Human-Wildlife Coexistence

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Human-Wildlife Coexistence / Feed

Human-wildlife coexistence is a significant challenge that only grows as habitats shrink and other issues like climate change alter the natural world. Technologies like biologging gear have become essential for proactively reducing human-wildlife conflict before it escalates, and tech projects that seek to understand population ranges and behaviour can help people learn to live with wildlife as part of our own environments. If you're interested in using technology to enhance human-wildlife coexistence, this group is the place for you!

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Human-wildlife conflict and coexistence is a shockingly common problem, often with enormous consequences for both individual animals and entire populations.

When human-wildlife conflict comes to mind, you may immediately think of wildlife crime instead - which isn't wrong, since many regions with wildlife crime problems like poaching are also areas where people may frequently deal with human-wildlife conflict, causing the two issues to go hand-in-hand. But human-wildlife conflict is a much broader issue encompassing many ways that human presence and interference can cause problems for us and animals alike. Human-wildlife conflict includes:

Elephants trampling a farmer's crops, resulting in retaliation
New real estate developments infringing on ecosystems where predator species live, leading to predators having less territory and less food, which in turn leads to predators attacking domestic animals and livestock
Freeways dividing the territory of animals like mountain lions, leading to wildlife venturing into neighborhoods or being killed by cars
Lead bullets used in hunting causing scavengers like condors to die of lead poisoning

These are just a few examples of how humans can negatively impact wildlife, and it's clear to see how many of these scenarios could escalate. Human-wildlife conflict solutions don't just include ways in which we can prevent these issues (for example, through tracking predators, monitoring populations' territories, or building barriers and wildlife crossings monitored by sensors), but also the ways in which we can help people connect with wildlife and care about learning to live alongside them.

If you're interested in solutions that can prevent human-wildlife conflict, join this group and get to know the people who are working to protect and save species around the world!

Header image: Casey Allen on Unsplash

Funding

Call for Nominations: Tusk Conservation Awards

Tusk

The 2020 Tusk Awards are now accepting nominations of outstanding individuals who have made a significant impact on conservation in Africa. These nominations offer the rare and exciting opportunity to honor your peers...

3 March 2020

Article

Fence-Based Elephant Early Warning System

Appiko

Technology is rapidly changing the way communities monitor wildlife movement and prevent or mitigate human-wildlife conflict. This case study from Appiko delves into field testing of the open source sensor warning...

25 February 2020

Article

HWC Tech Challenge Update: Thermal Elephant Alert System

Anne Dangerfield

The Arribada Initiative is back with an update on their thermal elephant alert system which aims to reduce human-elephant conflict (HEC). The success of their system rests on the ability of a camera to accurately...

17 February 2020

Article

A New Cloud Platform Unveils the Most Diverse Camera Trap Database in the World

Zoological Society London (ZSL)

Fueled by Artificial Intelligence, Wildlife Insights provides access to over 4.5 million camera trap records.

17 December 2019

Article

New technology trialled to better monitor human-gorilla conflict in Uganda

WILDLABS Admin

The International Gorilla Conservation Programme (IGCP), a coalition of World Wildlife Fund and Fauna & Flora International, has teamed up with Inmarsat, the world’s leading mobile satellite communications company,...

23 July 2019

Article

Caught in the crossfire – Tapirs in tiger territory

WILDLABS Team

It is common knowledge that the illegal trade in tiger bones and body parts poses a grave threat to the remaining populations of Asia’s most iconic big cat. But this grisly business also has a detrimental impact on...

31 May 2019

Article

Technology lab focused on wildlife protection opens on Ol Pejeta Conservancy

Ol Pejeta Conservancy

Ol Pejeta Conservancy partners with conservation and technology organisations to kick-start a research and innovation centre for wildlife conservation

31 May 2019

Article

HWC Tech Challenge: Smart Parks field update

Smart Parks

As a winner of the Human Wildlife Conflict Tech Challenge, Smart Parks is working in partnership with the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and WILDLABS to develop a smart solution that uses the power of the Internet of...

25 March 2019

Article

Arribada Initiative Update: Testing our prototype thermal cameras with elephants in India

Arribada Initiative

Arribada recently returned from field sites in Assam, India where they tested the image quality and detection abilities of low-cost thermal sensors for detecting elephants in conflict areas. Arribada is working on these...

1 March 2019