Elephant censusing via geophone arrays: a visual approach for linear arrays

The problem of censusing elephants via geophone recordings of their footsteps along a linear array positioned along a path leading to a watering hole is considered. We propose an intuitive and graphically motivated technique that delineates passings of herds of elephants. Additionally, a measure of dispersion of the localization estimates is proposed that correlates to the size of the passing herd. We illustrate the methods using both real data and a simulation study.