Occupancy Estimation Research Articles

ESTIMATED VERSUS ACTUAL: VARIATION IN PATROL EFFORT AND ESTIMATES OF NUMBER OF SURVEYS NEEDED FOR EFFICIENT LAW ENFORCEMENT IN PROTECTED AREAS

Law enforcement is central to the objectives of managing Protected Areas for the benefit of resident species. The study sought to appraise park patrol performance against variables needed for monitoring of the species, according to the ideologies of occupancy modelling in the Kalakpa Resource Reserve (KRR), by estimating patrol effort and comparing to estimates of survey effort needed for a precise occupancy estimation. Patrol indices were obtained from ranger patrol data and used to estimate patrol effort for rangers in the KRR. The survey effort was estimated using the values provided by the occupancy analysis of key ungulate species in KRR, for all encountered ungulates treated as a single group and four species directly sighted/heard on patrols. Encounter rates were low for ungulate species during the study period. The number of species and illegal activities observed were significantly affected by the number of staff on patrol, duration of patrols, and distance patrolled. The patrolling camp had no significant effect on the observations of species and illegal activities. Patrol effort was 190 survey occasions, with the estimated survey effort ranging from 377 to 1068 survey occasions. The estimated survey effort was significantly higher than the patrol effort and necessitated an increase in the number of patrols per unit time to improve the protection of the species in the KRR.

Broad-scale predictions of herpetofauna occupancy and colonization in an agriculturally dominated landscape.

Predictions of species occurrence allow land managers to focus conservation efforts on locations where species are most likely to occur. Such analyses are rare for herpetofauna compared to other taxa, despite increasing evidence that herptile populations are declining because of landcover change and habitat fragmentation. Our objective was to create predictions of occupancy and colonization probabilities for 15 herptiles of greatest conservation need in Iowa. From 2006-2014, we surveyed 295 properties throughout Iowa for herptile presence using timed visual-encounter surveys, coverboards, and aquatic traps. Data were analyzed using robust design occupancy modeling with landscape-level covariates. Occupancy ranged from 0.01 (95% CI = -0.01, 0.03) for prairie ringneck snake (Diadophis punctatus arnyi) to 0.90 (95% CI = 0.898, 0.904) for northern leopard frog (Lithobates pipiens). Occupancy for most species correlated to landscape features at the 1-km scale. General patterns of species' occupancy included negative effects of agricultural features and positive effects of water features on turtles and frogs. Colonization probabilities ranged from 0.007 (95% CI = 0.006, 0.008) for spiny softshell turtle (Apalone spinifera) to 0.82 (95% CI = 0.62, 1.0) for western fox snake (Pantherophis ramspotti). Colonization probabilities for most species were best explained by effects of water and grassland landscape features. Predictive models had strong support (AUC > 0.70) for six out of 15 species (40%), including all three turtles studied. Our results provide estimates of occupancy and colonization probabilities and spatial predictions of occurrence for herptiles of greatest conservation need across the state of Iowa.

PET mapping of receptor occupancy using joint direct parametric reconstruction.

In this work, we evaluate a novel joint direct parametric reconstruction framework to directly estimate distributions of RO and other kinetic parameters in the brain from a pair of baseline and postdrug injection dynamic PET scans. The proposed method combines the use of regularization on RO maps with alternating optimization to enable estimation of occupancy even in low binding regions. Simulation results demonstrate the quantitative improvement of this method over conventional approaches in terms of accuracy and precision of occupancy. The proposed method is also evaluated in preclinical in-vivo experiments using 11C-MK6884 and a muscarinic acetylcholine receptor 4 positive allosteric modulator drug, showing improved estimation of receptor occupancy as compared to traditional estimators. The proposed joint direct estimation framework improves RO estimation compared to conventional methods, especially in intermediate to low-binding regions. This work could potentially facilitate the evaluation of new drug candidates targeting the CNS.

