eMammal International Lesson Plan
Authors: Stephanie Schuttler, Tavis Forrester
Camera Trapping Science
Some of the fundamental questions of ecology are how organisms are distributed in time and space and how species interact with each other. Why are there so many species in one area and not another? Why are species increasing or decreasing over time at a single location? Answering these questions involves collecting data on species location and abundance. Mammals are especially interesting to ecologists because many can move large distances, are intelligent, have social interactions, can learn, and some are keystone species. The are also important to people for economic reasons, wildlife viewing, hunting,and fascination.
Unfortunately for scientists, most mammals are secretive, and many are nocturnal, which make them difficult to study. Two technological advances have helped scientists overcome these obstacles, (1) radio and GPS collars that let researchers accurately track and locate individual animals and (2) camera traps, motion-and-heat-triggered cameras that captures photos of animals that move in front of the camera.
Camera traps are now used by researchers around the world to study mammals and other wildlife. Before cameras were used, survey methods included records of tracks and other animal signs, but these surveys required a high degree of expertise and signs were often missed or misinterpreted. Populations of secretive or low density mammals, like threatened species and most carnivores were underestimated or often undetected. Camera traps were developed to solve some of these problems, but the first cameras were heavy, sensitive to damage, and were limited by film. Now camera traps can run for 6+ months off of 12 AA batteries, take thousands of photographs, and even record HD video. It is possible to identify all terrestrial mammal species larger than 100 grams (the size of a chipmunk) present in an area, record behavior and interactions, and for animals that can be identified individually (such as striped or spotted animals), estimate population size.
Camera trap surveys can be used to gather baseline data about an area or answer specific questions that a scientist may have. Baseline data are usually collected for long periods to monitor changes through time. For camera traps, they typically address what mammal species are present and the types of habitat they live in. Baseline data are especially important for conservation questions such as effects of human development on mammal species or how climate change affects mammals.
Examples of the types of questions you can ask with camera trap data:
Which habitat type has the most mammal species?
How are mammals affected by road density?
What mammals live in suburban areas? How does this compare to rural or wild areas?
What kinds of habitat are associated with many detections of coyotes?
Once a question or hypothesis is generated, the cameras are placed across the area of study to maximize data collection to answer the question. For example, to answer the example question about coyotes posed above, we could count the number of coyote detections across different kinds of habitats for a certain period of time. Therefore, we would find different habitat types and place cameras in those habitats. Scientists usually have at least 20 (but around 50 is best) camera locations per area of interest to generate enough data to be able to compare habitats. In the case of camera traps, the pictures are the data. When an animal triggers the camera trap, it takes a series of photos for every photo (eMammal uses 5 or 10 “bursts” of photos). Through eMammal software, these bursts are separated into sequences. Animals that are separated for more than one minute apart are inferred to be different individuals. In the software, we count the number of animals for each sequence. One animal in one sequence is a detection. For example, if you have two coyotes in one sequence, you have two coyote detections. You would add up all of these detections for each habitat and would compare them. You could infer that the habitat that has the most coyote detections is the one preferred by coyotes. This could lead to more questions by students. Why is this? Is there more prey in this habitat? Less humans? Are there less predators in this habitat? A key to science is answering questions leads to asking more questions.
Below are some of the ways to quantify camera trap data for analysis:
Relative abundance - the number of detections divided by the number of days the camera trap was in the field
Species richness - the number of species at a site
Diversity index - reflects the number of species and the composition of the species within community
Occupancy - the probability of a certain species occurring in a site (requires sophisticated analysis, not feasible for the classroom)
Activity pattern - Accumulating detections for each hour and plotting; allows you to see what time of the day the animal is active
eMammal Research
We encourage you to encourage your students to think like scientists, which involves asking questions. While the camera trapping that your students conduct will provide valuable data to eMammal, and the students will be participating in authentic research, it is important that in order for them to fully understand science, that they ask questions themselves. The activities below are not designed for a specific scientific question, but they can be easily adapted to do this in the classroom.
Currently, the overarching question of eMammal research is:
How do mammals change across the urban to wild gradient?
