Does social information affect the settlement decisions of resident birds in their second breeding attempt?A case study of the Japanese Tit(Parus minor)

Individuals may gather information about environmental conditions when deciding where to breed in order to maximize their lifetime fitness.They can obtain social information by observing conspecifics and heterospecifics with similar ecological needs.Many studies have shown that birds can rely on social information to select their nest sites.The location of active nests and the reproductive success of conspecifics and heterospecifics can provide accurate predictions about the quality of the breeding habitat.Some short-lived species can facultatively reproduce two and/or more times within a breeding season.However,few studies have focused on how multiplebrooding individuals select nest sites for their second breeding attempts.In this study,we use long-term data to test whether the Japanese Tit(Parus minor)can use social information from conspecifics and/or heterospecifics(the Eurasian Nuthatch Sitta europaea,the Daurian Redstart Phoenicurus auroreus and the Yellow-rumped Flycatcher Ficedula zanthopygia)to select a nest site for the second breeding attempt.Our results showed that the nest boxes occupied by tits on their second breeding attempt tended to be surrounded by more breeding conspecific nests,successful first nests of conspecifics,and fewer failed first nests of conspecifics than the nest boxes that remained unoccupied(the control group).However,the numbers of breeding heterospecific nests,successful heterospecific nests,and failed heterospecific nests did not differ between the nest boxes occupied by tits on their second breeding attempt and the unoccupied nest boxes.Furthermore,the tits with local successful breeding experience tended to choose areas with more successful first nests of conspecifics than those without successful breeding experience.Thus,we suggest that conspecifics'but not heterospecifics'social information within the same breeding season is the major factor influencing the nest site selection of Japanese Tits during second breeding attempts.

Classification Method Research to Remote Sensing Images

With rapid development of remote sensing technology, the resolution of remote sensing images is increasingly improved; then people can extract more useful data and information from these images. Thus, an important information extraction method from remote sensing images - image classification, becomes more and more important. Based on phenopthase and band composition characteristics, this paper firstly discusses the important role of background parameters in remote sensing images classification; then based on geographical infomation system technology, the computerized automatic classification to high-medium-low-yield croplands in Dingxiang County of Shanxi Province in rotate sensing images has been carried out by using eompound layers classification method of multi-thematic information; compared the classification result to the visual interpretation results, the accuracy increases from 70% to above 90%.

Dynamic statistical information theory

In recent years we extended Shannon static statistical information theory to dynamic processes and established a Shannon dynamic statistical information theory, whose core is the evolution law of dynamic entropy and dynamic information. We also proposed a corresponding Boltzmman dynamic statistical information theory. Based on the fact that the state variable evolution equation of respective dynamic systems, i.e. Fok- ker-Planck equation and Liouville diffusion equation can be regarded as their information symbol evolution equation, we derived the nonlinear evolution equations of Shannon dy- namic entropy density and dynamic information density and the nonlinear evolution equa- tions of Boltzmann dynamic entropy density and dynamic information density, that de- scribe respectively the evolution law of dynamic entropy and dynamic information. The evolution equations of these two kinds of dynamic entropies and dynamic informations show in unison that the time rate of change of dynamic entropy densities is caused by their drift, diffusion and production in state variable space inside the systems and coordinate space in the transmission processes; and that the time rate of change of dynamic infor- mation densities originates from their drift, diffusion and dissipation in state variable space inside the systems and coordinate space in the transmission processes. Entropy and in- formation have been combined with the state and its law of motion of the systems. Fur- thermore we presented the formulas of two kinds of entropy production rates and infor- mation dissipation rates, the expressions of two kinds of drift information flows and diffu- sion information flows. We proved that two kinds of information dissipation rates (or the decrease rates of the total information) were equal to their corresponding entropy produc- tion rates (or the increase rates of the total entropy) in the same dynamic system. We obtained the formulas of two kinds of dynamic mutual informations and dynamic channel capacities reflecting the dynamic dissipation characteristics in the transmission processes, which change into their maximum—the present static mutual information and static channel capacity under the limit case where the proportion of channel length to informa- tion transmission rate approaches to zero. All these unified and rigorous theoretical for- mulas and results are derived from the evolution equations of dynamic information and dynamic entropy without adding any extra assumption. In this review, we give an overview on the above main ideas, methods and results, and discuss the similarity and difference between two kinds of dynamic statistical information theories.