Thinking beyond the closure assumption: Designing surveys for estimating biological truth with occupancy models

Abstract Occupancy models estimate distributions of imperfectly detected species, but violations of the closure assumption can bias results. However, researchers working with mobile animals may find it impossible to eliminate such violations. Here, we tested the hypothesis that occupancy models fit to realistic sampling data can generate unbiased occupancy estimates for an itinerant Wood Thrush (Hylocichla mustelina) population. In 2013 and 2014, we tracked movements of 41 breeding Wood Thrush males. We modelled territory shift probabilities using logistic exposure models and within‐territory movements using continuous‐time stochastic process models. We then constructed an individual‐based model, simulated (1000 iterations) spatiotemporal locations for individuals and simulated sampling these populations using 162 different point count protocols with variable spatial (sampling radius and point placement method), and temporal (survey length, between‐survey intervals and number of surveys) characteristics. We compared occupancy estimates with true values of instantaneous, daily and seasonal occupancy from the simulations. We parameterized continuous time stochastic process models based on movements within 34 unique territories and estimated a daily territory shift probability of 0.0099 (95% CI: 0.0060, 0.0152). Simulated data indicated that estimates of occupancy ranged from 0.18 (0.06, 1.00) to 0.80 (0.71, 0.89) depending on protocol characteristics. Occupancy estimates increased with increasing survey radius, survey length and between‐survey interval. Protocols using shorter surveys and between‐survey intervals were good estimators for instantaneous occupancy (low bias and mean‐squared error) but poor estimators for daily and seasonal occupancy; longer surveys and intervals generated unbiased estimators of daily occupancy but underestimated seasonal occupancy. Logistic regression models that ignored imperfect detection outperformed occupancy models for estimating instantaneous occupancy but not daily or seasonal occupancy. For mobile animals, occupancy of sampling sites changes in space and time. Consequently, the spatial and temporal aspects of a sampling protocol have strong, but predictable, effects on occupancy model parameter estimates. Our results demonstrate that how these factors interact is critical for designing surveys that produce occupancy estimates representative of the biological process of interest to a researcher.

Seeing the Big‐ to Fine‐Grained Picture: Exploring the Baseline Status of Mammal Occupancy Across Myanmar Using Scale‐Optimised Modelling

ABSTRACTAimMyanmar, an Indo‐Burmese biodiversity hotspot, lacks baseline data on species occurrence and distribution. This hinders biodiversity monitoring and optimisation of conservation and development plans. We aim to document baseline mammal occupancy, interactions with environmental factors and scale‐dependent responses.LocationHkakaborazi National Park, Htamanthi Wildlife Sanctuary, Alaungdaw Kathapa National Park, Rakhine Yoma Elephant Range, Say Taung and Myinmoletkhat Key Biodiversity Areas distributed across Myanmar.MethodsCamera trap data throughout Myanmar were used to analyse species occupancy. We conducted a multiscale hierarchical spatial modelling process, using local and pooled data across Myanmar. We also optimised spatial scale across five scales and six predictors, using univariate occupancy models. We then selected scale‐optimised variables for multivariate modelling, repeating this process for each species across local, regional and national datasets.ResultsThe study identified 47 terrestrial species and observed strong scale‐dependent nonstationarity in occupancy estimates. Relationships with environmental variables differed among species and were highly scale dependent. Importantly, occupancy estimates produced by pooling data across sites were greatly different from any of the estimates for the individual sites, suggesting that high heterogeneity in occurrence and abundance across sites among species requires local or nested occupancy estimates to account for spatial heterogeneity and variation.Main ConclusionsFuture conservation efforts should focus on Northern Myanmar if range‐restricted and rare species are to be protected, while focus should still be given to common species which serve as potential indicators of overall community structure. The nonstationarity of occupancy results from different datasets underscores the potential for misleading interpretations from aggregated data in nonstationary ecological systems. Metareplicated analyses of local, geographically and ecologically proximal regional datasets provide an important view of spatial variation in occupancy patterns guiding conservation design and improving understanding of the drivers of biodiversity patterns and change across large regions, such as Southeast Asia.

Feedback–feedforward signal control with exogenous demand estimation in congested urban road networks

To cope with uncertain traffic patterns and traffic models, traffic-responsive signal control strategies in the literature are designed to be robust to these uncertainties. These robust strategies still require sensing infrastructure to implement traffic-responsiveness. In this paper, we take a novel perspective and show that it is possible to use the already necessary sensing infrastructure to estimate the uncertain quantities in real time. Specifically, resorting to the store-and-forward model, we design a novel network-wide traffic-responsive strategy that estimates the occupancy and exogenous demand in each link, i.e., entering (exiting) vehicle flows at the origins (destinations) of the network or within links, in real time. Borrowing from optimal control theory, we design an optimal linear quadratic control scheme, consisting of a linear feedback term, of the occupancy of the road links, and a feedforward component, which accounts for the varying exogenous vehicle load on the network. Thereby, the resulting control scheme is a simple feedback–feedforward controller, which is fed with occupancy and exogenous demand estimates, and is suitable for real-time implementation. Numerical simulations for the urban traffic network of Chania, Greece, show that, for realistic surges in the exogenous demand, the proposed solution significantly outperforms tried-and-tested solutions that ignore the exogenous demand.

