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Light-level geolocator analyses: a user's guide

Version 2 2024-09-18, 23:33
Version 1 2023-05-20, 11:07
journal contribution
posted on 2024-09-18, 23:33 authored by S Lisovski, S Bauer, M Briedis, SC Davidson, KL Dhanjal-Adams, MT Hallworth, J Karagicheva, CM Meier, B Merkel, J Ouwehand, L Pedersen, E Rakhimberdiev, A Roberto-Charron, NE Seavy, Michael SumnerMichael Sumner, CM Taylor, SJ Wotherspoon, ES Bridge

Light‐level geolocator tags use ambient light recordings to estimate the whereabouts of an individual over the time it carried the device. Over the past decade, these tags have emerged as an important tool and have been used extensively for tracking animal migrations, most commonly small birds. Analysing geolocator data can be daunting to new and experienced scientists alike. Over the past decades, several methods with fundamental differences in the analytical approach have been developed to cope with the various caveats and the often complicated data. Here, we explain the concepts behind the analyses of geolocator data and provide a practical guide for the common steps encompassing most analyses – annotation of twilights, calibration, estimating and refining locations, and extraction of movement patterns – describing good practices and common pitfalls for each step. We discuss criteria for deciding whether or not geolocators can answer proposed research questions, provide guidance in choosing an appropriate analysis method and introduce key features of the newest open‐source analysis tools. We provide advice for how to interpret and report results, highlighting parameters that should be reported in publications and included in data archiving. Finally, we introduce a comprehensive supplementary online manual that applies the concepts to several datasets, demonstrates the use of open‐source analysis tools with step‐by‐step instructions and code and details our recommendations for interpreting, reporting and archiving.

History

Publication title

Journal of Animal Ecology

Volume

89

Issue

1

Pagination

221-236

ISSN

0021-8790

Department/School

Ecology and Biodiversity, Australian Antarctic Program Partnership

Publisher

Blackwell Publishing Ltd

Publication status

  • Published

Place of publication

9600 Garsington Rd, Oxford, England, Oxon, Ox4 2Dg

Rights statement

Copyright 2019 The Authors

Socio-economic Objectives

280102 Expanding knowledge in the biological sciences

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