A goodness-of-fit test for occupancy models with correlated within-season revisits.

ABSTRACT: Occupancy modeling is important for exploring species distribution patterns and for conservation monitoring. Within this framework, explicit attention is given to species detection probabilities estimated from replicate surveys to sample units. A central assumption is that replicate surveys are independent Bernoulli trials, but this assumption becomes untenable when ecologists serially deploy remote cameras and acoustic recording devices over days and weeks to survey rare and elusive animals. Proposed solutions involve modifying the detection-level component of the model (e.g., first-order Markov covariate). Evaluating whether a model sufficiently accounts for correlation is imperative, but clear guidance for practitioners is lacking. Currently, an omnibus goodness-of-fit test using a chi-

SUBMITTER: Wright WJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4984513 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature