Maybe this is obvious, but maybe it's so obvious that you could easily forget to include this in your list of recommendations: encourage them to hang out here on WILDLABS!  I say that in all seriousness: if you get some great responses here and compile them into a list, it would be easy to forget the fact that you came to WILDLABS to get those responses.

I get questions like this frequently, and my recommended entry points are always (1) attend the WILDLABS Variety Hour series, (2) lurk on WILDLABS.net, and (3) if they express a specific interest in AI, lurk on the AI for Conservation Slack.

I usually also recommend that folks visit the Work on Climate Slack and - if they live in a major city - to attend one of the in-person Work on Climate events.  You'll see relatively little conservation talk there, but conservation tech is just a small subset of sustainability tech, and for a new person in the field, if they're interested in environmental sustainability, even if they're a bit more interested in conservation than in other aspects of sustainability, the sheer number of opportunities in non-conservation-related climate tech may help them get their hands dirty more quickly than in conservation specifically, especially if they're looking to make a full-time career transition.  But of course, I'd rather have everyone working on conservation!

Some good overview papers I'd recommend include: 

• Besson, M., Alison, J., Bjerge, K., Gorochowski, T. E., Høye, T. T., Jucker, T., ... & Clements, C. F. (2022). Towards the fully automated monitoring of ecological communities. Ecology Letters, 25(12), 2753-2775. 
• Speaker, T., O'Donnell, S., Wittemyer, G., Bruyere, B., Loucks, C., Dancer, A., ... & Solomon, J. (2022). A global community‐sourced assessment of the state of conservation technology. Conservation Biology, 36(3), e13871.
  • WILDLABS-led research! Led by @TaliaSpeaker and @StephODonnell 
• Lahoz-Monfort, J. J., & Magrath, M. J. (2021). A comprehensive overview of technologies for species and habitat monitoring and conservation. BioScience, 71(10), 1038-1062.
• Tuia, D., Kellenberger, B., Beery, S., Costelloe, B. R., Zuffi, S., Risse, B., ... & Berger-Wolf, T. (2022). Perspectives in machine learning for wildlife conservation. Nature communications, 13(1), 792.
• Stowell, D. (2022). Computational bioacoustics with deep learning: a review and roadmap. PeerJ, 10, e13152.
  • I'm biased towards bioacoustics because that's what I focus on, but this regardless this is an excellent horizon scan of AI/ML for conservation and acoustics!
• Borowiec, M. L., Dikow, R. B., Frandsen, P. B., McKeeken, A., Valentini, G., & White, A. E. (2022). Deep learning as a tool for ecology and evolution. Methods in Ecology and Evolution, 13(8), 1640-1660.

I'd also encourage you to follow the #tech4wildlife hashtags on social media! 

I'm also here for this. This is my first comment... I've been lurking for a while.

I have 20 years of professional knowledge in design, with the bulk of that being software design. I also have a keen interest in wildlife. I've never really combined the two; and I'm starting to feel like that is a waste. I have a lot to contribute. The loss of biodiversity is terrifying me. So I’m making a plan that in 2024 I’m going to combine both.

However, if I’m honest with you – I struggle with where to start. There are such vast amounts of information out there I find myself jumping all over the place. A lot of it is highly scientific, which is great – but I do not have a science background.

As suggested by the post title.. a “Wildlife Conservation for Dummies” would be exactly what I am looking for. Because in this case I’m happy to admit I am a complete dummy.

Hi Sol,

I think your concern is well placed.  The pros typically tow an array of hydrophones, in its simpler configuration it looks like a long fat rubber hose containing maybe a dozen transducers feeding their electrical signals to a recording unit back on the ship.  All this is done to reduce noise from the ship, from waves crashing, and flow noise.  The multiple transducers can also be electronically tuned to be directional so that it can be "pointed" away from a noise source (like the ship).

In your position, I would just try the simplest thing that could work, then fix the problems as they arise.  It could be you may need to be dead in the water while recording.  To address surface noise (slapping waves, wind), you could mount the hydromoth low down on a spar buoy, which you tow into position.

Best of luck, it sounds like an interesting project (c:

Hydromoths are great for the price but they do not have the most streamlined housing and audio quality won't be as good as something like a SoundTrap or really any recorder with a proper hydrophone and 16-bit +DAQ system.

If you can afford it, this is an excellent SoundTrap based towed autonomous system NOAA have been using. It might work towed behind an autonomous vehicle

Alternatively, if you can have something inside the vehicle, a simple tape recorder (e.g. Tascam DR40X) and hydrophone on cable  will provide excellent sound quality. You could also use something like a Raspberry Pi with audio focussed ADC hat to record but that would require a bit more programming. Even consider a standard AudioMoth and plug a proper hydrophone into the audio jack - this would still have a 12-bit ADC but would provide better sound quality than a hydromoth (hydrophones are more omnidirectional and there's no air filled causing reflections and attenuation)