Trialling a real-time drone detection and validation protocol for the koala (phascolarctos cinereus)

Title: Trialling a real-time drone detection and validation protocol for the koala (phascolarctos cinereus)
Creator: Beranek, Chad T.; Roff, Adam; Denholm, Bob; Howell, Lachlan G.; Witt, Ryan R.
Relation: Australian Mammalogy Vol. 43, Issue 2, p. 260-260
Publisher Link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1071/am20043
Publisher: CSIRO Publishing
Resource Type: journal article
Date: 2021
Description: Remotely piloted aircraft system (RPAS), or drone, technology has emerged as a promising survey method for the cryptic koala. We demonstrate an in-field protocol for wild koala RPAS surveys which provides real-time validation of thermal signatures. During 15 trial flights using a quadcopter drone (DJI Matrice 200 v2) we successfully detected and validated koala thermal signatures (n = 12) using two in-field approaches: validation by on-ground observer (n = 10) and validation using 4K footage captured and reviewed directly after the survey (n = 2). We also provide detectability considerations relative to survey time, temperature, wildlife–RPAS interactions and detection of non-target species, which can be used to further inform RPAS survey protocols.
Subject: drone; koala; monitoring; protocol; rpas; thermal signature validation
Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1449203
Identifier: uon:43602
Identifier: ISSN:0310-0049
Language: eng
Reviewed

		Thumbnail	File	Description	Size	Format