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Publication
Optimizing bat bioacoustic surveys in human‐modified Neotropical landscapes
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Advisor(s)
Abstract(s)
During the last decades, the use of bioacoustics as a non-invasive and costeffective
sampling method has greatly increased worldwide. For bats, acoustic surveys have
long been known to complement traditional mist-netting, however, appropriate protocol
guidelines are still lacking for tropical regions. Establishing the minimum sampling effort
needed to detect ecological changes in bat assemblages (e.g., activity, composition, and richness)
is crucial in view of workload and project cost constraints, and because detecting such
changes must be reliable enough to support effective conservation management. Using one of
the most comprehensive tropical bat acoustic data sets, collected in the Amazon, we assessed
the minimum survey effort required to accurately assess the completeness of assemblage inventories
and habitat selection in fragmented forest landscapes for aerial insectivorous bats. We
evaluated a combination of 20 different temporal sampling schemes, which differed regarding
number of hours per night, number of nights per site, and sampling only during the wet or dry
season, or both. This was assessed under two different landscape scenarios: in primary forest
fragments embedded in a matrix of secondary forest and in the same forest fragments, but after
they had been re-isolated through clearing of the secondary forest. We found that the sampling
effort required to achieve 90% inventory completeness varied considerably depending on the
research aim and the landscape scenario evaluated, averaging ~80 and 10 nights before and
after fragment re-isolation, respectively. Recording for more than 4 h per night did not result
in a substantial reduction in the required number of sampling nights. Regarding the effects of
habitat selection, except for assemblage composition, bat responses in terms of richness, diversity,
and activity were similar across all sampling schemes after fragment re-isolation. However,
before re-isolation, a minimum of four to six sampling hours per night after dusk and three to
five nights of sampling per site were needed to detect significant effects that could otherwise go
unnoticed. Based on our results, we propose guidelines that will aid to optimize sampling protocols
for bat acoustic surveys in the Neotropics.
Description
Keywords
acoustics Amazon Chiroptera echolocation habitat use monitoring rainforest sampling design
Pedagogical Context
Citation
L opez-Baucells, A., N. Yoh, R. Rocha, P. E. D. Bobrowiec, J. M. Palmeirim, and C. F. J. Meyer. 2021. Optimising bat bioacoustic surveys in human-modified neotropical landscapes. Ecological Applications 00(00):e02366. 10.1002/eap.2366
Publisher
Ecological Society of America