Montane avifauna of Pantepui: species distribution modelling and case study on serra da Mocidade, Brazil

The Pantepui is a biogeographic region formed by tabular mountains, known as tepuis, and other types of mountains. The region is of great scientific interest due to its endemic biota and notorious inaccessibility. After almost two centuries of ornithological studies, knowledge about the Pantepui avifauna is still far from complete. In this study, we constructed an extensive database of species occurrences and used the Maxent algorithm to model the distribution of montane species considered characteristic of Pantepui. Subsequently, we compared the results of suitability generated in the models with empirical records from an expedition to Serra da Mocidade, a previously unexplored mountain range, located in the state of Roraima, in northern Amazonian Brazil. We modeled the distribution of 94 Pantepui montane bird species, of which 41 were recorded in Serra da Mocidade and only two of them were not predicted with precision by the modelling. Of the other 53 Pantepui species not found on Mocidade, many were predicted to occur. Some of these may have been present but gone undetected; however, we believe that most of them either lack appropriate habitat on Mocidade, were predicted to occur incorrectly due to some lack of relevant variables in the model, or were unable to colonize or remain established on Mocidade due to its high degree of isolation. This study adds knowledge about the montane bird species of Pantepui, a very little studied region, and emphasizes the importance of studies in smaller or more isolated mountains of this biogeographic region.