Effect of grassland’s mosaic structure and dynamism on the habitat suitability for the Alectoris graeca singer male in a central Apennine pastoral landscape

Over the last several decades, the Mediterranean region has been subjected to mountain abandonment and farming cessation (leading to vegetation changes and grassland coenological features) contextually to the strong decline of the rock partridge (Alectoris graeca Meisner) (Bracchetti et al. 2012). To investigate the interplay of the presence/absence of singer males and the composition and dynamism of the vegetation mosaics, the sampling design consisted in two phases, aimed to define the suitable sites of spring territorial singer males (Angelici et al. 2001), and to characterize the vegetation mosaic of such sites. We defined the presence/absence of spring territorial singing males in seven sites (1,250‐2,400 m a.s.l.), by the census in 74 playback stations, distributed along 15 transects. We characterized the topography and the vegetation mosaic of such sites according to the collected topographic and vegetation cover data in 59 randomly selected plots (100 m × 100 m) along the transects. Our results emphasized the marked overlap between the general environmental condition proved to define the habitat suitability for A. graeca and the characteristics of the site chosen by the singer male for starting the reproductive activities. Tall grass‐dominated communities and thick‐turf grasslands exert their negative effect decreasing the habitat suitability for singer male starting from very low cover values (Catorci et al. 2011). Therefore, the singer male’s suitable habitat will be dramatically restricted to the steepest aspects of the south‐facing slopes, where topographic and soil conditions do not allow the spread of closed vegetation and the invasive/dominant tall grasses expansion.