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Roger Pradel and Ana Sanz-Aguilar (Biostatistics and Population Biology Group, Centre d'Ecologie Fonctionnelle et Evolutive, Montpellier, France) writing in the open-access journal PLoS ONE this year have used survival information from Cory's Shearwaters Calonectris diomedea to consider the problem of trap-shyness in capture-recapture studies.

The paper's abstract follows:

"Trap-awareness and related phenomena whereby successive capture events are not independent is a feature of the majority of capture-recapture studies. This phenomenon was up to now difficult to incorporate in open population models and most authors have chosen to neglect it although this may have damaging consequences. Focusing on the situation where animals exhibit a trap response at the occasion immediately following one where they have been trapped but revert to their original naïve state if they are missed once, we show that trap-dependence is more naturally viewed as a state transition and is amenable to the current models of capture-recapture. This approach has the potential to accommodate lasting or progressively waning trap effects."

Cory's Shearwater pair at its breeding site.  Photograph by Paulo Catry

Reference:

Pradel, R. & Sanz-Aguilar, A. 2012.  Modeling trap-awareness and related phenomena in capture-recapture studies.  PLoS ONE 7(3): e32666. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0032666.

John Cooper ACAP Information Officer, 18 April 2012