Eastern pygmy possum (Cercartetus nanus) populations persist in Central Coast forests after the Black Summer bushfires

The 2019–2020 Black Summer bushfires are an example of Australia’s climate-induced, changing fire regimes, where flora and fauna suffer both direct and indirect impacts as the result of large fires. The eastern pygmy possum (Cercartetus nanus) is a species that may be affected and, although its general ecology is well understood, there is limited knowledge of its response to wildfire. Using clusters of nest boxes across two state forests on the New South Wales Central Coast, detection histories were created from 2017 to 2023. Estimates of occupancy, detection and extinction were produced, where the top ranked model included Fire severity as a covariate of extinction. Extinction probability was highest in unburnt areas, 0.55 (95% CI = 0.13–0.82) and lowest in moderate fire severity areas, 0.15 (95% CI = 0.003–0.52), although all estimates were highly uncertain. Detection probability was 0.35 per cluster visit (95% CI = 0.26–0.45) and occupancy probability was 0.77 (95% CI = 0.39–0.98), indicating a high probability of occupancy at sites affected by fire. This suggests that eastern pygmy possums may benefit from post-fire resources, such as flowering shrubs, as well as their flexible den selection, providing a niche that other arboreal animals may be unable to exploit so soon post fire.

Floor-Level Occupancy Estimation of a Multi-Story Building Using Coarse Wi-Fi Data

In recent years, there has been an extraordinary increase in wireless capable devices and network infrastructure, which spawned a corresponding rise in data produced from the interactions of these technologies. Mobile devices constantly roam, leading to a perpetual dialog between a mobile device and wireless access points. This dialogue generates a continuous stream of device-specific data, including but not limited to a device’s media access control address, time of access, and received signal strength. Given the knowledge of the access point’s location and received signal strength, it is possible to infer the position of user devices and estimate their mobility and occupancy. This article presents two methods for accurately measuring floor-level occupancy in a multi-story building at Texas State University using coarse Wi-Fi log data. The first method employs a static filter, while the second incorporates user-role data and user location to create a dynamic filter. Quantitative methods are used to evaluate these filters against field-collected reference data and existing internal people-counting sensors. Our results demonstrate that the dynamic filter, leveraging variable thresholds, provides a more accurate estimation of occupancy compared to the fixed 5-min static filter which consistently overestimated occupancy. This research sheds light on the potential of dynamic filters derived from user-role data for precise floor-level occupancy estimations, with implications for various applications.

Modeling regional occupancy of fishes using acoustic telemetry: a model comparison framework applied to lake trout

Acoustic telemetry is a common tool used in fisheries management to estimate fish space use (i.e., occupancy) from a local habitat scale to entire systems. Numerous analytical models have been developed to estimate different aspects of fish movement from telemetry datasets, yet evaluations of model performance and comparisons among models are limited. Here, we develop a framework to evaluate model estimates of regional occupancy in large and fragmented systems using an acoustic receiver array in Lake Champlain. We simulated the tracks of 100 acoustically tagged fish using a random walk function and created detection events based on receiver positions and distance-based detection probability. Regional occupancy for the simulated data was estimated by six movement models that ranged in analytical complexity, and results were compared to the true distributions for each simulated track to evaluate model error. The six movement models included: (1) a basic residency index using detections alone; (2) a residency index using last-observation-carried-forward; (3) a centers of activity model; (4) linear and non-linear interpolations (i.e., least-cost paths); and (5 and 6) two dynamic Brownian bridge movement models generated using separate packages in R. We developed a model selection process to compare model performance and select the optimal analysis based on simulation error. This process showed significant differences in model performance among the six movement models based on model error. Overall, the model generating least-cost paths using linear and non-linear interpolations consistently provided the most accurate regional occupancy estimates. Based on these simulation results, we applied this model to a case study that evaluated patterns in the regional distribution of stocked lake trout (Salvelinus namaycush) in Lake Champlain, which demonstrated distinct regional occupancy of two stocked lake trout groups. These results demonstrate potential for large variability in interpretation of acoustic telemetry data for describing regional fish distribution dependent on the analytical method used.

Monocular BEV Perception of Road Scenes via Front-to-Top View Projection.

