Conhecimento etno-ornitológico de moradores da comunidade da Sabiaguaba (CE)

Abstract

Ethnobiology emerges as the science responsible for the study of traditional knowledge from a natural perspective of a population, and one of its branches is ethnozoology, which seeks to understand the knowledge of man about animals and also the uses of fauna by man. A subdivision of ethnozoology is ethno-ornithology, which is the focus of this work, which seeks to understand the knowledge of a bird community. Birds have always maintained an intimate relationship with mankind, and it continues until today, especially in traditional communities. In view of this, it is important to understand the traditional knowledge of communities, in the future, to contribute to the conservation of certain species, or the ecosystem in which they live, especially if there is a history of environmental pressures and impacts on the ecosystem in which the community is inserted. The traditional community of Sabiaguaba, also known as Boca da Barra, located in the city of Fortaleza, is a region known as a stopping point for migratory birds, as well as being a refuge for resident birds. However, the community has a history of environmental degradation, mainly due to real estate speculation, which ends up affecting the region's avifauna. The objective of this work was to evaluate the ethno-ornithological knowledge of the traditional community of Sabiaguaba, and from them to compare the ethno-knowledge about avifauna of the community with information available in the scientific literature and to identify, from this study, the disturbances in the surrounding ecosystems and their implications for the conservation of avifauna. Regular visits were made to the community and semi-structured interviews were conducted with community members, as well as guided tours. The objective of the interviews was to know and describe the community's emic knowledge, as well as to investigate the change in the composition of the region's species of birds and what caused this, based on the interviewees' perception. With the data obtained from interviews and guided tours, 62 species of birds were registered, as well as their occurrence sites. Subsequently, a table of comparative cognition was elaborated, in which the traditional knowledge was validated with what was described in scientific literature, finally, the species that are no longer observed are described along with those that are hardly seen today and the reasons that caused this. The community said that the main causes that led to the changes were construction of real estate projects and speculation that caused a loss of habitat and resources for the region's birds.