How to quantify animal activity from radio-frequency identification (RFID) recordings

Automated animal monitoring via radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology allows efficient and extensive data sampling of individual activity levels, and is therefore commonly used for ecological research. However, processing RFID data is still a largely unresolved problem, which potentially leads to inaccurate estimates for behavioural activity. One of the major challenges during data processing is to isolate independent behavioural actions from a set of superfluous, non-independent detections. As a case study, individual blue tits (Cyanistes caeruleus) were simultaneously monitored during reproduction with both video recordings and RFID technology. We demonstrated how RFID data can be processed based on the time spent in- and outside a nest box. We then validated the number and timing of nest visits obtained from the processed RFID dataset by calibration against video recordings. The video observations revealed a limited overlap between the time spent in- and outside the nest b...基于射频识别（Radio-Frequency Identification, RFID）技术的自动化动物监测，可实现对个体活动水平的高效且大规模数据采样，因此被广泛应用于生态学研究领域。然而，RFID数据的处理至今仍存在大量尚未解决的难题，这可能会导致行为活动评估出现偏差。数据处理过程中的核心挑战之一，便是从大量冗余且非独立的检测记录中，分离出独立的行为动作。作为案例研究，研究人员在繁殖期同时采用视频录制与RFID技术，对单个蓝山雀（Cyanistes caeruleus）进行监测。本研究展示了如何基于个体在巢箱内外的停留时长，对RFID数据进行处理。随后，研究人员以视频录制结果作为校准参照，对经处理的RFID数据集所得到的巢箱造访次数与造访时间进行了验证。视频观测结果显示，个体在巢箱内外的停留时长之间仅存在有限的重叠...