Bird Migration Map

Bird Migration Modelling is a research project which aims at modeling the spatio-temporal patterns of nocturnal bird migration using weather radars. The main website of this project is bmm.raphaelnussbaumer.com. All publications and update of the project are available on ResearchGate.

This repository is divided in the following projects

Project 1: Interpolation

The first project (/2016/)focuses on developing a geostatisctial model to interpolate bird densities at high resolution. Interactive presentation of the methodology is presented at rafnuss-postdoc.github.io/BMM/2016

Presentation:

Space-time interpolation of nocturnal bird migration. Raphaël Nussbaumer, Lionel Benoit, Grégoire Mariethoz, Felix Liechti, Baptiste Schmid. BOU 2019. Warwick University. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.11249.53605.

Paper:

A Geostatistical Approach to Estimate High Resolution Nocturnal Bird Migration Densities from a Weather Radar Network. Nussbaumer, R.; Benoit, L.; Mariethoz, G.; Liechti, F.; Bauer, S.; Schmid, B. Remote Sens. 2019, 11, 2233. DOI:10.3390/rs11192233.

Demo: birdmigrationmap.vogelwarte.ch/2016

Project 2: Birdflow

In the second project (/2018/), we use a flow model (from fluid dynamic) to quantifies the flow of birds taking-off and landing accross western Europe. A short overview of what each script is for is available at rafnuss-postdoc.github.io/BMM/2018.

Paper:

Quantifying year-round nocturnal bird migration with a fluid dynamics model. Nussbaumer R, Bauer S, Benoit L, Mariethoz G, Liechti F, Schmid B. 2021. J. R. Soc. Interface 18: 20210194. DOI: 10.1098/rsif.2021.0194

Demo: birdmigrationmap.vogelwarte.ch/2018

Project 3: Separation of birds, insects and weathers

This smaller third project is presenting a method to differentiate bird, insect and weather in weather radar data based on doppler product (airpseed and standard deviation of radar velocity. The MATLAB code an be found at rafnuss-postdoc.github.io/BMM/2018/LiveScript/Insect_removal.

Paper:

A Gaussian Mixture Model to Separate Birds and Insects in Single-Polarization Weather Radar Data. Raphäel Nussbaumer, Baptiste Schmid, Silke Bauer, Felix Liechti. Remote Sens. 2021, 13(10), 1989. DOI:10.3390/rs13101989.

Project 4: Windsupport

Study the influence of windspeed on groundspeed and airspeed in time and space. The MATLAB code an be found at rafnuss-postdoc.github.io/BMM/WindSupport/HTML/scriptTable.html.

Paper:

Favorable Winds Speed up Bird Migration in Spring but Not in Autumn. Raphäel Nussbaumer, Baptiste Schmid, Silke Bauer, Felix Liechti. Ecology and Evolution 2021 12(8):1–9. DOI:10.1002/ece3.9146.

Project 5: Particle Tracking

Using the interpolated departure, flight and landing information, we can generate particles in the flow to estimate individual-based information (length of journey, duration,etc…). This project is still at an early stage and I am not working a lot on it. You can find the current code at rafnuss-postdoc.github.io/BMM/Particle/HTML/Particle_tracking.html and the webdemo of the particle trajectory at flowmap.blue

Project 6: Windfarm

We combine birdflow map with the windturbine map to estime the number of bird at risk of collision (i.e., birds flying through wind turbine swept area) and simulatanously, the potential power production. The methodology is seperated in three steps:

  1. Windfarm processing
  2. Estimation of energy from wind
  3. Interpolation of the ratio of bird flying at wind turbine height
  4. Estimate the number of birds at risk
  5. Mitigation scenarios