Find research datasets worth reusing

opencc-by-4.0Nov 2023View details →

Monitor predation on zebra finch nest

Here, we report a detailed predation sequence, captured on film, of a sand goanna (Varanus gouldii) predating six zebra finch nestlings from a single nestbox in arid western New South Wales, Australia. The sand goanna made nine attempts to reach the nestbox by first climbing an adjacent bush and jumping onto the nestbox and eventually also by climbing up the steel post on which the box was attached.

opencc-zeroSep 2022View details →

Raspberry Pi nest cameras – an affordable tool for remote behavioural and conservation monitoring of bird nests

1. Bespoke (custom-built) Raspberry Pi cameras are increasingly popular research tools in the fields of behavioural ecology and conservation, because of their comparative flexibility in programmable settings, ability to be paired with other sensors, and because they are typically cheaper than commercially built models. 2. Here we describe a novel, Raspberry Pi-based camera system that is fully portable and yet weatherproof – especially to humidity and salt spray. The camera was paired with a passive infra-red sensor, to create a movement-triggered camera capable of recording videos over a 24-hr period. We describe an example deployment involving "retro-fitting" these cameras into artificial nest boxes on Praia Islet, Azores archipelago, Portugal, to monitor the behaviours and interspecific interactions of two sympatric species of breeding storm-petrel (Monteiro's storm-petrel Hydrobates monteiroi and Madeiran storm-petrel Hydrobates castro) during their chick-rearing periods. 3. Of the 138 deployments, 70% of all deployments were deemed to be "Successful" (Successful was defined as continuous footage being recorded for more than one hour without an interruption), which equated to 87% of the individual 30 s videos. The bespoke cameras proved to be easily portable between 54 different nests and reasonably weatherproof (~14% of deployments classed as "Partial" or "Failure" deployments were specifically due to the weather/humidity), and we make further trouble-shooting suggestions to mitigate additional weather-related failures. 4. Here we have shown that this system is fully portable and capable of coping with salt spray and humidity, and consequently the camera-build methods and scripts could be applied easily to many different species that also utilise cavities, burrows, and artificial nests, and can potentially be adapted for other wildlife monitoring situations to provide novel insights into species-specific daily cycles of behaviours and interspecies interactions.

Figure 1 in Monitoring the feeding and parental care behavior of a pair of free-living owls (Tyto furcata) in the nest during the reproductive period in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Figure 1. Couple of Tyto furcata image captured by the security camera positioned opposite from the nest.Campos dos Goytacazes, RJ.

Figure 5 in Monitoring the feeding and parental care behavior of a pair of free-living owls (Tyto furcata) in the nest during the reproductive period in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Figure 5. Day frequency that the Tyto furcata family brought food to the nest. Campos dos Goytacazes, RJ.

Figure 4 in Monitoring the feeding and parental care behavior of a pair of free-living owls (Tyto furcata) in the nest during the reproductive period in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Figure 4. Frequency that the Tyto furcata parents bring the chicks near themselves (July and August, 2017). Campos dos Goytacazes, RJ.

Figure 6 in Monitoring the feeding and parental care behavior of a pair of free-living owls (Tyto furcata) in the nest during the reproductive period in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Figure 6. Day frequency that the Tyto furcata family brought food to the nest, from laying the eggs until the chicks left the nest. Campos dos Goytacazes, RJ.

Figure 3 in Monitoring the feeding and parental care behavior of a pair of free-living owls (Tyto furcata) in the nest during the reproductive period in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Figure 3. Observation of the Tyto furcata family in the nest. (A) Female sitting on eggs in the artificial nest; (B) 25-day-old chicks; (C) Adult owl bringing food to the chicks; (D) Chicks feeding alone in the nest. Campos dos Goytacazes, RJ.

opencc-zeroApr 2023View details →

Assessment of the nesting population demography of loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta) in La Roche Percée: first long-term monitoring in New Caledonia.

