Blumstein & Daniel transmission fidelity technique (Sciuridae)

Knowledge graph centered on Blumstein & Daniel transmission fidelity technique (Sciuridae) with 71 nodes and 215 connections. Top connected: Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory, Gothic, Marmota, Yellow-bellied Marmot, Engelmann Spruce.

Method synopsis

Digital recording and spectral analysis of alarm vocalizations to quantify entropy and goodness of pitch as measures of call structure and acoustic properties.

Synthesized from method descriptions across 22 papers using this protocol.

Procedure from a recent peer-reviewed implementation

Steps below were extracted from the most recent peer-reviewed implementation of this protocol in the corpus — The sound of fear is heritable (2025), Current Zoology. The protocol was originally introduced by Alarm calling in yellow-bellied marmots: II. The importance of direct fitness (1997), Animal Behaviour. Implementations in other papers (listed below) may differ.

1. Acoustic analysis of alarm calls
   Recordings were edited to create files containing single alarm calls per bout with limited background noise using Audacity 2.1.3. Call entropy was quantified using Sound Analysis Pro with specific settings: contrast = 50, segment = 50 dB, frequency range = 1-10.025 kHz, window = 10.0 ms, advance window = 0.23 ms, contour threshold = 10.
   Quantities: Up to 5 files per calling bout were created and analyzedDuration: Not specifiedConditions: Digital audio processing
   Equipment: Audacity 2.1.3, Sound Analysis Pro software
2. Measure call parameters
   Quantified call entropy, energy bands (fundamental plus harmonics), and call duration. Energy bands were counted as the number of energy bands in the calls, which had shown positive association with entropy in prior work.
   Quantities: Measurements taken from processed call recordingsDuration: Not specifiedConditions: Digital analysis
   Equipment: Sound Analysis Pro software

Typical Equipment

• Sony PCM digital recorder
• Audix OM-3xb microphones
• Audacity 2.13
• Raven Pro 1.5
• Sound Analysis Pro 2011

Output Measurements

• entropy values
• goodness of pitch
• number of energy bands
• call duration

Papers Using This Protocol (22)

Species Studied With This Protocol

Places Where Used