Jh. Gove et al., BIOMODALITY OF THE COMBINED REMOVAL AND SIGNS-OF-ACTIVITIES ESTIMATORFOR SAMPLING CLOSED ANIMAL POPULATIONS, Environmental and ecological statistics, 3(1), 1996, pp. 65-78
The possibility of a bimodal log-likelihood function arises with certa
in data when the combined removal and signs-of-activities estimator is
used. Bimodal log-likelihoods may, in turn, yield disjoint confidence
intervals for certain confidence levels. The hypothesis that bimodali
ty is caused by the violation of the equal catchability assumption of
the removal model, leading to the combination of contradictory data/mo
dels in the combined estimator is set forth. Simulations, exploring th
e effect of the violation of removal model assumptions on estimation a
nd inference showed that the assumption of unequal capture probability
influenced the frequency of bimodal likelihoods; similarly, extreme p
arameter values for probability of capture influenced the number of ex
cessively large confidence intervals produced. A sex-specific combined
estimator is developed as a remedial model tailored to the problem. T
he simulations suggest that both the signs-of-activities estimator and
the sex-specific estimator perform equally well over the range of sim
ulations presented, though the signs-of-activities estimator is easier
to implement.