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Evaluating Detection Probabilities for American Marten in the Black Hills, South Dakota
Author(s) -
SMITH JOSHUA B.,
JENKS JONATHAN A.,
KLAVER ROBERT W.
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
the journal of wildlife management
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.94
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1937-2817
pISSN - 0022-541X
DOI - 10.2193/2007-091
Subject(s) - marten , quadrat , carnivore , geography , environmental science , ecology , habitat , biology , transect , predation
Assessing the effectiveness of monitoring techniques designed to determine presence of forest carnivores, such as American marten ( Martes Americana ), is crucial for validation of survey results. Although comparisons between techniques have been made, little attention has been paid to the issue of detection probabilities ( p ). Thus, the underlying assumption has been that detection probabilities equal 1.0. We used Presence‐Absence data obtained from a track‐plate survey in conjunction with results from a saturation‐trapping study to derive detection probabilities when marten occurred at high (>2 marten/10.2 km 2 ) and low (≤1 marten/10.2 km 2 ) densities within 8 10.2‐km 2 quadrats. Estimated probability of detecting marten in high‐density quadrats was p = 0.952 (SE = 0.047), whereas the detection probability for low‐density quadrats was considerably lower ( p = 0.333, SE = 0.136). Our results indicated that failure to account for imperfect detection could lead to an underestimation of marten presence in 15–52% of low‐density quadrats in the Black Hills, South Dakota, USA. We recommend that repeated site‐survey data be analyzed to assess detection probabilities when documenting carnivore survey results.