Effectiveness of interval photography cameras for a survey of pollinator communities: Comparison with direct observation

Premise Pollinator communities have been surveyed through direct observation, which is labor intensive and difficult for monitoring nocturnal pollinators. Interval photography surveys are increasingly used, although the resulting data from pollinator community surveys have rarely been validated. Methods We surveyed a pollinator community using both interval photography and direct observation and compared the two methods for differences in identification accuracy, pollinator composition, and number of pollinator visits detected. Results Compared to direct observation, the species‐level identification rate of pollinators using interval photography was significantly lower, although the order‐level identification remained comparable. The number of pollinator observations was highly correlated between interval photography and direct observation, regardless of flower shape or pollinator groups. A longer observation period using interval photography (10 h), despite fewer observable flowers per camera, could yield a comparable or even greater number of pollinator observations than a much shorter period of direct observation (15 min). Discussion Although interval photography has limitations for species‐level identification, it could be a powerful tool for surveying pollinator communities at higher taxonomic levels (e.g., order), including nocturnal pollinators, with reduced labor requirements and without human presence censuses.