Woodlark (Lullula arborea) is a protected species in five SPA areas in Slovenia, namely Banjšice, Goričko, Kras, Snežnik-Pivka, and Vipavski rob. The highest population densities are found in SPA Goričko and SPA Kras.
Therefore, we analyzed these two areas with regard to how their populations vary depending on the favorable land area. The favorable land use was vineyards, extensive orchards, permanent meadows, overgrown farmland, forest tree plantation, and uncultivated farmland. The larger the favorable area in a year, the higher the number of woodlark populations recorded that year. Thus, we can confirm that there is a significant positive correlation between
population size and favorable area, both for the SPA Goričko (r = 0.773) and for SPA Kras (r = 0.593). By analyzing the population size and the ratio of forest to a favorable area, however, we found that as this ratio decreases, the population size increases in SPA Kras (r = -0.432). In SPA Goričko, however, the picture is different because this ratio increases. The population size also increases (r = 0.039) because the species in this area need the forest edge and individual trees mainly as a hiding place against threats.
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