SAMPLE: An R Package to Estimate Sampling Effort for Species' Occurrence Rates

Area of Science:

• Ecology
• Computational Biology
• Conservation Biology

Background:

• Accurate species occurrence rates are crucial for ecological studies.
• Challenges like limited resources, elusive species, and difficult environments often lead to small sample sizes.
• Existing methods may not adequately address the need to assess sampling sufficiency in real-time.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce the SAMPLE R package for assessing the adequacy of sampling efforts in estimating species occurrence rates.
• To provide a tool that helps researchers decide if more sampling is needed to achieve accurate estimations.
• To offer guidance on parameter selection for optimal use of the package.

Main Methods:

• Development of the SAMPLE R package utilizing an R-based simulation approach.
• Validation of the package's accuracy through simulations.
• Application of the package to a real-world dataset of coral-dwelling species occurrence rates.

Main Results:

• The SAMPLE package accurately informs users about the sufficiency of their sampling efforts.
• Simulations confirmed the package's reliability in guiding parameter choices.
• The coral reef dataset demonstrated the package's utility in diverse ecological scenarios, including varying host species, symbiont loads, and depths.

Conclusions:

• The SAMPLE R package offers a simple and effective solution for researchers facing small sample size limitations.
• It enables real-time assessment of sampling adequacy, allowing for adaptive field strategies.
• The package is valuable for estimating species occurrence and prevalence rates, especially when large sample sizes are not feasible.