Occupancy surveys are widely used in ecology to study wildlife and plant habitat use. To account for imperfect detection probability many researchers use occupancy models. But occupancy probability estimates for rare species tend to be biased because we’re unlikely to observe the animals at all and as a result, the data aren’t very informative.
In their new article – ‘Occupancy surveys with conditional replicates: An alternative sampling design for rare species‘ – Specht et al. developed a new “conditional” occupancy survey design to improve occupancy estimates for rare species, They also compare it to standard and removal occupancy study designs. In this video two of the authors, Hannah Specht and Henry Reich, explain how their new conditional occupancy survey design works.
This video is based on the article ‘Occupancy surveys with conditional replicates: An alternative sampling design for rare species‘ by Specht et al.
