Observer experience and minke whale sighting ability in the IWC/IDCR-SOWER surveys

Abstract

The relationship between observer experience and the number of minke whale schools sighted on International Whaling Commission/International Decade of Cetacean Research-Southern Ocean Whale and Ecosystem Research (IWC/IDCR-SOWER) surveys from 1993/94 to 1998/99 is investigated for Independent Observer (IO) mode survey. Observer experience is defined as the number of past sightings surveys in which the observer participated. During the third circumpolar set of surveys (from 1991/92 onwards), about half of the observers had participated in fewer than five previous sightings surveys. Based upon the QAIC model selection criterion, the observers are classified into two groups depending on their experience: ‘Beginners’ (0-4 surveys) and ‘Experts’ ( > 4). The sighting rate for minke whale schools by Beginners is estimated to be 42% lower than that by Expert observers. Furthermore, perpendicular distances to the sightings do not show significant differences in relation to observer experience. These results jointly indicate that the probability of detection on the trackline, g(0), may be less than one when Beginners are amongst those observing. Abundance estimation for minke whales in IO mode involves the sightings made by triple observer combinations, with two observers in the barrel and one observer in the Independent Observer Platform (IOP) all searching simultaneously. Surprisingly, given the result above, no significant trend in sighting rate with the combined experience of this three-observer combination is detected. This might be an artifact of small sample size for some observer combinations, such as Experts in all platforms. When observer combinations in the barrel are pooled across, the estimated trend in the sighting rate with combined observer experience becomes steeper. Furthermore, when like-minke sightings are also taken into account, the trend becomes steeper still. In this case, when observations are pooled across observer combinations in the barrel, a model for sighting rate that includes an observer effect is selected in terms of the QAIC criteria. These analyses thus provide suggestive evidence that the introduction of Beginner observers during the third circumpolar set of surveys may have reduced g(0) and hence negatively biased abundance estimates for minke whales, both in absolute terms and compared with estimates from the second circumpolar set of surveys.