Thursday 4 April 2013

Research Questions

So what are our research questions?

We'd like to know if Corsair has a second home, or really to determine if there are any patterns we can figure out to see if we think neighbours are feeding her so we can knock on their door and ask them to stop.

What other research questions would we like answered by analysing the data from our statistically insignificant sample set?

- Can we justify spending $50 on a GPS logger?
- Are there recurring patterns in the cats daily movements?
- Do the cats stay within the residential area, or do they wander down to the open grassland and nature reserve near the nearby creek?
- Do they visit the local schools and if so, at what times?
- Does the age of the cats make a difference?
- Does the gender of the cats make a difference?
- What times of the day are the cats most likely to be at home and wandering?
- By comparing Magellan and Corsair's travel data - do we think the recent cat accident has inhibited Magellan's roaming?
- How far do they roam?
- Is the extent of their roaming weather dependant?
- Do they follow the sun?
- Do they stay home on rainy days?
- Is their roaming patterns affected by seasonal change?

 Please - I'd like to hear your suggestions for research questions we can answer - please comment with suggestions.

I think today's GPS today is going to show us that Magellan spent most of the day locked in the garage.


Can cats go further if they travel by bike?




8 comments:

  1. Do the cats change their pattern if their main carers are away for several days at a time?
    Which of the cats keeps sitting on my poor seedlings?
    What is the minimum level at which the cats determine it's too cold/wet/windy to go outside?
    Are they all attracted to the same areas?

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    1. Emily - this means we need to teach you to attack the logger and download the data daily while we are away.

      Also - given the cats like getting wet then coming inside and getting cuddles... I'm not sure what counts as too wet.

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  2. I'd be interested in how much they tend to stay together, or if they're all just totally independent once they've left the house.

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    Replies
    1. Mike - good question, the problem with this is that we only have one GPS logger. So we can only track one cat at a time. We can look for patterns - ie - if they are going to the same place at 1pm on a Monday for example. Nigel is building a GIS database so he can effectively query all of the data sets, rather than simply looking at one set of data at a time.

      Or you know - we could buy another GPS logger....

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  3. I want to know where Corsair collects her treasures from!!!

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  4. Ack....my log-in isn't working. The above unknown was Amber :-)

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  5. This blog thingie is AMAZING!! I love it. I so want a GPS logger!

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