[Babase] statdate questions
Daphne A. Onderdonk
babase@www.eco.princeton.edu
Fri, 10 Sep 2004 12:27:31 -0400
Hi all,
Sorry to not respond earlier - I've been immersed in matrices. Digging
into this unearthed many related issues, as usual. But in general I
think using the last confirmed presence is better than using the mom's
statdate. In addition to Susan's point that the kids may have
disappeared before the mom's statdate, there is the issue that some of
these moms still get censused on the occasional Other Group Censuses,
and so have quite recent statdates (see SCI). Also, in one case (CAS1),
the mom's statdate is actually before the kid's estimated birthdate (but
see below).
I think we generally can use last confirmed presence for the Lodge
infants. In the sporadic demography info from the end of 97 and early
98, there seems to be some information on their presence. On the
sexskin sheets from late 97, JA has notes for REM, RAH, and BIN saying
"birth?". I think this is because there are numbered footnotes below
(as if there was a repro note), but there are no corresponding repro
notes. Steph, could you check for originals there? At the bottom of
the census sheet, there are first letters for what I think must be the
new infants, with a mom's sname scribbled in the margin. It's hard for
me to read the snames on our xeroxes, but I think the ones we're
concerned with are there. If you find those repro notes, Steph, check
the note for BIN - BIN11 has a birthdate in Biograph of Sep 97 (I think
b/c of Jeanne's "birth?" note), but an infant of Binti's first shows up
on the census in Apr 98.
The ones from Proton's are a little trickier. CAS1 has a birth date in
Biograph of 20 Jun 93, but her mom's statdate is 11 Jun 93 (we obviously
do not want to use mom's stadate in this case). HOWEVER, there is more
information on both CAS and the infant than is reflected in Biograph.
There was an 8 month gap in any censuses of Proton's (from Jun 93 to Feb
94), and I think the info in Biograph only reflects the info through
93. I think CAS1's birthdate in Biograph was calculated from the
conception date - she is not directly noted until Feb 94 (where she is
given a name and sexed, none of which is in Biograph). This infant is
censused in Proton's through 94.
SCI5 has a birthdate of 14Aug 93 (also during the gap), and is not
mentioned in the next notes of Feb 94 (when 3 other infants are
described in detail). I think this birthdate must be estimated from the
conception date, but JA has a "Z?" for SCI's pregnancy in Feb 93. As
far as I can tell, we don't even know if this was a live birth. JA
thought the presence of the infant must have been mentioned in Other
Group Notes, or something, but I can't find any record of it. SCI
starts cycling again in Apr 94. Should this pregnancy even be in
Biograph if we don't know the outcome? Steph, did you find any other
record of this infant? If we do keep it in Biograph, I don't know what
to use as a statdate...
Jeanne and I talked about this briefly, and there clearly needs to be
some cleaning up of data from the period after Proton's and Lodge
stopped being monitored regularly. Now that we have demography notes,
the presence data can be updated as the current Other Group Censuses are
done, and the statdates would get updated automatically. (Steph, I know
that Karen started entering some of the old Other Group Census info, but
I don't know when she started and if she included Lodge and Proton's).
And there is clearly more info on names and sexes of infants that can be
added.
But this is a longer term solution, and we need to decide what to do
with these infants' statdates for the conversion. JA suggested using
the first direct observation of the infants as a statdate for now, until
we get to the longer-term adding of info later. Thoughts? This
obviously wouldn't be possible for SCI5.
None of these infants has anything for Bstatus, even though many of
their birthdates were estimated.
Jeanne suggested using a status code for these animals that we use for
males when we don't know if they are alive or dead, but we really don't
have such a status code. 2 is suspected dead, and 3 is missing, which
to me suggests a confirmed absence rather than just not knowing.
Currently if a male disappears, he gets put in group 9 (unknown) in
Members (through demog notes), but nothing happens to his status - it
stays blank (which is equivalent to alive). We basically haven't been
using status codes 2 and 3. Do we leave these guys with a blank status
code? Do we need a new status code?
Well, that's plenty to chew on. Let me know if questions.
Daphne
Jeanne Altmann wrote:
> sorry to be slow on this;
> I think we need to go with last confirmed presence and be sure that we
> use the status code that we use for males when we really just don't
> know whether they are alive or dead,
> jeanne
>
> At 08:46 AM 9/9/2004 +0300, you wrote:
>
>> Steph, this makes sense.... but, the only problem with taking
>> mother's statdate is that in some cases the kid may have
>> died/disappeared before the mother's statdate. in principle i think
>> it is fine to use mother's statdate if there is no other info but we
>> shouldn't do that in cases where the kid disappeared if we can help it.
>>
>> S
>>
>>> There are 9 animals for which we have this problem. I think the
>>> only problem with looking at the last confirmed presence is that it
>>> will likely be different from other lodge group members statdates
>>> (for example the moms). Perhaps we should just go with whatever
>>> moms statdate is listed as? Daphne, any thoughts?
>>
>>
>>
>>>
>>> -s
>>>
>>> --On Wednesday, September 08, 2004 11:29 AM +0300 Susan Alberts
>>> <alberts@duke.edu> wrote:
>>>
>>>> This is a sticky problem. One suggestion (not a decision, just a
>>>> suggestion, others should provide input) is that you check in the
>>>> original data sheets, to see when the kid in question was last
>>>> confirmed
>>>> present, and then entering a manual stat date. For some kids the mom's
>>>> statdate might provide a clue. How many are there?
>>>>
>>>> Susan
>>>>
>>>>> Hi again,
>>>>>
>>>>> Statdates - we have several blank statdates. 2 are from Proton's
>>>>> group and the others are lodge group. They are from when we stopped
>>>>> seeing them much. So, what we have is the knowledge that a
>>>>> particular female had an infant, usually we couldn't tell the sex,
>>>>> and then we haven't properly censused the groups again. I'm
>>>>> guessing that they are missing statdates because these kids weren't
>>>>> really named and so might not have been on the computer census
>>>>> sheets for the update (hence statdate not getting automatically
>>>>> generated). What to do? Shall I go for a manual entry? If so, what
>>>>> should I use as a cut off date?
>>>>>
>>>>> please stay tuned for my next question...i can feel it coming...
>>>>> -steph
>>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>
>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------
>>>> Susan Alberts, Department of Biology, Duke University, Box 90338,
>>>> Durham
>>>> NC 27708
>>>> 919-660-7272 (phone), 919-660-7293 (FAX)
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>
>>
>> --
>> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Susan Alberts, Department of Biology, Duke University, Box 90338,
>> Durham NC 27708
>> 919-660-7272 (phone), 919-660-7293 (FAX)
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