GeoPathSampleR reconstructs bird migration trajectories from stationary-period likelihood maps built with GeoPressureR. Its Gibbs sampler combines residence-dependent departure, a ground-speed distribution conditional on movement, and a prior on cumulative route distance between long periods. Unknown long-period locations can be sampled from light evidence alone. The package also provides posterior stay summaries and sampling diagnostics.
To install the latest version from GitHub:
# install.packages("pak")
pak::pkg_install("GeoPressure/GeoPathSampleR")See the getting-started vignette for inputs, movement settings, and interpretation.
For the software, cite:
Nussbaumer, R. (2026). GeoPathSampleR: Posterior Sampling of Geolocator Paths. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21944194. Available at: https://github.com/GeoPressure/GeoPathSampleR
The methods and validation are described in the following submitted manuscript (citation details will be updated after publication):
Nussbaumer, R., Gravey, M., Wong, J. B. & Benoit, L. (2026). Reconstructing bird migration trajectories from light: inspectable likelihoods and biologically informed movement priors. Manuscript submitted.