Hines, J.E., T. Boulinier,
J.D. Nichols, J.R. Sauer, and K.H. Pollock. 1999. COMDYN: software to study the
dynamics of animal communities using a capture-recapture approach. Bird Study 46
(suppl.):S209-217.
Large-scale Studies of
Marked Birds, Proceedings of EURING 97 Conference, April 7-12, University of
East Anglia, Norwich, UK. Edited by S. R. Baillie and P. M. North
COMDYN is a set of programs developed for estimation of parameters associated
with community dynamics using count data from two locations or time periods. It
is Internet-based, allowing remote users either to input their own data, or to
use data from the North American Breeding Bird Survey for analysis. COMDYN
allows probability of detection to vary among species and among locations and
time periods. The basic estimator for species richness underlying all estimators
is the jackknife estimator proposed by Burnham and Overton. Estimators are
presented for quantities associated with temporal change in species richness,
including rate of change in species richness over time, local extinction
probability, local species turnover and number of local colonizing species.
Estimators are also presented for quantities associated with spatial variation
in species richness, including relative richness at two locations and proportion
of species present in one location that are also present at a second location.
Application of the estimators to species richness estimation has been previously
described and justified. The potential applications of these programs are
discussed.