Acoustic sensors enable efficient and non-invasive monitoring of a wide range of species, including many that are difficult to monitor in other ways. Although they were initially limited in application scope largely due to cost and hardware constraints, the development of low-cost, open-source models like the Audiomoth in recent years has increased access immensely and opened up new avenues of research. For example, some teams are using them to identify illicit human activities through the detection of associated sounds, like gunshots, vehicles, or chainsaws (e.g. OpenEars).
With this relatively novel dimension of wildlife monitoring rapidly advancing in both marine and terrestrial systems, it is crucial that we identify and share information about the utility and constraints of these sensors to inform efforts. A recent study identified advancements in hardware and machine learning applications, as well as early development of acoustic biodiversity indicators, as factors facilitating progress in the field. In terms of limitations, the authors highlight insufficient reference sound libraries, a lack of open-source audio processing tools, and a need for standardization of survey and analysis protocols. They also stress the importance of collaboration in moving forward, which is precisely what this group will aim to facilitate.
If you're new to acoustic monitoring and want to get up to speed on the basics, check out these beginner's resources and conversations from across the WILDLABS platform:
Three Resources for Beginners:
- Listening to Nature: The Emerging Field of Bioacoustics, Adam Welz
- Ecoacoustics and Biodiversity Monitoring, RSEC Journal
- Monitoring Ecosystems through Sound: The Present and Future of Passive Acoustics, Ella Browning and Rory Gibb
Three Forum Threads for Beginners:
- AudioMoth user guide | Tessa Rhinehart
- Audiomoth and Natterjack Monitoring (UK) | Stuart Newson
- Help with analysing bat recordings from Audiomoth | Carlos Abrahams
Three Tutorials for Beginners:
- "How do I perform automated recordings of bird assemblages?" | Carlos Abrahams, Tech Tutors
- "How do I scale up acoustic surveys with Audiomoths and automated processing?" | Tessa Rhinehart, Tech Tutors
- Acoustic Monitoring | David Watson, Ruby Lee, Andy Hill, and Dimitri Ponirakis, Virtual Meetups
Want to know more about acoustic monitoring and learn from experts in the WILDLABS community? Jump into the discussion in our Acoustic Monitoring group!
Header image: Carly Batist
Monitoring and Evidence Manager, Kent Wildlife Trust
- 0 Resources
- 1 Discussions
- 6 Groups
Founder of Owl Sense, we create low cost, long running audio recorders.
- 0 Resources
- 6 Discussions
- 3 Groups
- @emmlub
- | she/her
Interested in soil health and acoustic monitoring
- 0 Resources
- 1 Discussions
- 2 Groups
- @tobiaspetri
- | he/him
Schäuffelhut Berger GmbH
data science & algorithmic developmentfor movement ecology
- 10 Resources
- 33 Discussions
- 10 Groups
PhD student in animal biology working on AI for wildlife conservation
- 0 Resources
- 1 Discussions
- 7 Groups
- @szacoustics
- | he/him
Bioacoustics @CarbonRewild
- 0 Resources
- 9 Discussions
- 3 Groups
- @srfreeze
- | He/Him
I am a wildlife expert with a decade of experience working with bats and proven success in efforts to study, manage, and conserve the species. I work at the nexus of advanced technologies and deep ecological understandings to provide effective solutions to government, academic, a
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 11 Groups
Environmental Engineer, phd researcher on soundscape ecology
- 0 Resources
- 1 Discussions
- 2 Groups
- @mr.kite
- | he/him
Environmental Specialist working with bird surveys and impact assessment. Here I'm focused on acoustic recording technologies and acoustic data analysis for birds.
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 8 Groups
- @joevstaas
- | Mr
Working with ocean data, technology and collaboration. Empowering ocean insights with a cloud-based geospatial platform, the Ocean Data Platform at HUB Ocean.
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 3 Groups
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 7 Groups
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 1 Groups
Careers
RFCx/Arbimon is Hiring a Data Scientist!
Carly Batist
Apply to work with an absolutely all-star group developing AI/ML techniques and models for acoustic monitoring!
28 June 2023
Article
Request for proposals - Biodiversity + tech solutions
Anna Colquhoun
The GSMA ClimateTech programme
21 June 2023
Careers
Job opportunity in Leiden, The Netherlands
9 June 2023
Careers
Wildlife Monitoring Engineer
Tom August
Permanent and Full Time role at the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology
8 June 2023
Funding
Field Inclusive, Inc. is offering a $2000 travel award to students to attend bird-focused conferences, workshops, and trainings. Interested acoustic monitoring community members should apply by July 31st for...
2 June 2023
Link
New Paper: Identification of fish sounds
Ellie Warren
Xavier Mouy recently shared this new bioacoustics paper on Twitter. This research focuses on identifying fish sounds in relation to specific species through the use of three underwater portable audio-video platforms....
