Satellites, the All-Seeing Eyes in the Sky: Counting Elephant Seals from Space
Regular censuses are fundamental for the management of animal populations but, are logistically challenging for species living in remote regions. The advent of readily accessible, high resolution satellite images of earth mean that it is possible to resolve relatively small (0.6 m) objects, sufficie...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:3961415 2023-05-15T16:05:35+02:00 Satellites, the All-Seeing Eyes in the Sky: Counting Elephant Seals from Space McMahon, Clive R. Howe, Hamish van den Hoff, John Alderman, Rachael Brolsma, Henk Hindell, Mark A. 2014-03-20 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3961415 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24651378 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0092613 en eng Public Library of Science http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3961415 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24651378 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0092613 This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. CC-BY Research Article Text 2014 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0092613 2014-03-30T01:42:24Z Regular censuses are fundamental for the management of animal populations but, are logistically challenging for species living in remote regions. The advent of readily accessible, high resolution satellite images of earth mean that it is possible to resolve relatively small (0.6 m) objects, sufficient to discern large animals. To illustrate how these advances can be used to count animals in remote regions, individual elephant seals (Mirounga leonina) were counted using satellite imagery. We used an image taken on 10/10/2011 to count elephant seals (n = 1790±306 (95%CL)) on the isthmus of Macquarie Island, an estimate which overlapped with concurrent ground counts (n = 1991). The number of individuals per harem estimated using the two approaches were highly correlated, with a slope close to one and the estimated intercept also encompassing zero. This proof of concept opens the way for satellites to be used as a standard censusing technique for inaccessible and cryptically coloured species. Quantifying the population trends of higher order predators provides an especially informative and tractable indicator of ecosystem health. Text Elephant Seals Macquarie Island Mirounga leonina PubMed Central (PMC) PLoS ONE 9 3 e92613 |
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Research Article |
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Research Article McMahon, Clive R. Howe, Hamish van den Hoff, John Alderman, Rachael Brolsma, Henk Hindell, Mark A. Satellites, the All-Seeing Eyes in the Sky: Counting Elephant Seals from Space |
topic_facet |
Research Article |
description |
Regular censuses are fundamental for the management of animal populations but, are logistically challenging for species living in remote regions. The advent of readily accessible, high resolution satellite images of earth mean that it is possible to resolve relatively small (0.6 m) objects, sufficient to discern large animals. To illustrate how these advances can be used to count animals in remote regions, individual elephant seals (Mirounga leonina) were counted using satellite imagery. We used an image taken on 10/10/2011 to count elephant seals (n = 1790±306 (95%CL)) on the isthmus of Macquarie Island, an estimate which overlapped with concurrent ground counts (n = 1991). The number of individuals per harem estimated using the two approaches were highly correlated, with a slope close to one and the estimated intercept also encompassing zero. This proof of concept opens the way for satellites to be used as a standard censusing technique for inaccessible and cryptically coloured species. Quantifying the population trends of higher order predators provides an especially informative and tractable indicator of ecosystem health. |
format |
Text |
author |
McMahon, Clive R. Howe, Hamish van den Hoff, John Alderman, Rachael Brolsma, Henk Hindell, Mark A. |
author_facet |
McMahon, Clive R. Howe, Hamish van den Hoff, John Alderman, Rachael Brolsma, Henk Hindell, Mark A. |
author_sort |
McMahon, Clive R. |
title |
Satellites, the All-Seeing Eyes in the Sky: Counting Elephant Seals from Space |
title_short |
Satellites, the All-Seeing Eyes in the Sky: Counting Elephant Seals from Space |
title_full |
Satellites, the All-Seeing Eyes in the Sky: Counting Elephant Seals from Space |
title_fullStr |
Satellites, the All-Seeing Eyes in the Sky: Counting Elephant Seals from Space |
title_full_unstemmed |
Satellites, the All-Seeing Eyes in the Sky: Counting Elephant Seals from Space |
title_sort |
satellites, the all-seeing eyes in the sky: counting elephant seals from space |
publisher |
Public Library of Science |
publishDate |
2014 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3961415 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24651378 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0092613 |
genre |
Elephant Seals Macquarie Island Mirounga leonina |
genre_facet |
Elephant Seals Macquarie Island Mirounga leonina |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3961415 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24651378 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0092613 |
op_rights |
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0092613 |
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PLoS ONE |
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9 |
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e92613 |
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