HD map reconstruction is crucial for autonomous driving. LiDAR-based methods are limited due to expensive sensors and time-consuming computation. Camera-based methods usually need to perform road segmentation and view transformation separately, which often causes distortion and missing content. To push the limits of the technology, we present a novel framework that reconstructs a local map formed by road layout and vehicle occupancy in the bird's-eye view given a front-view monocular image only. We propose a front-to-top view projection (FTVP) module, which takes the constraint of cycle consistency between views into account and makes full use of their correlation to strengthen the view transformation and scene understanding. In addition, we apply multi-scale FTVP modules to propagate the rich spatial information of low-level features to mitigate spatial deviation of the predicted object location. Experiments on public benchmarks show that our method achieves various tasks on road layout estimation, vehicle occupancy estimation, and multi-class semantic estimation, at a performance level comparable to the state-of-the-arts, while maintaining superior efficiency.

Thermal Image Based Occupant Count Measurement Model using Human Body Temperature for Smart Building

Objectives: The proposed Occupant Count Measurement (OCM) model aims to enhance sustainability, energy efficiency, comfort, and safety in smart buildings by accurately determining occupant count using thermal camera images and body temperature data. Methods: The model leverages real-time thermal camera images without the need for a pre-existing dataset. Key parameters include temperature threshold, occupant motion, size, and shape to ensure accurate occupancy estimation. The K-means algorithm identifies and clusters regions of interest (ROI) in thermal images corresponding to human body temperatures. The model also employs sensors like PIR, RGB cameras, and thermal image sensors. Manual counting serves as a benchmark for comparison. Findings: The K-means algorithm extracts regions with elevated temperatures related to human bodies from thermal images, partitioning them into K-clusters based on temperature ranges and assigning each pixel to one of the clusters. A temperature threshold differentiates human clusters in the thermal image, while connected component labeling refines human object segmentation by identifying blobs, which are then used for occupant counting. The model's precision is assessed using diverse image sensors and compared to the actual number of occupants. The proposed OCM model achieves an accuracy of about 90.2% compared to traditional methods. Novelty: This study introduces an OCM model that uses thermal images to estimate the number of occupants in a room based on their body temperature. The method focuses on detecting and counting occupants by their overall thermal body signature, providing a novel approach to occupant measurement in smart buildings. Keywords: Thermal Images, Segmentation, Occupant Estimation, Occupant Comfort, Smart Building

1‐Lipschitz Neural Distance Fields

AbstractNeural implicit surfaces are a promising tool for geometry processing that represent a solid object as the zero level set of a neural network. Usually trained to approximate a signed distance function of the considered object, these methods exhibit great visual fidelity and quality near the surface, yet their properties tend to degrade with distance, making geometrical queries hard to perform without the help of complex range analysis techniques. Based on recent advancements in Lipschitz neural networks, we introduce a new method for approximating the signed distance function of a given object. As our neural function is made 1‐Lipschitz by construction, it cannot overestimate the distance, which guarantees robustness even far from the surface. Moreover, the 1‐Lipschitz constraint allows us to use a different loss function, called the hinge‐Kantorovitch‐Rubinstein loss, which pushes the gradient as close to unit‐norm as possible, thus reducing computation costs in iterative queries. As this loss function only needs a rough estimate of occupancy to be optimized, this means that the true distance function need not to be known. We are therefore able to compute neural implicit representations of even bad quality geometry such as noisy point clouds or triangle soups. We demonstrate that our methods is able to approximate the distance function of any closed or open surfaces or curves in the plane or in space, while still allowing sphere tracing or closest point projections to be performed robustly.

Comparison of soil eDNA to camera traps for assessing mammal and bird community composition and site use.

Species detections often vary depending on the survey methods employed. Some species may go undetected when using only one approach in community-level inventory and monitoring programs, which has management and conservation implications. We conducted a comparative study of terrestrial mammal and bird detections in the spring and summer of 2021 by placing camera traps at 30 locations across a large military installation in northern Michigan, USA and testing replicate soil samples from these sites for environmental DNA (eDNA) using an established vertebrate metabarcoding assay. We detected a total of 48 taxa from both survey methods: 26 mammalian taxa (excluding humans, 24 to species and two to genus) and 22 avian taxa (21 to species and one to genus). We detected a relatively even distribution of mammalian taxa on cameras (17) and via eDNA analysis (15), with seven taxa detected from both methods. Most medium-to-large carnivores were detected only on cameras, whereas semi-fossorial small mammals were detected only via eDNA analysis. We detected higher bird diversity with camera traps (18 taxa) compared to eDNA analysis (eight taxa; four taxa were detected with both methods), but cameras alone were most effective at detecting smaller birds that frequently occupy arboreal environments. We also used Bayesian spatial occupancy models for two widely distributed game species (white-tailed deer, Odocoileus virginianus, and ruffed grouse, Bonasa umbellus) that were moderately detected with both survey methods and found species-specific site use (occupancy) estimates were similar between cameras and eDNA analysis. Concordant with similar studies, our findings suggest that a combination of camera trap and eDNA surveys could be most useful for assessing the composition of terrestrial mammal communities. Camera traps may be most efficient for assessing bird diversity but can be complemented with eDNA analysis, particularly for species that spend considerable time on the ground.