Population monitoring is essential to assess, manage and protect threatened species. Although the South Pacific loggerhead turtle subpopulation is classified as critically endangered by the IUCN, monitoring data are scarce. This study reports the results of the first long-term monitoring of the nesting population of loggerhead turtles held by Bwärä Tortues Marines on La Roche Percée beach, New Caledonia. From 2006 to 2020, Capture Mark Recapture was used to identify nesting individuals. Time and nesting success were recorded on site. A total of 452 different females were observed and tagged over 14 years. The number of different nesting individuals observed each year showed a significant increase along the timeframe of the study. A remigration interval of 3.34 years was observed and the overall nesting success was 59.02%. This study also reports the inter-nesting intervals, monthly and hourly variabilities in the visits at the nesting site. The conservation actions led by Bwärä Tortues Marines seem to be correlated with a higher nesting success. This study provides encouraging results and highlights the need to pursue the monitoring and conservation actions implemented by Bwärä Tortues Marines. Further management recommendations are also provided.

publicApr 2023View details →

Assessment of the nesting population demography of loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta) in La Roche Percée: first long-term monitoring in New Caledonia.

Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.

publicFeb 2022View details →

Raspberry Pi nest cameras – an affordable tool for remote behavioural and conservation monitoring of bird nests

Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.

opencc-zeroDec 2021View details →

Caribbean Roseate Tern nest survival and monitoring data

Determining how site characteristics influence reproductive success can help guide conservation planning for declining wildlife populations. For colonially-breeding seabirds, nest survival and predation risk can be influenced by both colony and nest site characteristics such as colony size, nest density, and nest location. We evaluated reproductive success of a declining population of Roseate Terns (Sterna dougallii) in the U.S. and British Virgin Islands to identify primary causes of nest failure and investigate the influence of colony and nest site covariates on nest survival. In addition, we measured the influence of colony characteristics on chick provisioning to determine if resource competition in larger colonies affected foraging rates. Monitoring was conducted in 2017–18 via motion-triggered cameras, which enable 24-hour monitoring with minimal nest disturbance. Nest survival was defined by both hatch success and early chick success, defined as a chick surviving from hatching through the 4th post-hatch day. We monitored 118 nests in 6 colonies over the 2 breeding seasons. We found that predation was the primary cause of nest failure. Both hatch and nest success increased with colony size, and neither nest survival nor predation probability were influenced by individual nest site characteristics. Provisioning rates were comparable among colony sites and did not vary with colony size. Our results suggest that directing management efforts toward enhancing colony size, rather than focusing on nest site characteristics, can be beneficial for tropical seabird conservation.

zenodo36/100

Figure 2 in Monitoring the feeding and parental care behavior of a pair of free-living owls (Tyto furcata) in the nest during the reproductive period in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Figure 2. The first egg of the couple of Tyto furcata. Campos dos Goytacazes, RJ.

publicFeb 2020View details →

Habitat-driven vulnerability to nest predation in Arctic-breeding plovers based on artificial nest experiment and real shorebird nest monitoring – Survival dataset

Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.

publicNov 2024View details →

Monitoring active Osprey nests with drones is more time-efficient and less disturbing than conventional methods

Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.

publicDec 2021View details →

Caribbean Roseate Tern nest survival and monitoring data

Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.

opencc-zeroDec 2014View details →

Data from: A high-resolution panorama camera system for monitoring colony-wide seabird nesting behaviour

