Animal tracking

A curated collection of my blog posts focused on animal tracking analysis.

Intro

There are numerous tools available for analyzing tracking data. In this post, I share a curated collection of my blog entries that focus specifically on movement analysis, covering from data loading and cleaning to visualizations. Additionally, I’ve included a brief list of papers that can serve as guidance when embarking on tracking studies.

Load data

• From movebank
  
• From csv

Data preparation

• Usage of time formats
  
• Converting times
  
• Time overlap between individuals
  
• Locate the animals central location
  
• Include Julian days
  
• Identify Day or night
  
• Calculate speed
  
• Behaviour classification

Clean raw data

• Select columns
  
• Remove undesired locations
  
• Identify gaps
  
• Complete or incomplete
  
• Export clean data frame

Calculate trip parameters

• Number of trips: Identify events
  
• Maximum distance: Distance from point
  
• Total length path: Distance between points

Home range tools and considerations

• Kernel UD considerations
  
• Interpolate a path
  
• Calculate UD and export shapefiles
  
• Calculate shared areas

Habitat use

• In land or not

Visualizations

• Plot basics
  
• Create a base map in R
  
• Inside plot legend
  
• Animations

Further reading

Below, you’ll find a list of recommended sources to explore.
I keep the list concise, though there are certainly many other resources available.

2006
- The package “adehabitat” for the R software: A tool for the analysis of space and habitat use by animals by C Calenge

2016
- Shared R script for calculating trip parameters by BG Lascelles

2019
- A compilation of R packages made by R Joo

2021
- Detailed description of the movebank system by R Kays
- A guide to pre-processing animal tracking data by P Gupte
- The package track2KBA by M Beal
- My package sula

2023
- My teaching materials

2024
- ExMove: An open-source toolkit for processing and exploring animal-tracking data by L Langley
- move2: R package for processing movement data by K Kranstauber

Note that technology is advancing rapidly, and some of the scripts rely on functions that might already being deprecated.

Even though there are a lot of resources out there, I prefer to write my own scripts, particularly when addressing specific questions. If you need help or a custom script, feel free to reach out to me.