Avifaunal Diversity of Government Science College Campus, Chitradurga, Karnataka, India: First Systematic Documentation from an Institutional Campus in the Semi-Arid Deccan Plateau
¹Noorunnissa M. Navalgund, ¹Sathishagouda S, ¹Veena Ammanna, ¹Gurudev Mali, ¹Akshay V Deshpande, and ¹Muhammed Zafar Iqbal A.N.
¹Department of Zoology, Government Science College, Chitradurga - 577501 (India) *Corresponding author: Muhammed Zafar Iqbal A.N. Email: zafarin@gmail.com
ABSTRACT
Institutional campuses in semi-arid landscapes represent understudied but ecologically significant refuges for urban avifauna. We report the first systematic avifaunal survey of the 25-acre campus of Government Science College (GSC), Chitradurga (14°13’N, 76°24’E), Karnataka, India — situated in the semi-arid Deccan Plateau of central Karnataka, a region historically underrepresented in Indian ornithological literature. Crepuscular surveys using fixed-width line transects (four transects, 25 m detection radius) and supplementary fixed-radius point counts were conducted over seven consecutive days (11–17 May 2026). A total of 43 bird species belonging to 30 families