1. Obtaining accurate and representative demographic metrics for animal populations is critical to many aspects of wildlife monitoring and management. However, at remote animal colonies, metrics derived from sequential counts or other continuous monitoring are often subject to logistical, weather and disturbance challenges.The development of remote camera technologies has assisted monitoring, but limitations in spatial and temporal resolution and sample sizes remain. 2. Here we describe the application of a robotic camera system (Gigapan) which takes a tiled sequence of photographs that are automatically stitched together to form high-resolution panoramas. We demonstrate the application of the Gigapan using data collected during field-testing at a shy albatross colony on Albatross Island in northwest Tasmania. 3. We took daily panoramas over five days to estimate mean incubation shift-duration, an indirect measure for foraging trip duration, in an existing study area. Similar numbers of occupied nests could be observed at a distance of ~100m in the Gigapan panoramas compared to ground-based counts (115 and 117 respectively). Of these, birds on 90% of nests visible in the panoramas could be unambiguously identified as marked or unmarked with a small daub of paint throughout the study period and thus a shift change reliably recorded. Gigapan-based shift duration was estimated using a novel instantaneous statistical method and were longer than estimates earlier in the egg brooding period, potentially revealing a new pattern in shift duration. 4. This example field application provides proof-of-concept and demonstration that the relatively low cost Gigapan system provides the spatial advantages of satellite or aerial photos with the detail and temporal replication of land-based camera systems. The Gigapan system can extend or enhance traditional data collection methods, particularly for simultaneous observations, at distance, of the behaviour of many surface nesting colonial seabirds..

opencc-zeroDec 2014View details →

Data from: Smart nest box: a tool and methodology for monitoring of cavity-dwelling animals

1.Camera recording and video analysis have emerged as a successful non-invasive method for collecting a wide range of biological data on many different taxa of animals. However, camera monitoring has rarely been applied to long term surveillance of cavity or box-nesting species and ordinary off-the-shelf cameras are employed. 2.We present methodology and data on the effectiveness of nest box monitoring using a camera system embedded in four "smart nest boxes" (SNBoxes). We applied the SNBoxes to eight Tengmalm's owl (Aegolius funereus) nests in the Czech Republic during a five-month period in 2014. Each SNBox consisted of a pair of cameras with infrared lighting, an event detector, a radio-frequency identification reader, auxiliary sensors, and a 60 Ah 12 V battery to power the whole system. All devices used were centrally managed by an embedded computer with specifically developed software. 3.Using four SNBoxes, we observed owl nesting continually during the incubation, nestling, and fledgling phases, in total 309 days, resulting in 3382 owl video events. Batteries were changed every 6.5 days. A memory of 4 GB was found sufficient to store monthly data. We identified 12 types of male and female parental activities and their timing, the diet composition and frequency of prey delivery, the manner of prey storage, the light intensity at the time of each parental activity, the temperature inside the clutch and outside the box, and the duration of nestling period of each young. We also produced a video on owl nesting for the general public. 4.The SNBox and related methodology show enormous potential as a non-invasive tool for monitoring animals using boxes or natural cavities. The main advantage of the SNBox is the possibility to study both nocturnal and diurnal animal species and great flexibility in use of the software and hardware for different tasks. As a result, the SNBox provides an opportunity for novel insights into the breeding, roosting, hibernating, and food storage activities of a wide range of cavity-living birds, mammals, and reptiles.

opencc-zeroDec 2023View details →

Data from: High nest failure in a zebra finch population and persistent predation of a nest by a monitor lizard

Predation is well known to have substantial effects on behaviour and fitness in many animals. In songbirds, nest predation is rarely observed directly, so that research focusses primarily on the consequences of predation and less on the behaviour of the predator. Here, we report predation data in a zebra finch (Taeniopygia catanosis) nest box population, highlighting a 22-min-long sequence, captured on video, of a sand goanna (Varanus gouldii) predating a zebra finch nest in the wild. This monitor lizard appeared to be extremely persistent with climbing and jumping up to the next box nine times, including three successive unsuccessful attempts that lead to a change in approach strategy. It removed all six nestlings from the nest box during those repeated approaches and consumed them. In combination with overall high predation rates in the study population we document here, the findings highlight the role that a single predator species can have on nest success and, thus potentially also breeding decisions and social organisation of the prey population. Specifically so in a species like the zebra finch which synchronises reproductive attempts through the use of social information acquired through nest inspections and which uses social hotspots where they could gather information on changes in local social composition due to the individualised signals they use.

publicNov 2016View details →

Data from: Smart nest box: a tool and methodology for monitoring of cavity-dwelling animals

Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.