Commentary: Brightness of the Night Sky Affects Loggerhead (Caretta caretta) Sea Turtle Hatchling Misorientation but Not Nest Site Selection
| Autor: | Travis Longcore, Dan M. Duriscoe, Andreas Jechow, Martin Aubé, Christopher C. M. Kyba, Kellie L. Pendoley |
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| Jazyk: | angličtina |
| Předmět: |
Brightness
Misorientation photometry lcsh:QH1-199.5 sky quality meter Night sky Light pollution Ocean Engineering Aquatic Science sea turtles lcsh:General. Including nature conservation geographical distribution Oceanography Photometry (optics) light measurement lcsh:Science Hatchling Water Science and Technology Global and Planetary Change biology light pollution glare biology.organism_classification Sea turtle Environmental science lcsh:Q Nest site |
| Zdroj: | Frontiers in Marine Science, Vol 7 (2020) Frontiers in Marine Science |
| ISSN: | 2296-7745 |
| DOI: | 10.3389/fmars.2020.00706 |
| Popis: | As research in the field of artificial light at night has increased and more sophisticated quantification of the influence of light is required, ecologists have been seeking a method to quickly and cost-effectively measure artificial light at night. Measuring light at night in a biologically meaningful way is complicated, and requires specialist knowledge (Swaddle et al., 2015; Hänel et al., 2018). It is therefore potentially tempting to adopt tools developed for other disciplines, such as the low-cost and easy-to-use radiance meter “Sky Quality Meter” (SQM), and the SQM-L model, which have both been widely used in night sky brightness studies. Unfortunately, in some cases these instruments are being used for purposes beyond which they were intended. Stanley et al. (2020) used SQMs to make observations of radiance from a series of points on the sky dome, with the intention of thereby measuring hemispherical light levels, to investigate their influence on sea turtle nesting location and hatchling behavior. We appreciate their intention to measure angularly resolved radiance, their analysis and conclusions, and do not disagree with their ultimate recommendations. However, we are concerned that the radiance data are unreliable because of an inadvisable use of an SQM. For this reason, we recommend that researchers do not use SQMs to measure light from very heterogeneous scenes (including the horizon) for biological and ecological studies, because those data could be difficult to reproduce and interpret, and therefore open to challenge. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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