RT Journal Article
T1 Measuring disturbance at swift breeding colonies due to the visual aspects of a drone: a quasi-experiment study
A1 Pires Mesquita, Geison
A1 Rodríguez-Teijeiro, José Domingo
A1 Wich, Serge A.
A1 Mulero-Pázmány, Margarita Cristina
K1 Aviones sin piloto
AB There is a growing body of research indicating that drones can disturb animals. However, it is usually unclear whether the disturbance is due to visual or auditory cues. Here, we examined the effect of drone flights on the behavior of great dusky swifts Cypseloides senex and white-collared swifts Streptoprocne zonaris in 2 breeding sites where drone noise was obscured by environmental noise from waterfalls and any disturbance must be largely visual. We performed 12 experimental flights with a multirotor drone at different vertical, horizontal, and diagonal distances from the colonies. From all flights, 17% caused <1% of birds to temporarily abandon the breeding site, 50% caused half to abandon, and 33% caused more than half to abandon. We found that the diagonal distance explained 98.9% of the variability of the disturbance percentage and while at distances >50 m the disturbance percentage does not exceed 20%, at <40 m the disturbance percentage increase to > 60%. We recommend that flights with a multirotor drone during the breeding period should be conducted at a distance of >50 m and that recreational flights should be discouraged or conducted at larger distances (e.g. 100 m) in nesting birds areas such as waterfalls, canyons, and caves.
PB Oxford Academy
YR 2020
FD 2020
LK https://hdl.handle.net/10630/33257
UL https://hdl.handle.net/10630/33257
LA eng
NO Mesquita, G.; Rodríguez Teijeiro, D.; Wich, S.; Mulero-Pázmány, M. (2020) Measuring disturbance at swift breeding colonies due to the visual aspects of a drone: a quasi-experiment study. Current Zoology, 16 (2): 157-163. https://doi.org/10.1093/cz/zoaa038 .
DS RIUMA. Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Málaga
RD 19 ene 2026