That’s what you will find out after reading this story:
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A new scientific approach to the calculation of wildlife detected 41,000 nest turtles hidden in one Amazon area.
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The Florida University team believes that they have created a more accurate way of observation of wildlife using drones and statistical modeling.
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According to research, the calculation of wildlife is extremely inaccurate current methods.
Researchers at the University of Florida have developed a new animal counting process. According to recent researchers, new research methods, paired drones with intellectual modeling, counted more than 41,000 endangered giant South American river turtles along the Amazon Guaporé River. It is the largest known freshwater turtle aggregation in the world.
This process presented in a study that has been published A magazine of applied ecology –includes picking up Thousands Images to follow and investigate animal behavior to eliminate errors made by other methods, such as counting on the spot.
The main author of the study, Ishmael Brack-Pottoras, researcher at the Florida University at the Food and Agricultural Sciences Institute at the Forest, Fisheries and Geomatic School of Science, has been a “novel” method and explained that the method can count many more beings than only turtles.
The team cooperates with the Brazilian, Colombian and Bolivian Wildlife Conservation Society to check the method essentially writing down the census of endangered turtles. These ruthless reptiles are exceptionally social animals, and women gather in nests every year in the summer months in the sand banks between the Brazil and Bolivian sand.
In the past, the scientist used drones and relied on what is called an orthomotic strategy (sewing hundreds of coincidence air photos) to count the turtles because it is a faster and less invasive approach than on Earth. Although the study is commonplace, the study explains that the style of detection errors that are often unobtrusive and try to take into account movement during observations.
In the new study, the team used white paint to mark 1,187 turtle sheaths. The drone flew over his head over the planned path four times a day for 12 days to capture 1,500 photos in each permit. The scientists then stitch the photos, capturing each turtle’s marked road, showing where it was inserted and where they walked. This information allowed researchers to create probability patterns to consider the turtle movement, all of which are based on visible behavior.
According to the study, it has been shown that the traditional orthomotic calculation is extremely inaccurate, as is the calculation taken only from the ground. The new behavioral modeling revealed that drone flights were only 45 percent of the turtles using Sandbank, and about 20 percent of the walks they saw were counted several times (some were counted seven times).
Due to discrepancies on Earth, it was estimated that there were 16,000 turtles on the site, while observers using the drone’s orthomasin strategy (without modeling) counted 79,000 turtles. When applying a new modeling by movement, the team estimated that there were about 41,000 turtles.
“This figure is very different, and it is a problem for conservationists,” Brack said. “If scientists are unable to determine the exact number of individuals, how they will find out if the population is decreasing, or is the effort to protect it successful?”
To make the plan work, scientists need to understand animal movement patterns that may require haircut seal fur, using elk collars, or marking a mountain goat with paintball pellets to mention several examples. The study states that in the calculation of animals when populations are spatially summarized, such as breeding or slot, which allows the accuracy and efficiency of the study effort.
The team plans to improve the process, focusing on turtles in other South American countries. “By combining information from several surveys,” said Brack, “we can detect the trends of the population, and the wildlife protection Society will know where to invest in preservation.”
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