American Journal of Applied Sciences 11 (9): 1519-1529, 2014 ISSN: 1546-9239 © 2014 Rajpar and Zakaria, This open access article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) 3.0 license doi:10.3844/ajassp.2014.1519.1529 Published Online 11 (9) 2014 (http://www.thescipub.com/ajas.toc) Corresponding Author: Rajpar, M.N., Department of Recreation and Ecotourism, Faculty of Forestry, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM Serdang, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia 1519 Science Publications AJAS ASSESSING THE EFFECTS OF LOGGING ACTIVITIES ON AVIAN RICHNESS AND DIVERSITY IN DIFFERENT AGED POST-HARVESTED HILL DIPTEROCARP TROPICAL RAINFOREST OF MALAYSIA Rajpar, M.N. and M. Zakaria Department of Recreation and Ecotourism, Faculty of Forestry, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM Serdang, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia Received 2014-01-23; Revised 2014-04-30; Accepted 2014-07-15 ABSTRACT Logging activities have encroached into the hill dipterocarp tropical rainforest area since the lowland dipterocarp forests have decreased in size. Hill dipterocarp tropical rainforest is rich in habitat diversity and provide a variety of resources for avian species such as food, habitat and shelter. Therefore it is important to examine the logging effects of hill dipterocarp rainforest on avian species. We compared the avian richness and diversity in different aged post-harvested hill dipterocarp tropical rainforest at the Berkelah Hill Dipterocarp Rainforest Reserve in Maran, Pahang, West Malaysia using mist-netting method. We captured a total of 1908 individuals representing 86 species and 29 families (i.e., 18.55% from two years post- harvested forest, 25.10% from ten years post-harvested, 23.90% from twenty years post-harvested and 32.44% from thirty five years post-harvested forests). Forty nine species were caught in two years and ten years, 55 species in twenty years and 59 species in thirty five years’ post-harvested forest. Seventeen species were common in all four types of forest. Pycnonotidae, Timaliidae and Nectariniidae were the most dominant families in all types of post-harvested hill dipterocarp tropical rainforest. Diversity analysis indicated that the bird species in twenty years post-harvested hill dipterocarp rainforest was most diverse (i.e., Fisher’s Alpha Diversity Index; 16.34) and evenly distributed (i.e., McIntosh Evenness index E; 0.933) as compared to two years, ten years and thirty five years post-harvested forest. However, thirty five years post-harvested forest was richest in avian species (i.e., Margalef’s Richness index R 1 ; 9.02) as compared to other post-harvested forest. The findings of this study revealed that logging and recovery process may affects on avian distribution and diversity. However, these effects may vary from species to species. Keywords: Birds, Rainforest, Mist-Netting, Post-Harvesting, Species Richness 1. INTRODUCTION Malaysia is blessed with a variety of forest types such as lowland dipterocarp forest, hill dipterocarp forest, upper-hill dipterocarp forest, oak-laurel forest, montane ericaceous forest, peat swamp forest, mangrove forests. Malaysian hill forests are dominated by trees of dipterocarpaceae which grows from 300 m to an altitude of 900 m. The significant feature of hill dipterocarp forest is the presence of Seraya (Shorea sp.) large size trees which most frequently grows on hill ridges with prolific undergrowth of Eugeisonna tristis (Bertam palm) and Oncosperma horridum (Thorny palm tree). These forests are the most diverse in vegetation structure and composition that supported a diversity of wildlife species especially avian which directly or indirectly depend on the forests for survival. Malaysia is rich in vegetation diversity and are home of 742 bird species which directly or indirectly use the forest