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!
No showcases have been added to this group yet.
- @Palinda
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Corporate Responsibility Specialist & Sustainability/ Climate Change Professional Helping Conservation, Restoration, Community Livelihood Development ESG strategy and Sustainable Development.
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Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN)
I'm a Biologist and currently a master's student. My research focuses on understanding how birds respond to a restoration experiment in a Seasonally Dry Tropical Forest exclusive to Brazil through bioacoustics.
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- @APooran
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- @kristian.cuervo
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Applied Mathematics student in Denmark, interested in applications of mathematics to ecology and nature conservation. Currently interested in developing sensors for perimeter detection in wildlife conservations in Africa.
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- @MorganeLabadie
- | She/Her
I'm an ecology researcher with extensive experience of fieldwork and project management in international contexts. I specialise in wildlife, zoonotic diseases, data collection and analysis using mainly non-invasive techniques (acoustic, camera traps, etc.) and invasive techniques
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- @Jen_NZ
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- @cappel
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Wildlife Science PhD candidate working on computer vision with camera traps and bioacoustics
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- @valengsb
- | she / her
GIS specialist for Audubon Americas | Biologist with an emphasis on Conservation and Sustainable Development | Innovative approaches in the study and monitoring of biodiversity for possible, biodiverse, and just futures.
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Ecologist at Noe NGO, Project manager in restauration, rewilding, and citizen sciences program for grassland ecosystems and wild pollinators
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- @capreolus
- | he/him
Capreolus e.U.
wildlife biologist with capreolus.at
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- @JakobWiren
- | He,him
Swedish soon-to-be graduate engineer in AI/ML and robotics. Writing my master thesis in using decision trees for anti-poaching in Limpopo, South Africa. Am passionate about conservation, AI and travelling. Help me find a way to help you!
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- @fshort
- | He / Him
Boston University PhD Candidate, Biological Anthropology. Engaging in passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) of Bornean orangutans (Pongo pygmaeus wurmbii), Bornean white-bearded gibbons (Hylobates albibarbis), and red leaf monkeys (Presbytis rubicunda)
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Careers
The Department of AI and Society (AIS) at the University at Buffalo (UB) invites candidates to apply for multiple positions as Assistant Professor, Associate Professor, or Full Professor. The new AIS department was...
8 July 2025
Article
This is a chance to participate in a short survey about the preferences that conservation practitioners have for evidence. There's a chance to win one of three £20 Mastercard gift cards.
24 June 2025
Article
In this case, you’ll explore how the BoutScout project is improving avian behavioural research through deep learning—without relying on images or video. By combining dataloggers, open-source hardware, and a powerful...
24 June 2025
Link
Drone Imagery and Deep Learning enabling northern gannet counts
Elsa Carla De Grandi
Using Ultra-High-Resolution Drone Imagery and Deep Learning to quantify the impact of avian influenza on northern gannet colony of Bass Rock, Scotland. Would love to hear if you know of any other similar exaples from...
12 June 2025
Careers
La Universidad de Ingeniería y Tecnología (UTEC) está buscando cubrir nuevas vacantes en su Instituto Amazónico de Investigación para la Sostenibilidad (ASRI).
12 June 2025
Link
How AI can protect mangroves
Alex Rood
Shared from WWF: "ManglarIA is a mangrove conservation project, supported by Google.org in 2023, that is deploying advanced technology, including artificial intelligence (AI), to collect and analyze data on the health...
12 June 2025
Careers
Business Intelligence Analyst
Raquel Filgueiras
Rewilding Europe is seeking a Business Intelligence Analyst to support measuring rewilding impact through data automation, dashboards, and cross-domain analysis.
3 June 2025
Careers
The intern will support CI in exploring and implementing AI solutions that address conservation challenges. We are looking for someone familiar with modern AI technologies (genAI, AI agents, LLMs, foundation models, etc...
2 June 2025
Article
HawkEars: a high-performance bird sound classifier for Canada
Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute
HawkEars is a deep learning model designed specifically to recognize the calls of 328 Canadian bird species and 13 amphibians.
13 May 2025
Link
Survey on Earth Observation in Wildlife Ecology
Helena Wehner
Hi together, I am working on detecting causalities between land surface dynamics and animal movement by using satellite-based earth observation data. As this is might be your expertise I kindly ask for your support...
8 May 2025
Link
Weed-AI: Supporting the AI revolution in weed control
Amber Balfour-Cunningham
Weeds, by definition, are plants in the wrong place but Weed-AI is helping put weed image data in the right place. Weed-AI is an open source, searchable, weeds image data platform designed to facilitate the research and...
7 May 2025
Careers
Global Science Data Management and AI Graduate Intern
World Wildlife Fund
The intern will help the Global Science team expand our understanding of nature-based solutions through artificial intelligence (AI) and support our efforts to create a model for data collection and analysis that can...