5 May 2023
Article
In this research, six acoustic indicators were used to evaluate the sound of the urban soundscape and the sound of birds in urban parks. The results of the research show that there is a significant relationship between...
2 May 2023
Article
HydroMoth GroupGets Campaign is Open
Ellie Warren
If you've been waiting to try a HydroMoth, join the GroupGets campaign before limited supplies run out
17 April 2023
Careers
Project Manager, Rainforest Connection (RFCx)
Carly Batist
The Project Manager will work to implement acoustic monitoring projects in countries worldwide with some of the biggest stakeholders in conservation tech and biodiversity monitoring!
12 April 2023
Careers
Hardware Lead - Biodiversity / Conservation
Ben Williamson
New role at Pivotal Earth
4 April 2023
Link
The WILDLABS Variety Hour: March 2023 - YouTube
Stephanie O'Donnell
If you missed our Variety Hour show yesterday, do not fear! It's already live on youtube for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy!
30 March 2023
Link
Alex Rogers: Acoustic Devices for Biodiversity Monitoring — Smart Forests Atlas
Stephanie O'Donnell
In this radio episode, we speak to Alex Rogers, Professor of Computer Science at the University of Oxford. We discuss how Alex's research team developed the acoustic recording device AudioMoth, how low-cost technologies...
24 March 2023
June 2025
event
Julia Wiel
July 2025
September 2025
October 2025
event
Vanesa Reyes
November 2025
September 2024
event
Vanesa Reyes
event
Marius Miron
event
Vanesa Reyes
61 Products
| Description | Activity | Replies | Groups | Updated |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thanks for that Steph - and for the link in included. A good set of papers there, and the review by Shonfield & Bayne on 'current use and future... |
|
Acoustics | 7 years 4 months ago | |
| Good news indeed, Al! I think a new thread is definitely a good idea - this one is getting rather unwieldy. @nilaksha, you might check out @Jan+Kees 's serval... |
+41
|
Acoustics | 7 years 5 months ago | |
| Great. Let's continue our discussion that through Skype ;-) My skype name is jkschakel and you can email me at jankees.schakel@sensingclues.com. I'm available on... |
|
Acoustics | 7 years 6 months ago | |
| Paul, Hi - is this still needed, as I'm sure we could provide something relating to birds, bats and cetaceans? Thanks, Carlos |
|
Acoustics | 7 years 7 months ago | |
| Steffen, Thanks for that tip-off, I'd not seen that paper before. One of the speakers at my bird bioacoustics meeting in July covered soundscape ecology, with some... |
|
Acoustics | 7 years 7 months ago | |
| In an effort to learn more about my group's members, I would like to pose a challenge to all of you. I would like to challenge each of... |
|
Acoustics | 7 years 8 months ago | |
| Wow, this would be amazing to continue on with the years of data I have from tigers! I understand their social lives are very different but it would be interesting to see what... |
|
Acoustics | 7 years 8 months ago | |
| Hi everyone, I happened upon this community on Twitter and I thought it would be the perfect place to post about the Wildlife... |
|
Acoustics | 7 years 11 months ago | |
| Hi guys, interesting discussion. As you may have read, we are developing an elephant-detector (to avoid HWC's). The technology we are using (neural networks) can... |
|
Acoustics | 7 years 11 months ago | |
| Hi Bhavesh - thanks a lot. WildLabs doesn't allow me to upload .wav files - can I email you or get them to you another way? They are small - 2 seconds each. You... |
|
Acoustics | 8 years 1 month ago | |
| sorry, double entry |
|
Acoustics | 8 years 6 months ago | |
| Hello Courtney My turn to apologies for delay. Your study sounds very interesting and potentially a valuable technique for future in-situ research. Seems it could indeed fit... |
|
Acoustics | 8 years 8 months ago |
European Forum Alpbach
1 August 2023 5:23pm
Senior Technical Specialist, Monitoring & Technology, ZSL
18 July 2023 1:44pm
New Updates to Carbon Mapper Data Portal
12 July 2023 4:57pm
WOPAM Day (World Oceans Passive Acoustic Monitoring Day)
12 July 2023 4:04pm
LABMaker
6 June 2023 3:31pm
17 June 2023 10:36am
Dear Tom, the AudioMoths are being sold via LabMakers (but I do not know if they construct them for them). Have you been in touch with the AudioMoth team? I am sure they will be able to provide you useful feedback regarding what you are trying to do, and LabMakers.
I have only used them to buy things from them.
Regards, Christos
3 July 2023 4:00pm
Hi Tom,
Seeed Studio also offers manufacturing services. Check out more info on the website here :)
RFCx/Arbimon is Hiring a Data Scientist!
