| Summary: | The eastern coast of China provides a network of Important Bird Areas (IBAs) as feeding and breeding habitats, as well as migratory corridors for a large variety of waterbirds. However, long-term coastal reclamation has greatly encroached on coastal wetlands and undermined their functions as waterbird habitats. To identify the impacts of coastal reclamation on waterbird habitats in 2014, we analyzed coastal wetland modifications that have been caused by various reclamation types in 38 IBAs along China's coastline by using remotely sensed data. The distribution data of major waterbird families in 15 IBAs were collected to explore their population responses to habitat modification. The densities of their population were calculated to compare the habitat preferences to the natural and modified habitats. In addition, the index of Reclamation Intensity was used to evaluate the comprehensive impacts of coastal reclamation on waterbirds. The results show that more than half of the wetland areas in the 38 IBAs have undergone modification from various types of land use. The different habitat preferences indicate that the original habitat suitability for waterbirds has been perturbed considerably by the coastal reclamation. Our findings revealed that there are still notable conservation gaps for waterbirds along China's coastline and the opportunity exists for trading off waterbird conservation versus socioeconomic benefits by wise use of artificial wetlands as alternative and provisional habitats for waterbirds. Keywords: Habitat modification, Coastal reclamation, Waterbird distribution, Habitat preference, Important bird area
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