species. These declines are tightly connected with decreased abundance and availability of crucial food resources within farmland, resulting in reduced reproductive success during breeding and low survival during winters of farmland bird species. Therefore, identification of high‐quality foraging habitats in farmland and its seasonal changes could be useful for farmland bird conservation. In this study, we investigated the year-round importance of manure heaps for birds in intensively-used agricultural landscapes. We compared species richness and abundance of birds on manure heaps and adjacent farmland during breeding, post-breeding and wintering seasons. Furthermore, we compared abundance and species richness between permanent and temporal manure sites. We found that abundance and species richness of all birds, farmland specialists and red-listed species were higher at manure sites than at control sites within adjacent farmland in all seasons. The differences in abundances and species richness between manure heaps and control sites were larger in winter, except for species richness of farmland specialist for which this difference was largest in spring. Additionally, we found that permanent manure sites had higher abundances and species richness of all birds and farmland specialists in autumn than temporary manure sites. In spite of the negative impact of manure facilities to surrounding environment, this study brings first comprehensive evidence of year-round importance of manure heap stands for bird communities, including species with conservation concern and thus uncovers its hidden potential for farmland bird conservation in agricultural landscapes.

中文翻译：

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粪便堆的全年相关性及其对农业景观中减少的农田鸟类的保护潜力

摘要 农业集约化导致景观结构同质化，农田生物多样性大量丧失。尽管进行了各种保护尝试，但农田鸟类的数量仍在不断减少，导致许多物种在当地灭绝和范围缩小。这些下降与农田内重要食物资源的丰度和可用性下降密切相关，导致繁殖期间繁殖成功率降低，农田鸟类在冬季存活率低。因此，识别农田优质觅食栖息地及其季节变化对农田鸟类保护具有重要意义。在这项研究中，我们调查了肥料堆在密集使用的农业景观中全年对鸟类的重要性。我们比较了繁殖、繁殖后和越冬季节粪便堆和邻近农田上鸟类的物种丰富度和丰度。此外，我们比较了永久性和临时性粪肥场所之间的丰度和物种丰富度。我们发现所有鸟类、农田专家和红色名录物种的丰度和物种丰富度在所有季节都在粪便场所高于相邻农田内的对照场所。除了农田专家的物种丰富度在春季差异最大外，冬季粪便堆与对照点之间的丰度和物种丰富度差异较大。此外，我们发现永久性粪便场地在秋季所有鸟类和农田专家的丰度和物种丰富度都高于临时粪便场地。