If you think of a city as an onion, for many cities, in the center you will have the most urban areas, followed by a layer of suburban, rural, and exurban neighborhoods, and then finally wild areas with very few or no people. The goal of eMammal research is to sample (collect camera trap images) across these different gradientsto see how the mammal communities change. There may be differences in the number of detections of species, the types of species or the activity patterns. We want to relate these findings to variables within the cities, for example, housing density or green space.
As it is impossible for one class to sample across a city, you can adapt this question to your school:Will the species richness/animal activity patterns of species change as cameras are closer to human-developed areas?Students can set cameras in habitats close to the school and farther away from the school
Dr. Stephanie Schuttler is also specifically investigating the “weekend” effect of animals. She will use the data collected from the eMammal middle school data sets to see if such a pattern occurs. As schools are highly centralized areas of human activity, and animals usually avoid human activity, she is looking to see if animals change their activity patterns on the weekends, when there is no or reduced human activity.
This research questions can be investigated at your school with your school data set. To do this, simply modify the animal activity worksheet. Students will create a graph that will only have data from school days on it and a separate graph that has weekend patterns (or one graph with two series). Students can then compare these two patterns to see if there are any differences.
Remember there are many questions to ask with eMammal data and we encourage you and your students to develop your own research questions. eMammals is constantly updating its website and soon you will be able to download data from sites other than your own and access data analysis tools to investigate questions at a larger scale. Check eMammal.org regularly.
eMammal Predictions of Mammals
TEACHER INSTRUCTIONS
Students will complete the table before they view camera trap photos for the first time.
Materials:
eMammal Predictions vs Observations table worksheet (p. 8), 1-2 per student
eMammal Predictions vs Observations table worksheet for master list of class; can be created on large poster board or projected on screen
Student Activity:
Day 1
- Print off a copy of the “eMammal Predictions vs Observations” table.
- Have students work alone and individually predict what mammal species they will find on the camera traps. They will list them in the first column of the table.
- This activity can be done for each camera location, for example if you wanted compare animals at a pond compared to a forest at your school, or for all of the cameras run at a single site, such as all of the cameras at your school.
- Students will think of non-mammal animals like reptiles, amphibians, and birds. Explain that birds can be captured by camera traps, but that our project focuses on mammals. Because birds can fly above camera traps, camera traps are not the best option for studying birds. Observations through binoculars and listening to songs are the most common methods.
- Students may think of small mammals (mice, moles, bats, etc.). Explain that these are an important part of the mammal community, but camera traps do not often capture images of these animals because they are small and largely live underground or fly (bats). Limit predictions to species larger than a chipmunk.
- Organize students into small groups and have students compare their lists, adding species to their list when there they agree or removing species from their list that they may not agree with. For example, a student may have thought of a raccoon and another student may not have and they will agree this is an appropriate species to add to their list. Or a student may have a grizzly bear on their list and they will have a discussion on whether or not grizzly bears live in the area, and may remove this animal based on their discussion.
- Reunite as a class and fill in the table together with the teacher creating a master list. Ideally the sheet will be posted in a place in the classroom for all students to view and be left up for as long as the camera traps are running. The teacher will ask for a species from each group until there are no unique species added. There may be species brought up that do not live in the range of the camera traps and discussion should be had on why these species will not be found on the camera traps and whether or not they should be added to the list. If the students worksheets are messy, the teacher may want to provide another copy of the worksheet for students to duplicate the master class list.
- Have the students count the number of animals in their predicted list. Write this number in the space next to “Predicted Species Richness” at the bottom of the table.
- Explain that animals have activity patterns. For example, humans are diurnal, they are active during the day and sleep at night. Define the following vocabulary for students:
- nocturnal - active at night
- diurnal - active during daylight hours
- crepuscular - active at dawn and dusk
- ultradian - active throughout a 24-hour period
- Leave the columns “Present, Detection Date, and # of Days” blank.
- For each species listed, have students predict whether they think the animal will be diurnal, nocturnal, crepuscular, or ultradian. Have students choose one option for each species and place a P in the box they think will best represent the predicted activity pattern for that species.
