Survey design: Assignment

Distance sampling
1

Add your answers to the Distance sampling Survey design assignment below

Choose whether to answer the section on:

  1. Designing your own surveys, or
  2. Assisting collaborators or field staff to design a survey, where you may not know the specifics of the survey objectives/species/survey conditions yet
2

I WOULD LIKE TO MAKE AN ATTEMPT AT DESIGNING A SURVEY. HAVE AN ASSIGNMENT TO CARRY OUT ASSESSMENT OF WILDLIFE AT AN AIRPORT IN OUR AREA WHICH IS A 2KM BY 2KM PREMISE, AND MAKE RECOMMENDATIONS ON HOW THESE CAN BE CONTROLLED FOR THE SAFETY OF FLIGHT MOVEMENTS.

  1. OBJECTIVE
    -to identify animal and bird species within Survey Airport
    -to make recommendations on control measures for identified species

  2. SURVEY EFFORT
    -We conducted a pilot study at the airport premise over a length of 1.5Km, and in that length we observed a total of 10 birds and 8 small mammals. Using the recommended constant of 3 and coefficient of variation of 10%, I calculated total transect length to be:

L=(b/cv2) x (Lo/no)
=300 x 0.0833
=24.9Km

  1. SAMPLING REGIME
    a. Replicates: the minimum recommended replicates is between 10-20, because the area is small I cannot do transects more than 2Km long, therefore I can have up to 12 transects of 2Km in length each with a distance of 166m in between.

b. Repeat surveys: I will conduct a repeat survey as I am interested in data for both the wet and dry season.

c. Randomisation: I plan to use parallel transects of 2Km each, which will start randomly from the eastern fence in one survey, and western fence in the following survey. The transects will run in a perpendicular direction to the runway.

4.COVARIATES
I will consider recording of covariates of any features that may be possible wildlife attractants, such as vegetation/trees/shrubs and physical developments that may attract wildlife. These are important as they are determinants of wildlife presence in the premises.

  1. UNCERTAINTY: I still have a concern regarding application of formula for total length of transects to survey. Although the advice is to maintain high levels of accuracy, findings from a pilot study may vary according to observers and other covariants, meaning the result will be different with every pilot study. It is also still a bit unclear to me how we determine coefficient of variation, maybe I rushed through. Hope Im making sense