Abstract In this study, we propose a novel strategy for identifying potential hotspots of avian roadkills in Europe. The proposed approach combines information about the spatial distribution of bird species at a comparatively higher risk of roadkill with data on road density. First, using a large dataset collected from several European studies and reports, we extracted the frequency of occurrence of bird casualties for 209 breeding bird species recorded in roadkill events. We standardized the relative frequency of roadkill from 0 (species never recorded in bird casualties' reports) to 1 (species with the higher number of roadkill's), obtaining a continuous variable that indicates the potential risk of roadkill species by species. Second, using published data on the spatial distribution of breeding bird species in Europe, we calculated the cumulative risk of roadkill in each bird assemblages, by considering the sum of the values estimated for each species in the previous step. Third, we calculated the road density in each spatial unit. Finally, we elaborate a forecasting map of potential avian roadkill-risk across Europe, by combining the data on road density and cumulative roadkill risk of bird communities. The tool proposed can help to identify potential hotspots at different spatial scales where the risk of avian roadkill is high, offering the possibility to improve conservation measures in road planning. Briefly, the prediction of where there is aligned convergence between communities with highly ranked species and landscapes with dense road networks can be used in procedures modelling wildlife-car collisions, for transportation mitigation projects.

中文翻译：

---

欧洲鸟类道路死亡风险预测图：识别潜在热点的工具

摘要 在这项研究中，我们提出了一种新的策略来识别欧洲鸟类道路死亡的潜在热点。拟议的方法将有关道路死亡风险相对较高的鸟类物种的空间分布信息与道路密度数据相结合。首先，我们使用从几项欧洲研究和报告中收集的大型数据集，提取了道路死亡事件中记录的 209 种繁殖鸟类的鸟类伤亡发生频率。我们将道路死亡的相对频率从 0（鸟类伤亡报告中从未记录的物种）标准化到 1（道路死亡数量较多的物种），获得了一个连续变量，该变量表明不同物种的道路死亡物种的潜在风险。其次，利用已发表的欧洲繁殖鸟类空间分布数据，通过考虑上一步中每个物种估计值的总和，我们计算了每个鸟类组合中道路死亡的累积风险。第三，我们计算了每个空间单元中的道路密度。最后，我们通过结合鸟类群落的道路密度和累积道路死亡风险数据，详细阐述了整个欧洲潜在鸟类道路死亡风险的预测图。提议的工具可以帮助识别不同空间尺度上鸟类道路死亡风险高的潜在热点，为改进道路规划中的保护措施提供了可能性。简而言之，预测具有高等级物种的社区和具有密集道路网络的景观之间的一致收敛位置可用于模拟野生动物与汽车碰撞的程序，用于交通缓解项目。