When Uploading Photos to eMammal
- When students are uploading photos to eMammal, they will create a list of new species that the identify. After the uploads have been finished, the students will meet as a class and fill in the eMammal Predictions vs Observations table. Whenever a new species is identified, if it has been predicted by the class, simply write a 1 next to the species in the “Present” column. If it was not predicted, add it on the list and add a 1 in the “Present” column. Write new species that were not predicted in a different color, or draw a line separating the rows between new species additions from the ones that were predicted so students will know which ones are their original predictions and which ones are additions that they did not think of.
- Write the date on which the species was first detected (found on camera trap image).
When ALL Photos Uploads are Finishedfor the School Year
- After all photos are collected, conduct Species Richness and Activity Pattern worksheets (p. 9 and 13)
eMammal Predictions vs Observations
Name ______Date ______
CameraLocation:______
Absent (0) / Activity Pattern
Diurnal / Nocturnal / Crepuscular / Ultradian
Predicted Species Richness
Actual Species Richness
eMammal Species Richness
TEACHER INSTRUCTIONS
Students will conduct this activity after all eMammal images have been collected and uploaded. *Note – camera traps should still run to collect data. This simply provides a stopping point for students to analyze the data collected from the school year.
Materials:
eMammal Species Richness worksheet (p. 10)
BackgroundInformation:
Species richness is the number of different species that inhabit a given area. How the area is defined will change the number of species that are present, and usually bigger areas have more species. This is especially true when comparing the same habitat type (a small desert versus a big desert). Whereas in different habitat types, a small area may have many more species. For example, a small rainforest will have more species than a large desert.
Camera traps only collect data on mammals, and only mammals larger than 100 grams.In the eastern US this includes animals larger than an eastern chipmunk (Tamias striatus), but excludes bats. Most of the diversity within mammals is in small mammals and bats, so species richness calculated by camera traps only represent a subset of the mammal diversity.
Often ecologists attempt to estimate species richness in very large areas. There are probability-based species richness estimators that calculate a range of species richness values based on how many species are captured in different sub-areas. Those methods require complicated statistics, so only the basic known species richness is presented here. Often ecologists may start with a list of expected species from past research or local knowledge.
Student Activity:
- Students complete the eMammal Species Richness worksheet (p. 10). They will need to refer to the “eMammal Predictions vs Observation Table” to answer the questions.
- The questions of the worksheet should first be completed by students alone or in small groups. They answers they provide can be discussed as a class for the questions within the activity should be discussed as a class so that they understand that species richness varies across ecosystems naturally.
eMammal Species Richness
Name:______Date:______
Refer to your filled out eMammal Predictions vs Observation Table.
(1)What species did you predict correctly? List and count them here:
(2)What species did you detect that you were not expecting to see? List and count them here:
Transfer the following information from your eMammal Predictions vs Observations Table.
Location:______
Predicted Species Richness______
Using the column “Present,” sum all of the numbers. Enter your total in the space next to “Actual Species Richness” at the bottom of the table and also in the space below:
Actual Species Richness:______
(3)Compare your Actual Species Richness value to your predicted. Which is higher?
(4)What do you think it means to have a high species richness?
(5)Is a higher or lower species richness value better? Why or why not?
(6)Would different ecosystems have different species richness values? Why or why not?
Below are pairs of ecosystems. Circle which one you think will have a higher species richness of the two when including all animal species (not just mammals).
(7)Coastal dunesSwamp
(8)TundraRainforest
(9)Pine forest Cave
(10)Deep seaCoral Reef
(11)National ParkCity park
eMammal Species RichnessTeacher Answers
*Note – Questions 1-3 will be unique to each data set.
(4)What do you think it means to have a high species richness?
Having a higher species richness means you have more species in that area. Note that you can have a high species richness value, but not necessarily have an equal representation of each species. For example, you may have 10 species present, but have only seen 9 of them one time.
(5)Is a higher or lower species richness value better? Why or why not?
If comparing animals in the same habitat type and in the roughly the same geographic location, then having a higher species richness value is better. It means that you have more species in the area and have not lost species (likely because of human intervention). However, some habitats naturally have more species than others. For example, very few animals are specialized to live in cave habitats, and therefore a low species richness value in a cave habitat compared to other habitats will not be mean that it is a worse habitat. The most diverse habitats are those that are warm, wet, and with a consistent amount of light (tropical rainforests, coral reefs).