With new technologies revolutionizing data collection, wildlife researchers are becoming increasingly able to collect data at much higher volumes than ever before. Now we are facing the challenges of putting this information to use, bringing the science of big data into the conservation arena. With the help of machine learning tools, this area holds immense potential for conservation practices. The applications range from online trafficking alerts to species-specific early warning systems to efficient movement and biodiversity monitoring and beyond.
However, the process of building effective machine learning tools depends upon large amounts of standardized training data, and conservationists currently lack an established system for standardization. How to best develop such a system and incentivize data sharing are questions at the forefront of this work. There are currently multiple AI-based conservation initiatives, including Wildlife Insights and WildBook, that are pioneering applications on this front.
This group is the perfect place to ask all your AI-related questions, no matter your skill level or previous familiarity! You'll find resources, meet other members with similar questions and experts who can answer them, and engage in exciting collaborative opportunities together.
Just getting started with AI in conservation? Check out our introduction tutorial, How Do I Train My First Machine Learning Model? with Daniel Situnayake, and our Virtual Meetup on Big Data. If you're coming from the more technical side of AI/ML, Sara Beery runs an AI for Conservation slack channel that might be of interest. Message her for an invite.
Header Image: Dr Claire Burke / @CBurkeSci
Explore the Basics: AI
Understanding the possibilities for incorporating new technology into your work can feel overwhelming. With so many tools available, so many resources to keep up with, and so many innovative projects happening around the world and in our community, it's easy to lose sight of how and why these new technologies matter, and how they can be practically applied to your projects.
Machine learning has huge potential in conservation tech, and its applications are growing every day! But the tradeoff of that potential is a big learning curve - or so it seems to those starting out with this powerful tool!
To help you explore the potential of AI (and prepare for some of our upcoming AI-themed events!), we've compiled simple, key resources, conversations, and videos to highlight the possibilities:
Three Resources for Beginners:
- Everything I know about Machine Learning and Camera Traps, Dan Morris | Resource library, camera traps, machine learning
- Using Computer Vision to Protect Endangered Species, Kasim Rafiq | Machine learning, data analysis, big cats
- Resource: WildID | WildID
Three Forum Threads for Beginners:
- I made an open-source tool to help you sort camera trap images | Petar Gyurov, Camera Traps
- Batch / Automated Cloud Processing | Chris Nicolas, Acoustic Monitoring
- Looking for help with camera trapping for Jaguars: Software for species ID and database building | Carmina Gutierrez, AI for Conservation
Three Tutorials for Beginners:
- How do I get started using machine learning for my camera traps? | Sara Beery, Tech Tutors
- How do I train my first machine learning model? | Daniel Situnayake, Tech Tutors
- Big Data in Conservation | Dave Thau, Dan Morris, Sarah Davidson, Virtual Meetups
Want to know more about AI, or have your specific machine learning questions answered by experts in the WILDLABS community? Make sure you join the conversation in our AI for Conservation group!
- @tutgut5
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Key Conservation
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- @SrinivasSivakumar
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I am a an Engineer at Wild Life Conservation Trust, India looking to build some tech for the WildLife.
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- @katerakelly
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I am a machine learning researcher (PhD UC Berkeley 2021) looking for opportunities to use my skills to help combat and mitigate climate change and support biodiversity. Research experience in few-shot learning, image recognition, and reinforcement learning.
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 1 Groups
Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology (DICE), University of Kent
Conservation Science PhD student at DICE, Kent. I am a GIS and remote sensing enthusiast as well as researcher. Been in love with the interaction between AI and conservation ever since I picked up a python crash course book out of curiosity during my undergraduate degree.
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- @LouisaRC
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LRC Wildlife Conservation
With 20 years of experience as a conservation practitioner, I have transitioned from a carnivore scientist to Dean, mentoring Africa’s next generation of conservation leaders. Now, as a consultant, I develop strategies integrating innovative Web 3.0 technologies for conservation.
- 1 Resources
- 1 Discussions
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Conservation Director, Texas with National Audubon Society
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- 4 Discussions
- 3 Groups
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- @pchwalek
- | He/him/his
I'm a PhD candidate in the Responsive Environments Group, working on electronic systems for human and wildlife monitoring.
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- 18 Discussions
- 9 Groups
I am a scientist with research background in evolutionary-ecological genomics and have impact at the senate level to prevent a government viral biocontrol release. UK based and looking to connect with passionate dreamers ready to shift paradigms
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- 9 Groups
MSc student in wildlife management and conservation
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- 12 Groups
- @LauraKloepper
- | she/her
Associate Professor at the University of New Hampshire. Our research aims to uncover behavioral principles underlying acoustic sensing, inspire the design of active sensing technology, and improve population monitoring for animal conservation.
