Hokkaido University · Environmental Science
Professor Masayuki Senzaki's research lab focuses on the ecological impacts of anthropogenic noise pollution across diverse ecosystems, with a particular emphasis on acoustic communication, predator-prey interactions, and animal movement in human-modified landscapes. The lab conducts field experiments to understand how noise affects foraging efficiency, species communities, and behavioral responses in birds, owls, frogs, and seabirds, especially under natural conditions. A central theme is the interplay between acoustic masking, distraction, and aversion, and how prior exposure to noise may shape behavioral plasticity in signal receivers. The lab also investigates long-term population trends of threatened species, such as seabirds, to inform conservation strategies.
Figures are computed from collected data and may differ slightly.
Anthropogenic noise has been increasing globally. Laboratory experiments suggest that noise disrupts foraging behavior across a range of species, but to reveal the full impacts of noise, we must examine the impacts of noise on foraging behavior among species in the wild. Owls are widespread nocturnal top predators and use prey rustling sounds for localizing prey when hunting. We conducted field experiments to examine the effect of traffic noise on owls' ability to detect prey. Results suggest th
Noise pollution is pervasive across every ecosystem on Earth. Although decades of research have documented a variety of negative impacts of noise to organisms, key gaps remain, such as how noise affects different taxa within a biological community and how effects of noise propagate across space. We experimentally applied traffic noise pollution to multiple roadless areas and quantified the impacts of noise on birds, grasshoppers and odonates. We show that acoustically oriented birds have reduced
Abstract Anthropogenic noise is widespread, and growing evidence suggests that it can negatively affect animals through many different mechanisms including masking of cues and signals, distraction, and aversion to noise. Acoustic masking has received the most attention from researchers and recent evidence suggests that masking effects can be mitigated by alteration of signal frequencies or amplitudes by signalers. Additionally, alteration can be a learned response via prior experience with noise
Successful dispersal or movement between patches in fragmented landscapes is key for the survival and population persistence of wildlife. Despite the growing interest in the impacts of anthropogenic noise, how noise alters the permeability of different types of land cover to animal movement in fragmented landscapes is underappreciated. Here, we experimentally quantified the movement distances of a frog species in three types of land cover common to fragmented landscapes (lawns with or without ca
Summary Global seabird populations are in decline, with nearly half of all seabird species currently in an extinction crisis. Understanding long-term seabird population trends is an essential first step to inform conservation actions. In this study, we assembled historical breeding records of seabirds throughout the Japanese archipelago and quantified the long-term population trends of 10 major breeding seabird species using a hierarchical Bayesian state-space model. The model revealed that six
Diurnal gulls and skuas, which depend mostly on visual cues during kleptoparasitic attacks, experience reduced predation success when low light conditions or dense vegetation impair prey visibility. Rhinoceros Auklets Cerorhinca monocerata lose prey to kleptoparasitic conspecifics and kleptoparasitic gulls. The return of adult auklets to their colony was observed and incidences of inter- and intra-specific kleptoparasitism were recorded in five study sites with high and low vegetation coverage u
Anthropogenic noise is ubiquitous globally. However, we know little about how the impacts of noise alter fundamental ecosystem properties, such as resource consumption by invertebrate consumers. Using experimental noise manipulation and faecal DNA metabarcoding, we assessed how the direct and cross-trophic indirect effects of noise altered the dietary richness and specializations of omnivorous grasshoppers in a grassland ecosystem. We found that the experimental noise treatment expanded grasshop
—The Spectacled Guillemot (Cepphus carbo) is a seabird endemic to northeastern Asia. It is listed as a “Vulnerable” species in Japan, though little is known of its population status. Population surveys were carried out during 2011–2014 throughout their range in northern Japan. Twenty-eight known and six suspected breeding colonies were reported in this region during 1875–2010. Fourteen known and four suspected breeding colonies were found in the 2011–2014 surveys, with 1,169 individuals and 294
The Swinhoe's Rail (Coturnicops exquisitus) is the world's smallest, and among the most poorly studied, Rallidae species. While the Japanese archipelago has long been considered a wintering area of this species, vocalizing Swinhoe's Rails have recently been observed during its breeding season in multiple distinct wetlands in northern Japan. During the summer of 2018, we investigated the breeding status of this species at a wetland in the Yufutsu Plain in central Hokkaido, where vocalizing Swinho
ABSTRACT Construction of buildings, and other types of land uses by humans can exert negative impacts on wildlife that live in the areas surrounding such developments (i.e., off‐site impacts). To reduce or lessen such impacts, it is important to determine the biological metrics (e.g., abundance, breeding success) that are affected and at which spatial scales. We monitored the eastern marsh harrier ( Circus spilonotus ) breeding in wetland patches in northern Japan for 4 years and quantified its
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