**2. Materials and Methods**

### *2.1. Study Area*

This study was conducted in Campos dos Goytacazes, RJ, Brazil, with approximately 4.037 km2 and an urban area of 87.73 km2. The total population is 507.548 thousand inhabitants, and almost 85% of the population lives in the urban area [18]. The climate is hot and humid tropical AW (Köppen-Geiger classification), with dry winter (April to September) and rainy summer (October to March), and average annual rainfall between 800 and 1200 mm [19]. The average temperature is around 26 ◦C in the hottest months and 19 ◦C in the coldest ones. Most of the vegetation found in urban areas results from public and private planting in specific places [20], modified over time. The selection of sampling points was made by marking over an aerial Google Earth image of Campos dos Goytacazes and validating the presence of vegetation in loco. Twelve urban green areas (UGAs—U1 to U12) were selected, including squares, parks and gardens. ArcGIS 10.0 was used to create location map (Figure 1).

**Figure 1.** Red dots show the location of urban green areas (U1 to U12) evaluated in this study in the urban area of Campos dos Goytacazes, RJ, Brazil (Google image of the ArcGIS database).
