Correcting wildlife counts using detection probabilities
Gary C. White
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations
Department of Fishery and Wildlife Biology, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO 80523, USA. Email: gwhite@cnr.colostate.edu
Wildlife Research 32(3) 211-216 https://doi.org/10.1071/WR03123
Submitted: 22 December 2003 Accepted: 3 March 2005 Published: 22 June 2005
Abstract
One of the most pervasive uses of indices of wildlife populations is uncorrected counts of animals. Two examples are the minimum number known alive from capture and release studies, and aerial surveys where the detection probability is not estimated from a sightability model, marked animals, or distance sampling. Both the mark–recapture and distance-sampling estimators are techniques to estimate the probability of detection of an individual animal (or cluster of animals), which is then used to correct a count of animals. However, often the number of animals in a survey is inadequate to compute an estimate of the detection probability and hence correct the count. Modern methods allow sophisticated modelling to estimate the detection probability, including incorporating covariates to provide additional information about the detection probability. Examples from both distance and mark–recapture sampling are presented to demonstrate the approach.
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