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I'm using QGIS 3.2, WGS 84, EPSG 4326. I have a series of coordinates that represent the location of Red Squirrel trail cams in a Forest, there is another file with every sighting date and location listed over several years. I am trying to derive an estimate of the total population of Red Squirrels. I would like to compare sightings within each 24 hour period taking into account the distance between other sightings on the same day thus eliminating 2 sightings where the squirrel could have travelled to second point. I hope to establish the max distance a squirrel can travel from another data file of radio collared tracking with date/time/location data.

However I first need to be able to calculate distances from the cordinates but am unsure how to do this accurately.

Vic
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  • This is trivially done with any GIS application, and a partial differential equation only solvable through iterative means if you want to do it on your own (search on "second problem of geodesey") – Vince Dec 05 '21 at 17:33
  • See this here for how to measure distances in QGIS: https://gis.stackexchange.com/a/408399/88814 and https://gis.stackexchange.com/a/401377/88814 and https://gis.stackexchange.com/a/396041/88814 – Babel Dec 05 '21 at 19:01
  • It may be trivial to an expert but to a non mathematically minded beginner it is non trivial, hence asking question. Am reading all the links suggested. – Vic Dec 07 '21 at 08:55

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You could have a look at the concept of coordinate systems and transformations to have your data in an "Cartesian Coordinate System" like UTM and transform your geographic point locations for metric euclidian distance measurements.

To start with the capabilities of QGIS the Lesson: Reprojecting and Transforming Data and Nearest Neighbor Analysis could be a good start point.

Spacedman
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huckfinn
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