[R-sig-eco] [AniMov/R-sig-eco] adehabitat HR: Problem with BRB and sample size (number of fixes)

Dagmar Ramgad82 at gmx.net
Tue Aug 29 11:03:08 CEST 2017


Dear Mathieu,

Thanks a lot for your answer!!! I did something similar like you 
suggested: I subsampled my data and tested if there still is a relation:

1) First I subsampled each month for each animal.

2) I took the animal with the lowest number of fixes. For each other 
animal I randomly chose as many fixes as the animal with the lowest 
number had.

I repeated that 20 times.

3) Then I calculated the UD for each of subsampled data.

4) I compared the UD results of those random chosen fixes to the one of 
the original data which used many fixes. I used linear regression to 
compare the results.

5) Still there a relation

So I do have a problem because there is a relation of the number of 
fixes and the UD size. Are there any other ideas than subsampling by 
hourly data?

Help would be very much appreciated!

Dagmar



Am 27.08.2017 um 15:07 schrieb Mathieu Basille:
> Hey Dagmar,
>
> What do you mean by "testing if the UD size is related to the number of
> fixes"? Did you model UD size as a function of number of fixes using all
> fixes for all animals? If that's what you did, you could also check if 
> it's
> true by animal too. One way to do it would be to compute UDs for each
> animal over samples of fixes for instance every 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 and 60
> minutes, and see if there is any relation here. If there is, you may not
> have other option than subsampling at the hour scale to compare all 
> animals
> (but what does the UD mean if there is such variation related to 
> sampling?
> I'm not familiar enough with BRBs to comment here). If there is no
> relationship per animal, then you simply have animals with high number of
> fixes AND large UDs!
>
> Hope this helps,
> Mathieu.
>
>
> On 08/23/2017 03:59 PM, Dagmar wrote:
>> Dear all,
>>
>> I want to compare the homerange size between animals based on GPS 
>> data but
>> it seems not to work.
>>
>> Here is what I did:
>>
>> I calculated the homeranges using the Biased random bridges from 
>> adehabitat
>> HR.
>>
>> Animal_ltraj <- as.ltraj(animalxy, animaltime, id=TierID)
>> D_Animal <- BRB.D(Animal_ltraj, Tmax=21600, Lmin=36)
>>
>> Animal_Grid <- ascgen(allanimals_xy, cellsize=32)  # I chose 32 
>> because it
>> was the smallest cellsize chosen automatically. I thought to compare
>> homerange size between animals I must use the same grid for all of them.
>>
>> Animal_BRB <- BRB(Animal_ltraj, D=
>> D_Animal,type=c("UD"),Tmax=21600,Lmin=36, hmin=100,grid=Animalgrid)
>> kernel.area(Animal_BRB, unout=c("km2"))
>>
>> My problem:
>>
>> I have very different sample sizes (i.e. number of fixes): Most animals
>> were located hourly but two animals were located about each 5 min. This
>> results in sample sizes of about 150 fixes per animals and some 
>> animals do
>> have almost 10.000 fixes for the same periods of time.
>>
>> Because I want to compare the resulting home range sizes I tested if 
>> the UD
>> size is related to the number of fixes and unfortunatly (!!) they are.
>>
>> That means that I cannot compare homerange sizes between my animals
>>
>> My question:
>>
>> - did I do something wrong?
>>
>> - is that problem known and is there a way to solve it?
>>
>> The only way that I find is to reduce the number of fixes of my 
>> frequently
>> located animals artificially / randomly to start with the equal 
>> number of
>> fixes for all animals. This would be a shame though!
>>
>> Help would be very, very, very much appreciated!!!
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> AniMov mailing list
>> AniMov at lists.faunalia.it
>> https://lists.faunalia.it/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/animov


Am 27.08.2017 um 15:07 schrieb Mathieu Basille:
> Hey Dagmar,
>
> What do you mean by "testing if the UD size is related to the number of
> fixes"? Did you model UD size as a function of number of fixes using all
> fixes for all animals? If that's what you did, you could also check if it's
> true by animal too. One way to do it would be to compute UDs for each
> animal over samples of fixes for instance every 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 and 60
> minutes, and see if there is any relation here. If there is, you may not
> have other option than subsampling at the hour scale to compare all animals
> (but what does the UD mean if there is such variation related to sampling?
> I'm not familiar enough with BRBs to comment here). If there is no
> relationship per animal, then you simply have animals with high number of
> fixes AND large UDs!
>
> Hope this helps,
> Mathieu.
>
>
> On 08/23/2017 03:59 PM, Dagmar wrote:
>> Dear all,
>>
>> I want to compare the homerange size between animals based on GPS data but
>> it seems not to work.
>>
>> Here is what I did:
>>
>> I calculated the homeranges using the Biased random bridges from adehabitat
>> HR.
>>
>> Animal_ltraj <- as.ltraj(animalxy, animaltime, id=TierID)
>> D_Animal <- BRB.D(Animal_ltraj, Tmax=21600, Lmin=36)
>>
>> Animal_Grid <- ascgen(allanimals_xy, cellsize=32)  # I chose 32 because it
>> was the smallest cellsize chosen automatically. I thought to compare
>> homerange size between animals I must use the same grid for all of them.
>>
>> Animal_BRB <- BRB(Animal_ltraj, D=
>> D_Animal,type=c("UD"),Tmax=21600,Lmin=36, hmin=100,grid=Animalgrid)
>> kernel.area(Animal_BRB, unout=c("km2"))
>>
>> My problem:
>>
>> I have very different sample sizes (i.e. number of fixes): Most animals
>> were located hourly but two animals were located about each 5 min. This
>> results in sample sizes of about 150 fixes per animals and some animals do
>> have almost 10.000 fixes for the same periods of time.
>>
>> Because I want to compare the resulting home range sizes I tested if the UD
>> size is related to the number of fixes and unfortunatly (!!) they are.
>>
>> That means that I cannot compare homerange sizes between my animals
>>
>> My question:
>>
>> - did I do something wrong?
>>
>> - is that problem known and is there a way to solve it?
>>
>> The only way that I find is to reduce the number of fixes of my frequently
>> located animals artificially / randomly to start with the equal number of
>> fixes for all animals. This would be a shame though!
>>
>> Help would be very, very, very much appreciated!!!
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> AniMov mailing list
>> AniMov at lists.faunalia.it
>> https://lists.faunalia.it/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/animov


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