Utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology
Marine ecosystems are heavily influenced by a wide range of human-related impacts, and thus monitoring is essential to preserve and manage these sensitive habitats. Seabirds are considered important bioindicators of the oceans, but accessing breeding populations can be difficult, expensive and time...
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Online Access: | http://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/3031388/ https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0208995 |
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ftunivliverpool:oai:livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk:3031388 2023-05-15T18:07:12+02:00 Utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology De Pascalis, Federico Collins, Philip M Green, Jonathan A Paiva, Vitor Hugo Rodrigues 2018 http://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/3031388/ https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0208995 eng eng Public Library of Science (PLoS) De Pascalis, Federico, Collins, Philip M and Green, Jonathan A orcid:0000-0001-8692-0163 (2018) Utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology. PLOS ONE, 13 (12). e0208995-. Article NonPeerReviewed 2018 ftunivliverpool https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0208995 2023-01-19T23:33:10Z Marine ecosystems are heavily influenced by a wide range of human-related impacts, and thus monitoring is essential to preserve and manage these sensitive habitats. Seabirds are considered important bioindicators of the oceans, but accessing breeding populations can be difficult, expensive and time consuming. New technologies have been employed to facilitate data collection on seabirds that can reduce costs and minimize disturbance. Among these, the use of time-lapse photography is a potentially effective way to reduce researcher effort, while collecting valuable information on key ecological parameters. However, the feasibility of this approach remains uncertain. Here, we assessed the use of time-lapse photography as a tool for estimating foraging behaviour from breeding seabirds, and evaluate ways forward for this method. We deployed cameras in front of active nests at a colony of black-legged kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla) during two breeding seasons, 5 nests in 2013 and 5 in 2014, taking pictures every 4 minutes. A subsample of monitored individuals were also equipped with accelerometers. Approximately 100,000 frames, covering incubation and chick-rearing periods, were analysed. Estimates of foraging trip duration from images were positively correlated with accelerometry estimates (R2 = 0.967). Equal partitioning of effort between pairs, predation events, nest attendance patterns and variation in trip metrics with breeding stage were also identified. Our results suggest that time-lapse photography is potentially a useful tool for assessing foraging trip duration and other fine-scale nesting ecology parameters as well as for assessing the effect of bio-logging devices on seabird foraging behaviour. Nevertheless, the time investment to manually extract data from images was high, and the process to set up cameras was not straightforward. To encourage wide use of time-lapse photography in seabird ecology, we thus provide guidelines for camera deployment and we suggest a need for further development of automated ... Article in Journal/Newspaper rissa tridactyla The University of Liverpool Repository PLOS ONE 13 12 e0208995 |
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The University of Liverpool Repository |
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ftunivliverpool |
language |
English |
description |
Marine ecosystems are heavily influenced by a wide range of human-related impacts, and thus monitoring is essential to preserve and manage these sensitive habitats. Seabirds are considered important bioindicators of the oceans, but accessing breeding populations can be difficult, expensive and time consuming. New technologies have been employed to facilitate data collection on seabirds that can reduce costs and minimize disturbance. Among these, the use of time-lapse photography is a potentially effective way to reduce researcher effort, while collecting valuable information on key ecological parameters. However, the feasibility of this approach remains uncertain. Here, we assessed the use of time-lapse photography as a tool for estimating foraging behaviour from breeding seabirds, and evaluate ways forward for this method. We deployed cameras in front of active nests at a colony of black-legged kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla) during two breeding seasons, 5 nests in 2013 and 5 in 2014, taking pictures every 4 minutes. A subsample of monitored individuals were also equipped with accelerometers. Approximately 100,000 frames, covering incubation and chick-rearing periods, were analysed. Estimates of foraging trip duration from images were positively correlated with accelerometry estimates (R2 = 0.967). Equal partitioning of effort between pairs, predation events, nest attendance patterns and variation in trip metrics with breeding stage were also identified. Our results suggest that time-lapse photography is potentially a useful tool for assessing foraging trip duration and other fine-scale nesting ecology parameters as well as for assessing the effect of bio-logging devices on seabird foraging behaviour. Nevertheless, the time investment to manually extract data from images was high, and the process to set up cameras was not straightforward. To encourage wide use of time-lapse photography in seabird ecology, we thus provide guidelines for camera deployment and we suggest a need for further development of automated ... |
author2 |
Paiva, Vitor Hugo Rodrigues |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
De Pascalis, Federico Collins, Philip M Green, Jonathan A |
spellingShingle |
De Pascalis, Federico Collins, Philip M Green, Jonathan A Utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology |
author_facet |
De Pascalis, Federico Collins, Philip M Green, Jonathan A |
author_sort |
De Pascalis, Federico |
title |
Utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology |
title_short |
Utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology |
title_full |
Utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology |
title_fullStr |
Utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology |
title_full_unstemmed |
Utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology |
title_sort |
utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology |
publisher |
Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
publishDate |
2018 |
url |
http://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/3031388/ https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0208995 |
genre |
rissa tridactyla |
genre_facet |
rissa tridactyla |
op_relation |
De Pascalis, Federico, Collins, Philip M and Green, Jonathan A orcid:0000-0001-8692-0163 (2018) Utility of time-lapse photography in studies of seabird ecology. PLOS ONE, 13 (12). e0208995-. |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0208995 |
container_title |
PLOS ONE |
container_volume |
13 |
container_issue |
12 |
container_start_page |
e0208995 |
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1766179169490698240 |