Limestone karst habitats are threatened globally by quarrying for production of concrete and cement. A significant area of limestone karst shared among the provinces of Saraburi, Lopburi and Nakhon Ratchasima in Thailand encompasses the entire global range of a threatened bird taxon, the Rufous Limestone Babbler Gypsophila calcicola. We estimate that 10% of the suitable habitat for this species had already been lost to quarrying by 2020, and the extension of already proposed concessions could increase this to one-quarter, with the total area impacted by proposed future quarrying as great as 273 km2, or one and a half times greater than the entire area thought to support the species, within a few years. Only 2.66 km2 (1.4% of the species’ range) has received formal habitat protection as national park. We propose further surveys of the babbler be incorporated as part of a wider biotic survey of the Saraburi Group Limestones, leading to the development of an integrated management and zoning plan that takes account of the distributional knowledge of other threatened endemic taxa of this region.

石灰岩岩溶栖息地在全球范围内受到用于生产混凝土和水泥的采石的威胁。泰国北标府、华富里和呵叻府共有一个重要的石灰岩喀斯特地区，包括整个全球范围内的受威胁鸟类分类群——红褐色石灰岩巴布勒满天星（Gypsophila calcicola）。我们估计，到 2020 年，该物种 10% 的适宜栖息地已经因采石而丧失，而将已提议的特许权延长至四分之一，受提议的未来采石影响的总面积高达 273 平方公里2，或在几年内比认为支持该物种的整个区域大一倍半。仅 2.66 公里2（该物种范围的 1.4%）已作为国家公园获得正式的栖息地保护。我们建议将进一步的巴布勒调查纳入对北标石灰岩的更广泛生物调查的一部分，从而制定综合管理和分区计划，该计划考虑到该地区其他受威胁的地方性分类群的分布知识。