Explainable finite mixture of mixtures of bounded asymmetric generalized Gaussian and Uniform distributions learning for energy demand management

We introduce a mixture of mixtures of bounded asymmetric generalized Gaussian and uniform distributions. Based on this framework, we propose model-based classification and model-based clustering algorithms. We develop an objective function for the minimum message length (MML) model selection criterion to discover the optimal number of clusters for the unsupervised approach of our proposed model. Given the crucial attention received by Explainable AI (XAI) in recent years, we introduce a method to interpret the predictions obtained from the proposed model in both learning settings by defining their boundaries in terms of the crucial features. Integrating Explainability within our proposed algorithm increases the credibility of the algorithm’s predictions since it would be explainable to the user’s perspective through simple If-Then statements using a small binary decision tree. In this paper, the proposed algorithm proves its reliability and superiority to several state-of-the-art machine learning algorithms within the following real-world applications: fault detection and diagnosis (FDD) in chillers, occupancy estimation and categorization of residential energy consumers.

Being confident in confidence scores: calibration in deep learning models for camera trap image sequences

AbstractIn ecological studies, machine learning models are increasingly being used for the automatic processing of camera trap images. Although this automation facilitates and accelerates the identification step, the results of these models may lack interpretability and their immediate applicability to ecological downstream tasks (e.g. occupancy estimation) remains questionable. In particular, little is known about their calibration, a property that allows confidence scores to be interpreted as probabilities that model's predictions are true. Using a large and diverse European camera trap dataset, we investigate whether deep learning models for species classification in camera trap images are well calibrated. Additionally, as camera traps are often configured to take multiple photos of the same event, we also explore the calibration of predictions aggregated across sequences of images. Finally, we study the effect and the practicality of a post‐hoc calibration method, i.e. temperature scaling, for predictions made at image and sequence levels. Based on five established models and three independent test sets, we show that averaging the logits over the sequence, selecting an appropriate architecture, and optionally using temperature scaling can produce well‐calibrated models. Our findings have clear implication for, for instance, the calculation of error rates or the selection of confidence score thresholds in ecological studies making use of artificial intelligence models.

Occupancy Estimation from Blurred Video: A Multifaceted Approach with Privacy Consideration

Building occupancy information is significant for a variety of reasons, from allocation of resources in smart buildings to responding during emergency situations. As most people spend more than 90% of their time indoors, a comfortable indoor environment is crucial. To ensure comfort, traditional HVAC systems condition rooms assuming maximum occupancy, accounting for more than 50% of buildings’ energy budgets in the US. Occupancy level is a key factor in ensuring energy efficiency, as occupancy-controlled HVAC systems can reduce energy waste by conditioning rooms based on actual usage. Numerous studies have focused on developing occupancy estimation models leveraging existing sensors, with camera-based methods gaining popularity due to their high precision and widespread availability. However, the main concern with using cameras for occupancy estimation is the potential violation of occupants’ privacy. Unlike previous video-/image-based occupancy estimation methods, we addressed the issue of occupants’ privacy in this work by proposing and investigating both motion-based and motion-independent occupancy counting methods on intentionally blurred video frames. Our proposed approach included the development of a motion-based technique that inherently preserves privacy, as well as motion-independent techniques such as detection-based and density-estimation-based methods. To improve the accuracy of the motion-independent approaches, we utilized deblurring methods: an iterative statistical technique and a deep-learning-based method. Furthermore, we conducted an analysis of the privacy implications of our motion-independent occupancy counting system by comparing the original, blurred, and deblurred frames using different image quality assessment metrics. This analysis provided insights into the trade-off between occupancy estimation accuracy and the preservation of occupants’ visual privacy. The combination of iterative statistical deblurring and density estimation achieved a 16.29% counting error, outperforming our other proposed approaches while preserving occupants’ visual privacy to a certain extent. Our multifaceted approach aims to contribute to the field of occupancy estimation by proposing a solution that seeks to balance the trade-off between accuracy and privacy. While further research is needed to fully address this complex issue, our work provides insights and a step towards a more privacy-aware occupancy estimation system.

