USE KALEIDOSCOPE PRO TO PROCESS INDIVIDUAL SURVEY EVENTS
Photo credit: Roxanne Pourshoustari
Make sure to READ ALL SECTIONS before performing the steps of the Processing stationary acoustic data in Kaleidoscope Pro guidance. Information in these sections accompanies the NABat directions and needs to be incorporated into the steps.
Open Kaleidoscope and follow the steps in the Processing stationary acoustic data in Kaleidoscope Pro guidance. Listed below is additional guidance and information for following the directions while submitting FBB regulatory data to USFWS.
1. Your input directories will be your “Raw” data deployment folders. Data being submitted for FBB regulatory surveys need to be in WAV format. Pay attention to the options within the INPUTS and OUTPUTS of the “Batch” tab and ensure that they are selected appropriately for processing and producing WAV files, not Zero-Crossing (ZC) files (Figure 4).
Figure 4. The Kaleidoscope Pro application, set up for taking in raw WAV files and outputting processed WAV files. If the lower left of your application does not look like this image, make sure to download and load the “NABat Metadata Form Kaleidoscope Stationary” project form.​
2. Use the information below while filling in the Kaleidoscope Pro NABat metadata form. Download the most up-to-date version of the appropriate metadata forms.
​
a) For detailed definitions of the different NABat metadata fields, hover over the metadata fields in the form in Kaleidoscope Pro with your mouse cursor.
b) If desired, use the FBB_DB_KPro_Stationary_Acoustic_Metadata CSV template to copy/paste values into the metadata form in Kaleidoscope (Figure 5).
Figure 5. An example of the site metadata CSV. The first row is the column header, the second and third rows are informative of data types and column formatting requirements, and the following rows are data rows with one row per acoustic site. Use this before processing to copy/paste values into the metadata form in Kaleidoscope Pro.
c) Do not include commas in values you input into the metadata form (e.g., no comma before “Inc.” or “LLC” in company names). Extra commas in metadata fields cause upload issues for the project meta.csv (CSV = Comma-Separated Values).
​
d) GRTS Cell ID: Determine GRTS ID for each site by using the NABat Grid Cell Finder (noted in the training videos as the Location Obfuscation Tool). It is optional to have the GRTS ID in the metadata spreadsheet if the coordinates are included, but it is needed for the acoustic file names anyway. The NABat Grid Cell Finder can also be found on the quick links to resources page.
e) Survey Start/End Time: These reference the beginning and ending detector activation time. If detector starts recording late, then start time should be listed as the date and time from the first file recorded. If a detector stops recording early, the end time should be listed as the date and time of the last file recorded. Note such incidents in the “Unusual Occurrences” metadata field. Adjust times as necessary for each detector/deployment (i.e., do not just use the same full survey time for all batches unless detectors were all active for that full time). Use the formatting yyyy:mm:ddThh:mm:ss (e.g., “2020-07-15T21:30:00”).
f) Land Unit Code: The first 4 letters of the county where the survey was conducted (same code as used in project name; see Appendix 3)
​
g) Name of Species List for Auto Id: Make sure the name you input here matches exactly with the name of the Species List you created in Section 1.
​
h) Note: Include any additional notes about the specific deployment (or specific night if running batches nightly) in this field if not included in the “Unusual Occurrences” field. Save these notes to add into the NABat Partner Portal later.
​
3. Your output directories will be your empty “Processed” data deployment folders.
4. The next steps are in the “Auto ID for Bats” tab of Kaleidoscope. For USFWS FBB regulatory survey data submission, select “0 Balanced (Neutral)” instead of “+1 More Accurate (Conservative)” as suggested in the NABat guidance. Make sure to select the appropriate species for the species classifier based on the county the survey was conducted in (same species as the species list you created in the project in the NABat Partner Portal; Appendix 2).
NOTE ABOUT Corynorhinus rafinesquii
In Kaleidoscope, files auto-identified as (CORTOW) represent calls from (CORRAF), as these two species are considered acoustically indistinguishable and does not occur in Florida. CORRAF is not an option in the Kaleidoscope species list, so CORTOW is checked for data processing
NOTE ABOUT Lasiurus borealis and L. seminolus
While Kaleidoscope includes both (LASBOR) and (LASSEM) as options for the species classifier, only select LASBOR. Files auto-identified as LASBOR represent calls that could be either of these two Lasiurus species, as they are considered acoustically indistinguishable. Including both species will result in a greater number of NoID files. When manually vetting for these species, you will use LABOLASE. these species, you will use LABOLASE.
5. Before clicking “Process Files,” make sure the settings in the “Signal Params” are appropriate for FBB surveys (Figure 6).
Figure 6. The appropriate signal detection parameters to use when processing acoustic files in Kaleidoscope for FBB regulatory surveys. These include A) 8–120 (kHz) Minimum and Maximum Frequency Range; B) 2–50 (ms) Minimum and Maximum Length of Detected Pulses; C) 500 (ms) Maximum inter-syllable gap; and D) 2 Minimum number of pulses.
​​
6. If running batches in full deployments (not night-by-night) and you intend to conduct manual vetting to NABat’s recommendations (manually vet one file per species per night per deployment) – it is best to organize files within the Kaleidoscope file viewer before vetting them.
​
a) Open results (id.csv) in Kaleidoscope.
​
b) Timestamps should be included in file names. If so, click the “Out File FS” column title (make sure files are organized first recorded to last recorded instead of vice versa – click title again if ordered last to first). Alternatively, you can order by “Date” and then “Time” columns by clicking their column titles, respectively, again ensuring that the files are listed first recorded to last.
​
c) Click the “Auto ID” column title. This allows you to sort through files one species at a time with the files in order from first to last recorded.
​
d) Audio files auto identified as EUMFLO that are manually vetted as Noise should be included in metadata for upload. Remove the associated audio file(s) from the Noise folder to the main project folder with the other audio files. ​​
​
7. For Nightly Low/High Weather Parameters, use the FBB_Weather_Template found in the Data Resources Package. Fill out the nightly high and low weather parameters of each site surveyed. Click File -> Save As -> and provide a unique file name. This file will be used later. Continue to the Create Metadata section.
​