28 June 2023 9:37pm
The Wildlife Society Conference
19 June 2023 5:59am
Catch up with The Variety Hour: June 2023
16 June 2023 11:43am
Wildlife Monitoring Engineer
8 June 2023 4:54pm
ISO Speakers for Emerging Technologies class.
31 May 2023 4:29pm
31 May 2023 10:21pm
Definitely interested! I'm in the ecoacoustics/acoustic monitoring space, working at Rainforest Connection and Arbimon.
2 June 2023 2:08pm
Carly, that would be great! Thanks! I work with soundscapes and love the work of Rainforest Connection! I'll send you an email (@CUNY) to coordinate!
Funding Opportunity for attending bird-focused events and trainings
2 June 2023 12:54am
Looking for AI volunteer positions
24 May 2023 5:41am
24 May 2023 3:45pm
Hi Donya! You might check out the Conservation Tech Directory to see what projects/organizations/tools best align with your interests and skills.
New Paper: Identification of fish sounds
5 May 2023 12:40am
Marine Mammals Research Association (DMAD) and ACCOBAMS Joint Training Course
4 May 2023 1:00pm
Soundscape analysis using eco‑acoustic indices for the birdsbiodiversity assessment in urban parks (case study: IsfahanCity, Iran)
2 May 2023 11:52pm
[Recordings Now Available!) EarthRanger User Conference
27 April 2023 5:52am
Software for marine acoustic monitoring?
25 April 2023 11:53pm
Congo Basin activity?
30 March 2023 9:14pm
25 April 2023 5:08pm
greetings!
i sent you a PM regarding this, feel free to contact me however is most convenient for you -
regards,
chris
HydroMoth GroupGets Campaign is Open
17 April 2023 8:44pm
How do I get started with Bird Audio processing and classification?
17 April 2023 9:11am
World Oceans Passive Acoustic Monitoring Day
14 April 2023 4:36am
Project Manager, Rainforest Connection (RFCx)
12 April 2023 1:09pm
The 59th Annual Meeting of Illinois Chapter of The Wildlife Society
12 April 2023 5:24am
Accessible acoustic analysis tech for blind scientist - ideas?
31 March 2023 10:52pm
6 April 2023 10:49pm
Hey Kate I don't have any explicit ideas at the moment but will think on it - such a cool concept! I wonder if there's some form of tactile spectrogram that you could develop, or a way that you could have them try to draw a representation (so assign some shape) of what they are hearing as a means of classification a call and then clustering those shapes? There's a way of creating an image using foam and paper I believe so they could have a tactile record of those shapes. Guess it depends what you want to the quantitative results to be. Super cool that you are looking for greater accessibility in acoustics!!!
7 April 2023 1:40am
Hi Kate,
We've developed a screen-reader workflow for a classification problem on our "Ocean Voices" Zooniverse project, which simply asks folks to label sounds based on what they hear and omits the spectrogram altogether. There are lots of screen-reader users who are active in the Zooniverse Talk forums, so they may have valuable input for you as well.
Once a person has labeled data, I wonder if they could run automated detectors over the data in Pamguard, calculate features (using something like the R package PAMpal), and then use the BrailleR package to explore the statistics in R. This article has a pretty interesting summary about statistical software for visually impaired folks - might not be news to your student, but I thought it was pretty cool.
I'm very curious what our friends who are visually impaired might notice in the acoustic data. Best of luck to you and your student!
Cheers,
Anne
7 April 2023 5:11pm
Hi Kate- ARISTA Lab (Advanced Research in Inclusion & STEAM Accessibility) is actively working on this through their eclispse soundscape project. I recommend reaching out to MaryKay to get the latest on their project.
Megan
Who's going to ESA in Portland this year?
31 March 2023 9:27am
4 April 2023 9:58am
That sounds great. I think you should encourage people to bring a bit of tech with them, can be a good conversation starter/ice-breaker
4 April 2023 4:04pm
Good idea! I've got a ransom assortment of different acoustic recorders I can bring along
5 April 2023 11:58pm
Indeed, I'll be there too! I like to meet new conservation friends with morning runs, so I will likely organize a couple of runs, maybe one right near the conference, and one somewhere in a nearby park where we can look for wildlife. The latter would probably be at an obscenely early hour, so we can drive somewhere, ideally see elk (there are elk within 25 minutes of Portland!), and still get back in time for the morning sessions.
Updates about Arbimon for Ecoacoustics - free, cloud based analytical tool
31 March 2023 11:09am
31 March 2023 3:43pm
Yes please reach out with any questions on acoustic monitoring, Arbimon, RFCx, etc.!
8 June 2023 1:59am
GroupGets?