Automated acoustic detection of Geoffroy's spider monkey highlights tipping points of human disturbance

Lawson, J., Rizos, G., Jasinghe, D., Whitworth, A., Schuller, B. and Banks-Leite, C. (2023) Automated acoustic detection of Geoffroy's spider monkey highlights tipping points of human disturbance. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 290(1995), 20222473. (doi: 10.1098/rspb.2022.2473) (PMID:36919432) (PMCID:PMC10015327)

Abstract

As more land is altered by human activity and more species become at risk of extinction, it is essential that we understand the requirements for conserving threatened species across human-modified landscapes. Owing to their rarity and often sparse distributions, threatened species can be difficult to study and efficient methods to sample them across wide temporal and spatial scales have been lacking. Passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) is increasingly recognized as an efficient method for collecting data on vocal species; however, the development of automated species detectors required to analyse large amounts of acoustic data is not keeping pace. Here, we collected 35 805 h of acoustic data across 341 sites in a region over 1000 km2 to show that PAM, together with a newly developed automated detector, is able to successfully detect the endangered Geoffroy's spider monkey (Ateles geoffroyi), allowing us to show that Geoffroy's spider monkey was absent below a threshold of 80% forest cover and within 1 km of primary paved roads and occurred equally in old growth and secondary forests. We discuss how this methodology circumvents many of the existing issues in traditional sampling methods and can be highly successful in the study of vocally rare or threatened species. Our results provide tools and knowledge for setting targets and developing conservation strategies for the protection of Geoffroy's spider monkey.

• Item Type: Articles
• Additional Information: This work was supported by the Natural Environment Research Council (grant no. NE/L002515/1).
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Whitworth, Dr Andrew

Creator Roles

Whitworth, A.: Funding acquisition, Resources, Supervision, Writing – review and editing

• Authors: Lawson, J., Rizos, G., Jasinghe, D., Whitworth, A., Schuller, B., and Banks-Leite, C.
• College/School: College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Biodiversity, One Health & Veterinary Medicine
• Journal Name: Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
• Publisher: Royal Society of London
• ISSN: 0962-8452
• ISSN (Online): 1471-2954
• Published Online: 15 March 2023
• Copyright Holders: Copyrights © 2023 The Authors
• First Published: First published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 290(1995):20222473
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced under a Creative Commons license