[Babase] Fwd: Rank and ranker issues

Susan Alberts babase@www.eco.princeton.edu
Mon, 7 Feb 2005 15:34:42 -0500


Thanks Catherine, I am forwarding this to the list so it gets in the string.

Susan
>
>>Date: Thu, 03 Feb 2005 21:35:05 -0500
>>From: Catherine Markham <amarkham@Princeton.EDU>
>>Subject: Rank and ranker issues
>>To: Jeanne Altmann <altj@Princeton.EDU>
>>Organization: Princeton University
>>X-Accept-Language: en-us, en
>>User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.3)
>>  Gecko/20040910
>>Original-recipient: rfc822;altj@phoenix.princeton.edu
>>
>>Hi Jeanne,
>>
>>I read through the BaBase emails about ranker and wanted to send 
>>you a quick summary of the two main male rank issues that Daphne 
>>had told me about . . .
>>
>>First, Daphne had mentioned that rank correction files for males 
>>exist because the ranker program was creating problems when a male 
>>was in two groups in one month.  The program would add him to the 
>>second group but with the rank he had in the first group, or some 
>>sort of similar mix-up.  I got the impression that this issue had 
>>been resolved with the ranker program itself, but the incorrect 
>>files had not yet been modified.
>>
>>Also, I know Daphne was aware of the inconsistencies with all group 
>>ranks regarding age and sex that Susan mentioned.  Daphne had 
>>warned me that for some years the order went adult males, adult 
>>females, juvenile males, etc. while in other years the order went 
>>adult males, juvenile males, adult females, etc.  This problem was 
>>one of the factors contributing to the difficulty in extracting 
>>just the male ranks and also in determining the adult males (as 
>>opposed to the juveniles) based on the rank file.  In addition, it 
>>seems to have caused errors in determining the number of rank males 
>>(the program was counting till it got to a female, so if subadult 
>>males were listed above females the number of rank males would be 
>>inaccurate).
>>
>>Hope this helps somewhat,
>>Catherine
>>
>>
>>--
>>Catherine Markham
>>Department Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
>>Princeton University
>>Phone: (609) 258-6898 Fax: (609) 258-2712


-- 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Susan Alberts, Associate Professor 
Department of Biology, Duke University, Box 90338, Durham NC 27708 
phone 919-660-7272  fax 919-660-7293