INDIANA BAT SUMMER SURVEY GUIDANCE PART DEUX. Robyn Niver, Mike Armstrong, and Andrew King U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Transcription

1 INDIANA BAT SUMMER SURVEY GUIDANCE PART DEUX Robyn Niver, Mike Armstrong, and Andrew King U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

2 DRAFTING TEAM: 6 Service Biologists: R3 - Andy King (IN) & Keith Lott (OH) R4 - Mike Armstrong (KY) & Dave Pelren (TN) R5 - Robyn Niver (NY) & Barb Douglas (WV) 3 State Biologists: NY - Carl Herzog IN - Scott Haulton KY - Brooke Hines 3 Federal Bat Biologists: USGS - Dr. Mark Ford USFS - Katrina Schultes DoD - Dr. Eric Britzke

3 U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE Our mission is to conserve, protect and enhance fish and wildlife and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people.

4 PURPOSE OF THE ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT to provide a means whereby the ecosystems upon which endangered species and threatened species depend may be conserved, to provide a program for the conservation of such endangered and threatened species

5 BACKGROUND: Regional recovery leads for the Service received approval to revise 2007 guidance (January 2011) Outlined revision process, including State/Federal Team (March 2011) Team started work on 1 st draft (June 2011) 1 st draft completed (October 2011) Internal Service Review (November 2011) Internal comments incorporated and 2 nd draft ready for external peer review (January 2012) NEBWG preview 12 January 2012

6 ONE YEAR AGO Tyburec 2012

7 BACKGROUND: Peer Review announced via eastern bat working groups and Service IBat website on 3 February (closed on 2 March 2012).

8 PEER REVIEW COMMENTS 57 individuals/organizations submitted comments 20 consultants 11 academics/students 9 federal agency biologists 7 state agencies/biologists 3 concerned citizens 2 conservation organizations 2 municipal park biologists 2 bat acoustic equipment businesses 1 trade association (coal) THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU!!!

9 BACKGROUND: Peer Review announced via eastern bat working groups and Service IBat website on 3 February (closed on 2 March 2012) Pilot Year continue to use 2007 guidance Pilot studies in NY and KY (L. Coleman, M. Ford, E. Britzke, C. Dobony, M. Armstrong, B. Hines) Team review and incorporation of comments Release of 2013 Draft Summer Survey Guidance and associated documents on 7 January 2013

10 DOCUMENTS AVAILABLE FOR REVIEW Draft Summer Survey Guidance Software Testing Criteria 2013 Contingency Plan Frequently Asked Questions Acoustic Glossary All documents are available at: mammals/inba/inbasummersurveyguidance.html

11 SUMMER SURVEY GUIDANCE IS Presence/probable absence survey protocols to document Indiana bats within a given area Additional protocols for field data collection if presence is established An effort to maximize detection/capture of Indiana bats at a minimum or reasonable level of effort.

12 SUMMER SURVEY GUIDANCE IS NOT A bat population monitoring program to gather data on all bat species in a given area An endorsement of any specific equipment used in the presence/absence survey Perfect

13 PHASED APPROACH 1. Habitat Assessment 2. Acoustic Surveys 3. Mist-netting Surveys 4. Radio-tracking & Emergence Surveys

14 COMMON COMMENT THEMES- GENERAL Great deal of support in adding acoustics to the survey guidance Questions about training/qualifications/permit needs Questions about species ID, software availability

15 PHASE 1 HABITAT ASSESSMENTS Unclear if it is necessary for all projects? Overkill -especially for large-scale projects Requires an on-site visit that often is not otherwise necessary 3 dbh trees are too small to be considered suitable habitat

16 PHASE 2 ACOUSTIC PROTOCOLS Microphone type Full-Spectrum vs. Zero-Crossing issues Species ID questions Passive vs. active monitoring Questions about false positives and false negatives Software availability for testing?

17 PHASE 3 MIST-NETTING Continue to require Loss of data for other species Mist netting results should be able to disprove suspect acoustic results Timeframe Photographic requirements Number of hours of netting

18 PHASE 4 Radio Tracking: Track # bats/site or # bats/project? Track multiple bats at the same time? 10% body weight for transmitters is too high Emergence Counts: Why would you need a Service recovery permit to conduct an emergence survey?