- 1 Resources
- 3 Discussions
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Link
Apply Now: UW Data Science for Social Good Projects
Talia Speaker
Sign up for Data Science for Social Good 2024! This summer program is a great opportunity to get dedicated data science support on a conservation (tech) project or to get rich experience as a student in the field. More...
8 February 2024
Careers
PhD Opportunity - Exploring plants’ sensing capability with vibroacoustics
University of Southampton
Applications open for a PhD position in plant vibroacoustics at the University of Southampton
8 February 2024
Article
We demonstrate the power of using passive acoustic monitoring & machine learning to survey species, using ruffed lemurs in southeastern Madagascar as an example.
23 January 2024
Article
new paper in Journal of Animal Ecology
17 January 2024
Funding
Salesforce Accelerator: AI for Climate
Stephanie O'Donnell
Do you work for a climate organization looking to multiply impact with AI? Apply for the Salesforce Accelerator - AI for Climate! This new philanthropic initiative is dedicated to supporting innovative solutions for...
16 January 2024
Careers
Two year postdoc - Machine Learning & Bioacoustics
Emmanuel Dufourq
Two years in Cape Town, South Africa. Yearly visits to Rwanda. If you love to code, and all things Python/deep learning/tech stuff/ then you'll have an awesome time!
16 January 2024
Article
Application of a deep learning image classifier for identification of Amazonian fishes
Alexander J Robillard
Given the sharp increase in agricultural and infrastructure development and the paucity of widespread data available to support conservation management decisions, a more rapid and accurate tool for identifying fish...
11 January 2024
Article
HWC Tech Challenge update 2020
Lars Holst Hansen
An update on @Alasdair and @adanger24's HWC project
11 January 2024
Article
Here are a few key insights from this year's event that we're carrying into 2024.
2 January 2024
Link
For the current e-obs newsletter, Chris Beirne and I have summarized our previous work on the annotation of King vultures in Costa Rica.
20 December 2023
Article
News from a grant to explore potential projects for monitoring biodiversity in latin american countries
16 December 2023
Link
Milestones Systems and Polar Bear International present their test of bear-dar in Churchill in the this Youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiXAHYCA99M
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| Description | Activity | Replies | Groups | Updated |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| I added plain old motion detection because megadetector v5 was not working well with the smaller rat images and in thermal.This works really well: Also, I can see... |
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AI for Conservation, Camera Traps | 4 months 3 weeks ago | |
| Hello WalterThanks for your input. I have achieved better results with the puc when hooking it up to a powerbank. Have got them set up to "recording only", and GPS to low power... |
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Acoustics, AI for Conservation, Citizen Science, Sensors | 5 months ago | |
| great, this security cameras might be interesting for monitoring crop development and maybe other bigger pests like boars or some other herbivorous animals that could eventually... |
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AI for Conservation, Camera Traps | 5 months 1 week ago | |
| In a recent call with researchers in Thailand. They have mentioned that they use passive chip readers to log data about chipped animals as they pass by. |
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AI for Conservation, Animal Movement | 5 months 1 week ago | |
| Seems like we should include some rotations in our image augmentations as the real world can be seen a bit tilted - as this cropped corner view from our fisheye at the zoo shows. |
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AI for Conservation, Camera Traps, Data management and processing tools | 5 months 2 weeks ago | |
| Bird Monitoring Data Exchange is a standard often used for birds data. |
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AI for Conservation, Data management and processing tools, Emerging Tech | 5 months 3 weeks ago | |
| Hey everyone!As you might have heard, BlueSky is on hype now, with millions of users migrating to it from X. Including the scientific world... |
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AI for Conservation | 5 months 4 weeks ago | |
| Hi Zhongqi! We are finalizing our modelling work over the next couple of weeks and can make our work availabile for your team. Our objective is to create small (<500k... |
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AI for Conservation, Camera Traps, Software Development | 6 months ago | |
| Hats off to your team for this absolute game-changing technology! We rescue stray and wild animals in Taiwan, and the bulk of our work is saving animals maimed by wire snares... |
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AI for Conservation, Drones, Emerging Tech, Human-Wildlife Conflict, Wildlife Crime | 6 months ago | |
| There's quite a few diy or prototype solutions described online and in literature - but it seems none of these have made it to market yet as generally available fully usable... |
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AI for Conservation, Camera Traps, Human-Wildlife Conflict, Sensors | 6 months ago | |
| As others have said, pretty much all image models at least start with general-subject datasets ("car," "bird," "person", etc.) and have to be refined to work with more precision... |
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AI for Conservation, Camera Traps | 6 months 1 week ago | |
| This is a thread for anyone who has questions about AI for Conservation Office Hours 2025.We're once again teaming up with Dan Morris from... |
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Acoustics, AI for Conservation, Camera Traps, Community Base, Geospatial | 6 months 1 week ago |
News: The Latest in Conservation Tech (March 24)
24 March 2022 12:00am
Apply now: Women in Conservation Technology Programme, Kenya
8 March 2022 12:00am
BirdCLEF 2022 Kaggle Challenge
The Cornell Lab of Ornithology
2 March 2022 12:00am
Introducing the WILDLABS On the Edge Fellows
10 February 2022 12:00am
WILDLABS Fellowships & Awards: Matchmaking between tech and conservation
28 January 2022 3:22pm
Deep Learning for Marine Ecology and Conservation
20 December 2021 12:00am
AI for Conservation Office Hours: are you interested?
