Abstract:
Environmental degradation is a major threat facing ecosystems around the world. In order
to determine ecosystems in need of conservation interventions, we must monitor the
biodiversity of these ecosystems effectively. Bioacoustic approaches offer a means to
monitor ecosystems of interest in a sustainable manner. In this work we show how a
bioacoustic record from the Dedan Kimathi University wildlife conservancy, a conservancy
in the Mount Kenya ecosystem, was obtained in a cost effective manner. A subset of the
dataset was annotated with the identities of bird species present since they serve as useful
indicator species. These data reveal the spatial distribution of species within the
conservancy and also point to the effects of major highways on bird populations. This
dataset will provide data to train automatic species recognition systems for birds found
within the Mount Kenya ecosystem. Such systems are necessary if bioacoustic approaches
are to be employed at the large scales necessary to influence wildlife conservation
measures.
New information
We provide acoustic recordings from the Dedan Kimathi University wildlife conservancy, a
conservancy in the Mount Kenya ecosystem, obtained using a low cost acoustic recorder.
A total of 2701 minute long recordings are provided including both daytime and nighttime
recordings. We present an annotation of a subset of the daytime recordings indicating the
bird species present in the recordings. The dataset contains recordings of at least 36 bird
species. In addition, the presence of a few nocturnal species within the conservancy is also confirmed.