Guidelines for estimating occupancy from autocorrelated camera trap detections

Abstract Site occupancy models (SOMs) are a common tool for studying the spatial ecology of wildlife. When observational data are collected using passive monitoring field methods, including camera traps or autonomous recorders, detections of animals may be temporally autocorrelated, leading to biased estimates and incorrectly quantified uncertainty. We presently lack clear guidance for understanding and mitigating the consequences of temporal autocorrelation when estimating occupancy models with camera trap data. We use simulations to explore when and how autocorrelation gives rise to biased or overconfident estimates of occupancy. We explore the impact of sampling design and biological conditions on model performance in the presence of autocorrelation, investigate the usefulness of several techniques for identifying and mitigating bias and compare performance of the SOM to a model that explicitly estimates autocorrelation. We also conduct a case study using detections of 22 North American mammals. We show that a join count goodness‐of‐fit test previously proposed for identifying clustered detections is effective for detecting autocorrelation across a range of conditions. We find that strong bias occurs in the estimated occupancy intercept when survey durations are short and detection rates are low. We provide a reference table for assessing the degree of bias to be expected under all conditions. We further find that discretizing data with larger windows decreases the magnitude of bias introduced by autocorrelation. In our case study, we find that detections of most species are autocorrelated and demonstrate how larger detection windows might mitigate the resulting bias. Our findings suggest that autocorrelation is likely widespread in camera trap data and that many previous studies of occupancy based on camera trap data may have systematically underestimated occupancy probabilities. Moving forward, we recommend that ecologists estimating occupancy from camera trap data use the join count goodness‐of‐fit test to determine whether autocorrelation is present in their data. If it is, SOMs should use large detection windows to mitigate bias and more accurately quantify uncertainty in occupancy model parameters. Ecologists should not use gaps between detection periods, which are ineffective at mitigating temporal structure in data and discard useful data.

A scaled dirichlet-based predictive model for occupancy estimation in smart buildings

A scaled dirichlet-based predictive model for occupancy estimation in smart buildings

Estimating occupational disease burden: a way forward.

Estimates of occupational disease burden provide important information on which effective policy and regulations can be developed. However, there is no direct way that these data can be obtained, and most burden estimates are derived by merging different data from diverse sources to synthesize estimates of the number of people made ill or who have died from workplace exposures. In recent years, several research groups have published estimates of occupational health burden at national or global scales; these are not always consistent. The World Health Organisation and the International Labour Organisation have taken on the task of producing occupational disease burden estimates for several workplace agents, which we assume are to be seen as the definitive global, regional, and national data. In this commentary, we critique the WHO/ILO approach for their estimates of the non-melanoma skin cancer burden from solar ultraviolet radiation and some of their results for hazardous particulates. We provide recommendations for researchers undertaking occupational burden estimates that they should report along with their data.

On the trade-off between accuracy and spatial resolution when estimating species occupancy from geographically biased samples

Species occupancy is often defined as the proportion of areal units (sites) in a landscape that the focal species occupies, but it is usually estimated from the subset of sites that have been sampled. Assuming no measurement error, we show that three quantities–the degree of sampling bias (in terms of site selection), the proportion of sites that have been sampled and the variability of true occupancy across sites–determine the extent to which a sample-based estimate of occupancy differs from its true value across the wider landscape. That these are the only three quantities (measurement error notwithstanding) to affect the accuracy of estimates of species occupancy is the fundamental insight of the “Meng equation”, an algebraic re-expression of statistical error. We use simulations to show how each of the three quantities vary with the spatial resolution of the analysis and that absolute estimation error is lower at coarser resolutions. Absolute error scales similarly with resolution regardless of the size and clustering of the virtual species’ distribution. Finely resolved estimates of species occupancy have the potential to be more useful than coarse ones, but this potential is only realised if the estimates are at least reasonably accurate. Consequently, wherever there is the potential for sampling bias, there is a trade-off between spatial resolution and accuracy, and the Meng equation provides a theoretical framework in which analysts can consider the balance between the two. An obvious next step is to consider the implications of the Meng equation for estimating a time trend in species occupancy, where it is the confounding of error and true change that is of most interest.