A Low-Cost Technique for Radio-Tracking Wildlife Using a Small Standard Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

Tremblay, Junior A.; Desrochers, André; Aubry, Yves; Pace, Paul; Bird, David M.

doi:10.1139/juvs-2016-0021

Cited by 19 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…Apart from optical surveys, UAVs can be used for radio-tracking birds. Tremblay et al (2017) used this technique on small forest birds: Catharus bicknelli (Bicknell's thrush) and Catharus ustulatus (Swainson's thrush). The UAV equipped with radio-receiver was able to detect 50% of tagged birds during a flight at 50-m altitude, where the signal was stronger and more constant in comparison with ground-based signals.…”

Section: Population and Behaviour Studies Of Animalsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in environmental biology: a review

Nowak¹,

Dziób²,

Bogawski³

2019

European Journal of Ecology

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Acquiring information about the environment is a key step during each study in the field of environmental biology at different levels, from an individual species to community and biome. However, obtaining information about the environment is frequently difficult because of, for example, the phenological timing, spatial distribution of a species or limited accessibility of a particular area for the field survey. Moreover, remote sensing technology, which enables the observation of the Earth’s surface and is currently very common in environmental research, has many limitations such as insufficient spatial, spectral and temporal resolution and a high cost of data acquisition. Since the 1990s, researchers have been exploring the potential of different types of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for monitoring Earth’s surface. The present study reviews recent scientific literature dealing with the use of UAV in environmental biology. Amongst numerous papers, short communications and conference abstracts, we selected 110 original studies of how UAVs can be used in environmental biology and which organisms can be studied in this manner. Most of these studies concerned the use of UAV to measure the vegetation parameters such as crown height, volume, number of individuals (14 studies) and quantification of the spatio-temporal dynamics of vegetation changes (12 studies). UAVs were also frequently applied to count birds and mammals, especially those living in the water. Generally, the analytical part of the present study was divided into following sections: (1) detecting, assessing and predicting threats on vegetation, (2) measuring the biophysical parameters of vegetation, (3) quantifying the dynamics of changes in plants and habitats and (4) population and behaviour studies of animals. At the end, we also synthesised all the information showing, amongst others, the advances in environmental biology because of UAV application. Considering that 33% of studies found and included in this review were published in 2017 and 2018, it is expected that the number and variety of applications of UAVs in environmental biology will increase in the future.

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Section: Population and Behaviour Studies Of Animalsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in environmental biology: a review

Nowak¹,

Dziób²,

Bogawski³

2019

European Journal of Ecology

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“…Some satellites are able to collect superspectral (between 10-100 bands) imagery; for example, WorldView-3 can capture up to 17 bands. The data used for satellite, manned aerial, and UAS surveys include panchromatic [58], RGB [11,43], multispectral [29][30][31][32][33]35], and thermal infrared imagery [53,62,63], as well as radio-tracking data [23,48,64,65].…”

Section: Sensorsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These issues may become less important with continued technological developments and the increased availability of thermal infrared cameras. In addition, radio-tracking devices have been used on UASs in recent years to study the behaviors of small animals, such as Bicknell's and Swainson's thrushes (C. ustulatus) [64], noisy miners (Manorina melanocephala) [48], and iguanas [65], which used to be monitored from a ground-based vehicle or on foot by following radio signals [5,78]. However, to use radio tags, researchers had to first install the radio tags on the animals before tracking them.…”

Section: Uas Surveysmentioning

confidence: 99%

Surveying Wild Animals from Satellites, Manned Aircraft and Unmanned Aerial Systems (UASs): A Review

2019

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This article reviews studies regarding wild animal surveys based on multiple platforms, including satellites, manned aircraft, and unmanned aircraft systems (UASs), and focuses on the data used, animal detection methods, and their accuracies. We also discuss the advantages and limitations of each type of remote sensing data and highlight some new research opportunities and challenges. Submeter very-high-resolution (VHR) spaceborne imagery has potential in modeling the population dynamics of large (>0.6 m) wild animals at large spatial and temporal scales, but has difficulty discerning small (<0.6 m) animals at the species level, although high-resolution commercial satellites, such as WorldView-3 and -4, have been able to collect images with a ground resolution of up to 0.31 m in panchromatic mode. This situation will not change unless the satellite image resolution is greatly improved in the future. Manned aerial surveys have long been employed to capture the centimeter-scale images required for animal censuses over large areas. However, such aerial surveys are costly to implement in small areas and can cause significant disturbances to wild animals because of their noise. In contrast, UAS surveys are seen as a safe, convenient and less expensive alternative to ground-based and conventional manned aerial surveys, but most UASs can cover only small areas. The proposed use of UAS imagery in combination with VHR satellite imagery would produce critical population data for large wild animal species and colonies over large areas. The development of software systems for automatically producing image mosaics and recognizing wild animals will further improve survey efficiency.

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“…Transmitters were avian nanotags model NTQB-4-2, Lotek Wireless Inc., Newmarket, ON, Canada). Each nanotag had a unique set of pulses delivered each 5 s at a frequency of 166.38 MHz (VHF; very high frequency), a standard used by the Motus Wildlife Tracking System [12,13]. After the completion of each flight, we downloaded data from two sources: the telemetry receiver and the drone navigation log.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Estimating Wildlife Tag Location Errors from a VHF Receiver Mounted on a Drone

Desrochers

Tremblay

Aubry

et al. 2018

Drones

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Recent studies have demonstrated the high potential of drones as tools to facilitate wildlife radio-tracking in rugged, difficult-to-access terrain. Without estimates of accuracy, however, data obtained from receivers attached to drones will be of limited use. We estimated transmitter location errors from a drone-borne VHF (very high frequency) receiver in a hilly and dense boreal forest in southern Québec, Canada. Transmitters and the drone-borne receiver were part of the Motus radio-tracking system, a collaborative network designed to study animal movements at local to continental scales. We placed five transmitters at fixed locations, 1-2 m above ground, and flew a quadrotor drone over them along linear segments, at distances to transmitters ranging from 20 m to 534 m. Signal strength was highest with transmitters with antennae pointing upwards, and lowest with transmitters with horizontal antennae. Based on drone positions with maximum signal strength, mean location error was 134 m (range 44-278 m, n = 17). Estimating peak signal strength against drone GPS coordinates with quadratic, least-squares regressions led to lower location error (mean = 94 m, range 15-275 m, n = 10) but with frequent loss of data due to statistical estimation problems. We conclude that accuracy in this system was insufficient for high-precision purposes such as finding nests. However, in the absence of a dense array of fixed receivers, the use of drone-borne Motus receivers may be a cost-effective way to augment the quantity and quality of data, relative to deploying personnel in difficult-to-access terrain.

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A Low-Cost Technique for Radio-Tracking Wildlife Using a Small Standard Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

Cited by 19 publications

References 14 publications

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in environmental biology: a review

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in environmental biology: a review

Surveying Wild Animals from Satellites, Manned Aircraft and Unmanned Aerial Systems (UASs): A Review

Estimating Wildlife Tag Location Errors from a VHF Receiver Mounted on a Drone

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