#805: MAPS: Automated Recording Devices Enhance Birds Research
Along with capturing and banding song birds in Alberta’s oil sands region, some stations also have special recording equipment.
These are called Automated Recording Units (ARU).
According to Dr. Ken Foster of Owl Moon Environmental, these remote units are solar powered and record both acoustic and ultrasonic sounds.
DR KEN FOSTER: The benefits to this equipment is that it allows you to concurrently record all of the calls of these different species groups over a targeted period of times when we know these species are active. And it allows you to do so in a very remote way. These things just function through the season and collect the data. So in fall and winter we have technicians analyze the data, the birds and amphibian calls. Our technicians listen and look at the sonograms, the pictoral representation of those calls on a computer screen, and identifies which species of frog or toad or bird is calling. And we have a separate software package that is used to analyze which of the seven bat species that were detected by the microphone.
You can listen to the full interview with Dr. Ken Foster at InnovationAnthology.com
Thanks today to SYNCRUDE
I’M CHERYL CROUCHER
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Program Date: 2016-08-23