Backyard Bioblitz Predation Bias Field Experiment: Data & Meta-data

This experiment took place over 8 days from October 11th - October 18th, first in a yard in Nipissing First Nation, and then in a similar environment in North York. The goal of the experiment was to observe and compare the level of comfort demonstrated by animals in each environment around the researcher in an attempt to loosely quantify their perceived predation bias in the presence of humans and its effect on biodiversity. Level of comfort was approximated by using the distance between the observed species and the researcher. Organisms observed high up in trees or flying often have no available distance data due to the added height factor, which could not be accurately estimated. Observations in both locations took place for approximately one hour each day, for four days in each location in the afternoon beginning between 2:20 and 3:45pm. The weather from October 11th-14th in Nipissing First Nation was cool and sunny. On October 15th in North York it was cool and rainy, resulting in less observations. The remaining days in North York were cool and either sunny or overcast.

本次实验于10月11日至10月18日（共8天）开展，先后在尼皮辛第一民族（Nipissing First Nation）的一处庭院，以及北约克（North York）的相似环境中进行。本实验旨在观察并对比动物在两种环境中围绕研究人员时展现的舒适程度，以粗略量化其在人类在场时的感知捕食倾向，以及该倾向对生物多样性的影响。实验以观测到的物种与研究人员之间的距离作为舒适程度的近似衡量指标。但栖息于高空树木或飞行的生物往往无法获取有效距离数据，因高度因素难以准确估算。两地的每日观测时长均约为1小时，每个地点均开展4天的下午观测，观测开始时间介于14:20至15:45之间。10月11日至14日，尼皮辛第一民族地区天气凉爽晴朗。10月15日北约克地区天气凉爽多雨，导致当日观测样本减少。北约克其余时段天气均较为凉爽，晴或多云。