Status of Nahan’s Partridge Ptilopachus nahani (Dubois, 1905) (Aves: Galliformes: Odontophoridae) in Uganda
We carried out a survey of Nahan’s Partridge Ptilopachus nahani in the Ugandan forests of Mabira, Bugoma, and Budongo from December 2016 to December 2017, using a point count method employing a call playback technique. The aim was to establish the population status of this globally threatened species, which was last surveyed in 2003. Separate analyses of the number of groups per point and those involving use of the Distance Program yielded the same density estimates, indicating that either method reliably estimates the density of the species. The density estimates for the three reserves were 31.6, 25.2, and 13.3 groups per km2 for Bugoma, Budongo, and Mabira forest reserves, respectively. In the last 14 years, it appears that the density of the species for Uganda has increased from 16.3 to 23.4 groups per km2, which when extrapolated translates to 16,000 and 23,000 groups, respectively. This represents a 44% increase in density, or a group growth rate of 450 per year. The lowest density and population increment was registered in Mabira and we attribute this to the apparently high incidence of disturbance and degradation of this forest compared to the other two. Since Mabira, Bugoma, and Budongo are the only remaining large tropical rainforest reserves in Uganda, strengthening their conservation or upgrading their conservation status to national parks is required to save the species.