19 SOME MAJOR REVISIONS (Re)Extended mist-netting season through August 15 th Increased level of acoustic effort based on pilot study results but more flexibility incorporated Clarified definition of summer habitat so its no longer any tree greater than 3 Reduced much of the required notifications Further clarification on personnel requirements Inclusion of full spectrum detectors

20 DOCUMENTS AVAILABLE FOR REVIEW Draft Summer Survey Guidance Software Testing Criteria 2013 Contingency Plan Frequently Asked Questions Acoustic Glossary

21 SOFTWARE TESTING AND CRITERIA Submit software to the Service USGS will assist the Service by conducting independent testing of all submitted software packages We request feedback/input on the proposed testing criteria

22 DRAFT SOFTWARE TESTING CRITERIA 1. program must be quantitative and automated. 2. based upon an extensive call library of free-flying bats. 3. explicitly state which species and geographic area(s) it covers.

23 DRAFT SOFTWARE TESTING CRITERIA 4. include filtering to remove extraneous noise and non-bat files, as well as feeding buzzes, files with multiple bats, poor-quality passes that are recognizable as a bat but not to species, and medium-quality passes that are only recognizable to genus. 5. include an unknown category for classifying calls that are not characteristic of species in the call library to ensure that such calls are not forced to a species identification.

24 DRAFT SOFTWARE TESTING CRITERIA 6. Accuracy rates of the program must be derived through crossvalidation (e.g., qualitative assessment). Correct classification rates of files identified to individual bats species for the underlying analytical program (e.g., discriminant function analysis, neural networks, classification and regression tree) must be provided to show the initial basis used for maximum-likelihood estimator calculations. Minimum correct classification rate on the software s training data must be 90% or better for all Myotis species that may occur within the range of the Indiana bat.

25 DRAFT SOFTWARE TESTING CRITERIA 7. utilize a maximum-likelihood estimator approach to determine species presence at the site rather than relying on a single sequence. 8. Results must include: file level summaries (e.g., # of pulses, species IDs, unknown species, invalid); site/night analyses (e.g., # of files, # of invalid files, # of files ID d to species vs. unknown, IDs for each species); and the maximum-likelihood estimator value assignments.

26 NEXT STEPS 30-day public comment period to begin with Federal Register Notice of Availability (9 Jan 8 Feb 2013) Team review of comments, revision and finalization of guidance and associated documents (Feb 2013) Submission of software for USGS testing Announcement of 2013 Summer Survey Guidance and any applicable software (March 2013) Possible use of 2013 Contingency Plan

27 2013 DRAFT CONTINGENCY PLAN Should we not have a Service-approved automated acoustic identification program(s) available for use in 2013, surveyors would use the following contingency plan. Step 1. Conduct Phase 1 Habitat Assessment. a) Suitable summer habitat present, proceed to Step 2. b) Suitable summer habitat absent, no further summer surveys required. Step 2. Can all adverse effects to Indiana bats be avoided? a) No, assume presence of Indiana bats or proceed to Step 3. b) Yes, no further summer surveys required.

28 2013 DRAFT CONTINGENCY PLAN Step 3. Conduct Phase 2 Acoustic Surveys. a) No positive detection of high frequency calls ( 35 khz), no further summer surveys required. b) Positive detection of high frequency calls, assume presence of Indiana bats or proceed to Step 4. Step 4. Conduct additional acoustic analyses. a) No positive detections of Indiana bats (based on current filters, software, and/ or qualitative visual analyses), no further summer surveys required. b) Positive detections of Indiana bats, assume presence of Indiana bats (AND you can proceed to Step 5 to attempt to capture and attach radio transmitters).

29 2013 DRAFT CONTINGENCY PLAN Step 5. Conduct Phase 3 Mist-netting Surveys. a) No Indiana bats are captured, coordinate with local Service FO to determine what type population of Indiana bat is assumed to be present. b) Indiana bats are captured, proceed to Step 6. Step 6. Follow Phase 4 Protocols (Radio-tracking and Emergence Surveys).

30 WHY NOT CONTINUE TO USE 2007 GUIDANCE AS CONTINGENCY PLAN? Mist-netting fails to adequately detect Indiana bats in WNSpositive areas It is difficult to predict where WNS impacts may be observed each summer We are providing options to move forward while better protecting the species

31 TO SUBMIT COMMENTS U.S. mail: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Field Supervisor, 620 South Walker Street, Bloomington, IN ; Hand-delivery: Bloomington Field Office at the above address; or Fax: 812/ Include Indiana Bat Summer Survey Protocols in the subject line of the facsimile transmittal. NOTE: All comments will be posted on the Service Indiana Bat website

32 QUESTIONS DURING THE PUBLIC COMMENT PERIOD? Contact: Mike Armstrong, Andy King, Robyn Niver,

33 THANK YOU!! Tyburec 2012, modified