FlyingR: Predicting birds’ flight range. A Tutorial.

Introduction

In this tutorial, a sample of 28 birds from the program Flight is used to demonstrate how to use the package to estimate flight ranges of migrating birds. Note that in package FlyingR two approaches are implemented for this estimation. The first from Pennycuick (1975) and the second from Pennycuick and Battley (1998) and Pennycuick (2008). In this tutorial focus is on the second approach (a time-marching approach).

Basic usage with default settings.

data("birds", package = "FlyingR")
results <-
  FlyingR::migrate(data = birds,
                  method = "cmm",
                  speed_control = 1,
                  min_energy_protein = 0.05)

## ## settings not defined. Using default constants.
##             
## Default airDensity = 1.00 kg m^3

# extract range as a vector
results$range

##           Anser anser  Hydrobates pelagicus   Pachyptila desolata 
##              3523.341              3015.679              4234.999 
##       Regulus regulus      Calidris canutus     Aegypius monachus 
##              1239.048              4427.874              3977.319 
##      Limosa lapponica           Anas crecca       Hirundo rustica 
##             16542.199              3957.240              3366.906 
##         Cygnus cygnus          Sylvia borin     Luscinia luscinia 
##              3486.521              2626.797              2132.726 
##       Corvus monedula         Anas penelope   Fregata magnificens 
##              2282.793              6417.650             11818.913 
##      Larus ridibundus      Diomedea exulans   Phalacrocorax carbo 
##              6154.056              6253.491              2940.844 
##       Gyps rueppellii   Torgos tracheliotus         Ardeotis kori 
##              7849.544              6885.830              4622.839 
##      Sturnus vulgaris     Fringilla coelebs      Carduelis spinus 
##              4342.847              2781.554              2573.194 
##     Turdus philomelos Calidris tenuirostris     Buteo swainsoni M 
##              3155.936              7021.358              5943.870 
##     Buteo swainsoni F 
##              7832.813

In this case, the muscle mass adjustment criteria is the constant muscle mass (“cmm”, meaning protein is not consumed from muscle mass). Run by holding true airspeed at start of flight constant, the alternative is maintain the ratio between true airspeed and minimum power speed constant (speed_control = 0). In this simulation, additional protein is consumed (5% of the total energy) and this comes from the airframe mass.

The default settings are as follows:

These settings could be adjusted. For example, the default value for the induced power factor is high, the recommended being 0.9. This can be adjusted as follows settings = list(ipf =0.9). Basic knowledge of defining lists is required.

results <-
  FlyingR::migrate(data = birds,
                  method = "cmm",
                  settings = list(ipf = 0.9),
                  speed_control = 1,
                  min_energy_protein = 0.05)

Other methods are the constant specific work (method = "csw") and constant specific power (method = "csp").

results <-
  FlyingR::migrate(data = birds,
                  method = "csw",
                  settings = list(ipf = 0.9),
                  speed_control = 1,
                  min_energy_protein = 0.05)


# obtain remaining body mass
results$bodyMass

##           Anser anser  Hydrobates pelagicus   Pachyptila desolata 
##           2.519994936           0.017024028           0.097398903 
##       Regulus regulus      Calidris canutus     Aegypius monachus 
##           0.003760447           0.075167275           6.901150950 
##      Limosa lapponica           Anas crecca       Hirundo rustica 
##           0.072327343           0.138060363           0.010553746 
##         Cygnus cygnus          Sylvia borin     Luscinia luscinia 
##           8.807117551           0.012255185           0.017009737 
##       Corvus monedula         Anas penelope   Fregata magnificens 
##           0.127357220           0.349389454           0.843895225 
##      Larus ridibundus      Diomedea exulans   Phalacrocorax carbo 
##           0.168160520           6.415392298           1.809294431 
##       Gyps rueppellii   Torgos tracheliotus         Ardeotis kori 
##           3.579893319           3.626748479           6.821882187 
##      Sturnus vulgaris     Fringilla coelebs      Carduelis spinus 
##           0.038112871           0.012801287           0.006230200 
##     Turdus philomelos Calidris tenuirostris     Buteo swainsoni M 
##           0.039904948           0.100881801           0.445811279 
##     Buteo swainsoni F 
##           0.512133471

# starting minimum power speed
results$startMinSpeed

##           Anser anser  Hydrobates pelagicus   Pachyptila desolata 
##             17.943034              7.226151              9.809614 
##       Regulus regulus      Calidris canutus     Aegypius monachus 
##              6.478470              9.987883             17.961954 
##      Limosa lapponica           Anas crecca       Hirundo rustica 
##             12.067335             11.790593              6.894405 
##         Cygnus cygnus          Sylvia borin     Luscinia luscinia 
##             21.156584              8.333710              8.523696 
##       Corvus monedula         Anas penelope   Fregata magnificens 
##             10.644033             14.738550             11.825379 
##      Larus ridibundus      Diomedea exulans   Phalacrocorax carbo 
##              9.754916             17.701882             17.168295 
##       Gyps rueppellii   Torgos tracheliotus         Ardeotis kori 
##             17.893455             16.836893             21.188122 
##      Sturnus vulgaris     Fringilla coelebs      Carduelis spinus 
##             10.213171              8.064553              7.079332 
##     Turdus philomelos Calidris tenuirostris     Buteo swainsoni M 
##             10.071773             11.706853             11.977692 
##     Buteo swainsoni F 
##             12.890201

# end of flight minimum power speed
results$endMinSpeed

##           Anser anser  Hydrobates pelagicus   Pachyptila desolata 
##             15.687467              6.290587              8.401544 
##       Regulus regulus      Calidris canutus     Aegypius monachus 
##              5.734903              8.385144             15.925371 
##      Limosa lapponica           Anas crecca       Hirundo rustica 
##              7.020574              9.874101              5.666809 
##         Cygnus cygnus          Sylvia borin     Luscinia luscinia 
##             18.824703              6.856383              7.306440 
##       Corvus monedula         Anas penelope   Fregata magnificens 
##              9.466638             11.324106              9.417949 
##      Larus ridibundus      Diomedea exulans   Phalacrocorax carbo 
##              8.181101             15.491528             15.291795 
##       Gyps rueppellii   Torgos tracheliotus         Ardeotis kori 
##             14.108853             13.789329             17.599673 
##      Sturnus vulgaris     Fringilla coelebs      Carduelis spinus 
##              7.913486              6.633048              5.821629 
##     Turdus philomelos Calidris tenuirostris     Buteo swainsoni M 
##              8.287716              8.855204              9.960540 
##     Buteo swainsoni F 
##             10.113454

References

Pennycuick, Colin J. 1975. “Mechanics of Flight.” In Avian Biology, edited by D. S. Farner and King J. R, 5:1–75. New York.

———. 2008. Modelling the Flying Bird. First Edition. Vol. 5. New Jersey: Elsevier.

Pennycuick, Colin J., and Philip F. Battley. 1998. “Burning the Engine: A Time-Marching Computation of Fat and Protein Consumption in a 5420-Km Non-Stop Flight by Great Knots, Calidris Tenuirostris.” Journal of Theoretical Biology 191: 47–61. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1006/jtbi.1997.0572.