Habitat fragmentation and degradation are major problems in tropical forests, leading to a decline in biodiversity. However, it is often unclear which aspects of habitat change are responsible for the decline of specific species. Physiological studies can help identify potential stressors and elucidate causal relationships between habitat change and species decline. In this study, we measured the heterophil-to-lymphocyte (H:L)...

Tropical forest birds face mounting pressures from habitat loss, degradation, and climate warming, yet their combined effects on early‐life development remain unclear. Using over a decade of morphological and behavioural observations from Kenya's Taita Hills and 4 years of nestling corticosterone measurements across eight forest patches differing in size and degradation, we examined how forest quality and climate shape nestlin...

Human-induced habitat loss, fragmentation and degradation are among the leading causes of species decline worldwide. This is particularly true in tropical forests, where unique, often highly specialized fauna is under threat. By altering resource availability, anthropogenic habitat change can impose resource constraints on animals and may influence their allocation of resources to competing life history traits. In this study,...

Land-use change remains the main threat to tropical forests and their dependent fauna and flora, and degradation of existing forest remnants will further accelerate species loss. Forest degradation may result directly from human forest use or through spatial effects of land-use change. Understanding the drivers of forest degradation and its effects on biodiversity is pivotal for formulating impactful forest management and moni...

Habitat fragmentation can restrict geneflow, reduce neighbourhood effective population size, and increase genetic drift and inbreeding in small, isolated habitat remnants. The extent to which habitat fragmentation leads to population fragmentation, however, differs among landscapes and taxa. Commonly, researchers use information on the current status of a species to predict population effects of habitat fragmentation. Such met...

We examined the effects of habitat fragmentation of the white‐starred robin Pogonocichla stellata metapopulation in the Taita Hills archipelago, a hotspot for biodiversity which was fragmented ~40 years ago. Using seven microsatellite markers, we analysed the robin's genetic structure and tested for equilibrium between migration and drift (testing the probability of decreased dispersal) as well as between mutation and drift (t...