Accuracy of an Acoustic Location System for Monitoring the Position of Duetting Songbirds in Tropical Forest
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University of Windsor Scholarship at UWindsor Biological Sciences Publications Department of Biological Sciences 2006 Accuracy of an acoustic location system for monitoring the position of duetting songbirds in tropical forest Daniel J. Mennill University of Windsor John M. Burt Kurt M. Fristrup Sandra L. Vehrencamp Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/biologypub Part of the Biology Commons Recommended Citation Mennill, Daniel J.; Burt, John M.; Fristrup, Kurt M.; and Vehrencamp, Sandra L., "Accuracy of an acoustic location system for monitoring the position of duetting songbirds in tropical forest" (2006). Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 119, 5, 2832-2839. https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/biologypub/1030 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Biological Sciences at Scholarship at UWindsor. It has been accepted for inclusion in Biological Sciences Publications by an authorized administrator of Scholarship at UWindsor. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Accuracy of an acoustic location system for monitoring the position of duetting songbirds in tropical forest Daniel J. Mennill, John M. Burt, Kurt M. Fristrup, and Sandra L. Vehrencamp Citation: The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 119, 2832 (2006); doi: 10.1121/1.2184988 View online: https://doi.org/10.1121/1.2184988 View Table of Contents: http://asa.scitation.org/toc/jas/119/5 Published by the Acoustical Society of America Articles you may be interested in Acoustic localization of antbirds in a Mexican rainforest using a wireless sensor network The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 128, 182 (2010); 10.1121/1.3425729 Short- and long-term changes in right whale calling behavior: The potential effects of noise on acoustic communication The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 122, 3725 (2007); 10.1121/1.2799904 Manatee position estimation by passive acoustic localization The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 121, 2049 (2007); 10.1121/1.2532210 Measuring the free field acoustic impedance and absorption coefficient of sound absorbing materials with a combined particle velocity-pressure sensor The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 119, 2826 (2006); 10.1121/1.2188821 Contributed Review: Source-localization algorithms and applications using time of arrival and time difference of arrival measurements Review of Scientific Instruments 87, 041502 (2016); 10.1063/1.4947001 Killer whale (Orcinus orca) behavioral audiograms The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 141, 2387 (2017); 10.1121/1.4979116 Accuracy of an acoustic location system for monitoring the position of duetting songbirds in tropical forest ͒ Daniel J. Mennilla Department of Biological Sciences, University of Windsor, 401 Sunset Avenue, Windsor, Ontario, Canada N9B3P4 ͒ John M. Burtb Psychology Department, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195 ͒ Kurt M. Fristrupc Natural Sounds Program Center, National Park Service, 1201 Oakridge Drive, Suite 100, Fort Collins, Colorado 80525 ͒ Sandra L. Vehrencampd Lab of Ornithology, Cornell University, 159 Sapsucker Woods Road, Ithaca, New York 14850 ͑Received 1 September 2005; revised 14 February 2006; accepted 14 February 2006͒ A field test was conducted on the accuracy of an eight-microphone acoustic location system designed to triangulate the position of duetting rufous-and-white wrens ͑Thryothorus rufalbus͒ in Costa Rica’s humid evergreen forest. Eight microphones were set up in the breeding territories of 20 pairs of wrens, with an average intermicrophone distance of 75.2±2.6 m. The array of microphones was used to record antiphonal duets broadcast through stereo loudspeakers. The positions of the loudspeakers were then estimated by evaluating the delay with which the eight microphones recorded the broadcast sounds. Position estimates were compared to coordinates surveyed with a global-positioning system ͑GPS͒. The acoustic location system estimated the position of loudspeakers with an error of 2.82±0.26 m and calculated the distance between the “male” and “female” loudspeakers with an error of 2.12±0.42 m. Given the large range of distances between duetting birds, this relatively low level of error demonstrates that the acoustic location system is a useful tool for studying avian duets. Location error was influenced partly by the difficulties inherent in collecting high accuracy GPS coordinates of microphone positions underneath a lush tropical canopy and partly by the complicating influence of irregular topography and thick vegetation on sound transmission. © 2006 Acoustical Society of America. ͓DOI: 