Monitoring protocol aimed at surveilling bat populations of the vast majority of species in their foraging sites. This protocol was specifically developed to be used in different habitat types, such as forests, urban, agricultural
ecosystems, meadows, riparian forests, amongst many others.
This protocolwas created in 2009 when the first automatic ultrasound detectors appeared in the market. Such detectors enabled the continuous recording of bat calls. Through this monitoring scheme, we managed to collect the large volume of data that was unimaginable some years ago. Obtained data was sufficient to study changes in population trends across the different habitats and territories over many years.
It is a remote and multi-species monitoring system because allows data collection for a considerable number of bat species. At the moment, ultrasound calls can be identified to the species level, or to the "phonic group" level in cases when unambiguous classification is impossible.
Evolution of the number of localities and sessions through the years
Volunteer ranking by the number of sessions.