8 October 2021 12:00pm
14 December 2021 2:47pm
We've now wrapped our first run of AI for Conservation Office Hours and you can read my review of how it went and lessons learned here.
Given the overall success of the programme, we're excited to announce that in early spring next year we will be coordinating a second round - so keep an eye out for further updates in the new year on the application and sign-up process.
Also, we'd love to know whether you'd be interested in having a 1:1 so comment below and tell us what conservation tech challenge you would like to cover or how a session could help you in your conservation work.
Many thanks,
Lucas
AI for Conservation Office Hours: 2021 Review
14 December 2021 12:00am
Low-cost underwater camera trapping and deep learning
30 November 2021 12:00am
The race to save California's rarest butterflies
29 November 2021 12:00am
Environmental Data Justice
26 November 2021 12:00am
Technical Difficulties: The Promise and Pitfalls of Machine Learning for Conservation
Sara Beery
and 1 more
23 November 2021 12:00am
Caiman: Images as Sources of Intelligence
18 November 2021 12:00am
Try our open-source automatic camera trap detection/labeling tool!
12 November 2021 8:39pm
Opportunity: GEO-Microsoft Planetary Computer Programme
4 November 2021 12:00am
EarthRanger Announces Inaugural Conservation Tech Award Recipients
3 November 2021 12:00am
Opportunity: PhD or Postdoctoral Research Fellowships - Chinstrap penguin biologging
1 November 2021 12:00am
Using IoT and Machine Learning to help protect Kenya's Rivers
21 October 2021 12:00am
Tech Tutors: How do I analyze large acoustic datasets using PAMGuard?
14 October 2021 3:42pm
How do I analyze large acoustic datasets using PAMGuard?
7 October 2021 12:00am
Call for Papers: Special Issue on Computer Vision Approach for Animal Tracking and Modeling
20 September 2021 12:00am
Tech Tutors: How do I use AI to fight wildlife crime?
1 September 2021 10:59pm
Which are major open challenges that AI can help to solve in nature conservation ?
28 April 2021 9:15am
4 August 2021 5:00pm
I would perhaps ask this in a new thread, so the rest of the community can see it! (as opposed to a reply here, where only the people in the conversation are notified of more replies).
13 August 2021 10:04pm
Elizabeth Bondi has work on detection from thermal imagery taken by drones! I'd look at her papers :)
27 August 2021 10:51am
Looks good, but what is the added value compared to other examples as Obsidentify and Plantnet?
AI/ML Engineer Job at Dryad
26 August 2021 2:45pm
Widening the Bottleneck: Can Citizen Science Accelerate Conservation?
19 August 2021 12:00am
Open positions in ML & conservation/climate sci
18 August 2021 2:22pm
Geo for Good Lightning Talks: Nature Conservation
Google Earth Outreach
17 August 2021 12:00am
Building Sustainable Support with Edge Impulse
13 August 2021 12:00am
Accessible Tech and Real Impact with the WILDLABS Fellowship: On the Edge
9 August 2021 12:00am
WILDLABS Community Call: August 12th
WILDLABS Team
4 August 2021 12:00am
25 October 2021 4:13pm
Hi Wildlabbers!
We're now going ahead with a small pilot of around ten 1:1 office hour sessions with Microsoft AI for Earth specialists. More details coming very soon.
For the time being sign-ups are now closed, but thank you to everyone who has been interested. We will keep you updated on how the 1:1s go and whether there will be further sessions to sign up for later in the year.
Cheers,
Lucas