18 April 2025
August 2025
event
Louisa Richmond-Coggan
September 2025
event
Louisa Richmond-Coggan
event
Louisa Richmond-Coggan
October 2025
event
Lacey Hughey and 3 more
December 2025
event
Alex Rood
March 2026
November 2023
event
Stephanie O'Donnell
event
Stephanie O'Donnell
17 Products
Recently updated products
| Description | Activity | Replies | Groups | Updated |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 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 | 8 months 3 weeks 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 Coexistence, Wildlife Crime | 8 months 3 weeks 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 Coexistence, Sensors | 8 months 3 weeks 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 | 9 months 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 | 9 months ago | |
| One thing I love about software is that in an ever-changing landscape of languages, frameworks, and tools, you can never stop learning.... |
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Software Development, AI for Conservation | 9 months ago | |
| Hi Eugene!Interesting project!I already signed up to test it!Cheers,Lars |
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AI for Conservation, Camera Traps | 9 months 1 week ago | |
| I am certainly a somewhat vertical thing with a lump on top, so I get it... |
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AI for Conservation | 9 months 2 weeks ago | |
| Hi all! I wanted to open a discussion on a topic that I've been thinking about ever since I entered the job market-- how to get a... |
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Software Development, AI for Conservation, Early Career, Open Source Solutions | 9 months 3 weeks ago | |
| That's great, thanks Lars! |
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AI for Conservation | 9 months 3 weeks ago | |
| I did a short presentation on our work with the polar bear alarm in the Wildlabs Variety Hour October 30th.It can be found here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zr2Q8bUJZ8U... |
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Human-Wildlife Coexistence, AI for Conservation | 9 months 3 weeks ago | |
| Comma.ai would be your best bet. Not sure if it's officially open source but was started by a noteable hacker with an open source ethos. Could try reaching out to them. |
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AI for Conservation | 10 months ago |
Enter the Zooniverse: Try Citizen Science for Yourself!
18 March 2020 12:00am
Tutorial: Train a TinyML Model That Can Recognize Sounds Using Only 23 kB of RAM
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Accepting Applications: ArcGIS Solutions for Protected Area Management
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Call for Nominations: Tusk Conservation Awards
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Competition: Plastic Data Challenge
Ellie Warren
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Hawai'i Conservation Conference
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Team for Building of ML app for horse identification and conservation
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ICEI2020: 11th International Conference on Ecological Informatics
ICEI 2020
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Seafood fund seeks ideas for innovation projects up to £250k
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WILDLABS Virtual Meetup Recording: Acoustic Monitoring
WILDLABS Team
5 February 2020 12:00am
AI for camera trap public data
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17 December 2019 12:00am
[ARCHIVED] Workshop on Deep Learning Methods and Appliocations for Animal Re-Identification
25 November 2019 6:24pm
WACV2020 AI for Animal Re-ID: Deep Learning Methods and Applications for Animal Re-Identification
25 November 2019 12:00am
WILDLABS Virtual Meetup Recording: Drones
WILDLABS Team
9 November 2019 12:00am
Camera Trapping: Incredibly Useful Resources List
5 November 2019 12:00am
Who wants to learn Python? Courses to get you started coding
2 May 2016 3:13pm
1 March 2019 9:20am
Hello everyone what are you wating for..
All US, UK, India users can enroll courses from Intellipaat (the largest IT trainng company)
check some of thier superb training list:
29 October 2019 4:52pm
Chuck's Python for Everyone course is available these days at www.py4e.com, and he's also created a course called Web Apps for Everyone www.wa4e.com. Both excellent resources, and he's a strong proponent for (and creator of) open source educational tools in general.
Lucy
Plant-Powered Camera Trap Breakthrough
15 October 2019 12:00am
Using Artificial Intelligence to Track Birds’ Dark-of-Night Migrations
9 October 2019 12:00am
Camera Trap Technology Symposium (Recordings): Bringing Developers and Users Together
2 September 2019 12:00am
ICCB 2019: 5 Key Discussions about the Future of Conservation Tech
21 August 2019 12:00am
Conservation biologists find new applications for AI tools
5 August 2019 2:57pm
Automated Identification of Indonesian Rhinos
27 July 2019 12:00am
[ARCHIVED] Position: UI/UX Machine Learning Engineer
8 July 2019 11:27pm
[ARCHIVED] Position: Senior Computer Vision Research Engineer
8 July 2019 10:42pm
Hello buzzing World!
7 July 2019 6:55pm
ML at the Edge
28 June 2019 8:16am
31 August 2017 9:06am
A couple of years ago I completed the Coursera course Programming for Everybody (Getting Started with Python) with Charles Severance. I found it really well paced and well taught. He's a very personable tutor, and has also written a free book Python for Everybody, available as a PDF.
I found the Coursera course on R Programming with Roger Peng to be more difficult to follow, but I'm not sure whether that was down to the teaching style or the language itself. For R, I'd definitely recommend the best place to get started is swirl - Learn R, in R!
Happy coding