Spatially Explicit Abundance Modeling of a Highly Specialized Wetland Bird Using Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 Modélisation spatialement explicite de l’abondance d’un oiseau très spécifique aux zones humides à l’aide de Sentinel-1 et de Sentinel-2

Abstract

Yellow Rail (Coturnicops noveboracensis) are a highly specialized wetland obligate bird. They are a species at risk in Canada and very little is known about their abundance in the wetlands of the western boreal forest. Emerging technologies have enabled us to effectively survey for Yellow Rail and other wetland birds in remote areas by using ground-based remote sensors (autonomous recording units; ARUs) to conduct passive acoustic monitoring. We analyzed bird data from the first four years (2013–2016) of an ongoing monitoring program led by the Bioacoustic Unit at the Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute. We developed species abundance models using satellite data from Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 processed in Google Earth Engine. We identified covariates from both synthetic aperture radar and optical remote sensing that had strong predictive capacity for this wetland bird (AUC = 0.96). Approximately 1.5% of available wetland habitat in our northeast Alberta study area was predicted to be highly suitable for Yellow Rail.