10.1121/1.2184988͔ PACS number͑s͒: 43.60.Fg, 43.60.Rw, 43.60.Bf ͓JAS͔ Pages: 2832–2839 I. INTRODUCTION acoustic location systems is uncommon ͑but see Spiesberger, 1999; Hayes et al., 2000; Mohl et al., 2001; Wahlberg et al., An acoustic location system consists of an array of mi- 2001, 2003; Bower and Clark, 2005; Burt and Vehrencamp, crophones that facilitates spatial monitoring of animals based 2005͒. Here we test the accuracy of a passive acoustic loca- on the sounds they produce. Acoustic location systems offer tion system for monitoring the position of duetting songbirds special research advantages because animals’ natural move- in neotropical forest. ment patterns are not inhibited by the passive monitoring Duets occur when two animals, usually breeding part- process and animals can be located even in environments ners, coordinate their songs in overlapping or exactly alter- characterized by visual obstructions ͑McGregor et al., 1997͒. nating bouts of vocalizations. Duets are produced in many Furthermore, the signals exchanged between animals are re- texa, including insects ͑Bailey, 2003͒, frogs ͑Emerson and corded as part of the acoustic location process, facilitating ͒ ͑ ͒ detailed studies of communication processes between mul- Boyd, 1999 , mammals e.g., Geissmann, 2002 , and birds ͑ ͒ tiple individuals simultaneously ͑McGregor et al., 1997; Burt Hall, 2004 . Duetting occurs in more than 220 species of and Vehrencamp, 2005͒. Acoustic location systems have birds and ranks among the most highly coordinated behav- been used extensively to monitor the behavior of many ma- iors known in the animal kingdom ͑Thorpe, 1963; Hall, rine organisms, with particular focus on large mammals ͑e.g., 2004͒. However, much controversy and little consensus sur- Stafford et al., 1998; Mellinger and Clark, 2003; Clark and rounds the ecological and evolutionary significance of duet- Clapham, 2004͒. In contrast, research employing terrestrial ting, as well as the mechanics of vocal coordination by du- etting partners. This is, in part, because many duetting birds live in densely vegetated tropical forest where traditional ͒ a Electronic mail: [email protected] ͒ tools for following and observing animals, such as visual b Electronic mail: [email protected] ͒ c Electronic mail: kurtគ[email protected] tracking or radiotelemetry, are difficult. Nevertheless, spatial ͒ d Electronic mail: [email protected] analyses of duetting may allow for an advanced understand- 2832 J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 119 ͑5͒, May 20060001-4966/2006/119͑5͒/2832/8/$22.50 © 2006 Acoustical Society of America ing of the significance of this intriguing behavior. We were interested in studying duetting behavior in neotropical rufous-and-white wrens ͑Thryothorus rufalbus͒ from a spa- tial perspective. To that end, we developed an eight- microphone acoustic location system for spatial monitoring of the duetting behavior of birds in the humid forests of northwest Costa Rica. In this study we present a test of this system by quantifying the accuracy with which microphone array recordings allowed us to triangulate the position of loudspeakers broadcasting simulated rufous-and-white wren duets. II. METHODS A. Study species and study site Rufous-and-white wrens live in forested and semi- forested habitat throughout much of Central America and northwestern South America. Males and females coordinate their songs to produce both antiphonal and polyphonal duets. The voices of the two sexes are similar, although male songs have significantly lower frequency characteristics and are significantly longer than female songs ͑Mennill and Vehren- camp, 2005͒. Rufous-and-white wrens are largely ground- dwelling songbirds ͑Ahumada, 2001͒ and typically remain in very low vegetation, occasionally ascending to higher perches to sing. At Santa Rosa National Park in northwest Costa Rica ͑10°40ЈN,85°30ЈW͒, our study population of rufous-and- white wrens inhabits the fragments of evergreen moist forest FIG. 1. Photograph of one of the eight microphones used to record playback that remain within the mosaic of regenerating forests that of rufous-and-white wren duets. Microphones were placed on 3.0-m wooden constitute the Guanacaste Conservation Area. The study site poles and attached to trees within wren territories. The average between- microphone distance within each of the 20 array configurations was is characterized by thick vegetation, including a rich vertical 75.2±2.6 m. structure and a lush canopy dominated by guapinol ͑Hyme- nea courbaril͒, milk ͑Brosiumu utile͒, and chicle ͑Manilkara chicle͒ trees. The study site also has diverse topography—the each rufous-and-white wren territory, mounting microphones wrens’ territories follow the sloped stream-sides and small opportunistically where vegetation allowed. Within each ar- escarpments that are associated with the park’s evergreen ray,