Using soundscapes to investigate homogenization of tropical forest diversity in selectively logged forests

Selective logging in tropical forests changes the local number of animal species (alpha diversity), but it also likely affects species turnover (beta diversity). Whilst such changes are documented in many ecosystems under different disturbances, they are poorly understood in selectively logged tropical forests. By using soundscape recordings across broad spatial scales, we measured soundscape saturation and dissimilarity of pairs of soundscapes, as a proxy of alpha and beta diversity, respectively, in selectively logged and protected tropical forest in Indonesian Borneo. Soundscapes of selectively logged forests were more homogeneous than the soundscapes of never logged forest, and that soundscape saturation of protected forest was higher during the day and lower at night in comparison with selective logging concessions. Synthesis and applications. Selectively logged forests act as an important reservoir of biodiversity. Optimizing such production forests for biodiversity conservation requires the consideration of the total continuous area that is assigned to selective logging, and spatial arrangement of annual cutting blocks, as these could affect beta diversity and its recovery.