Human-wildlife conflict 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
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Woodland Park Zoo
Living Northwest Conservation Manager, Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle, WA, USA
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- @gfandos
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I am a conservation scientist mix between a field biologist and a data geek, I am an avid R user, who enjoys working with large datasets (both researcher-collected and citizen science) while developing and/or implementing new statistical methods
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G8Way Technologies (Pty) Ltd
Passionate Technology and Wildlife enthusiast
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Funding
Challenge: ElephantEdge
Smart Parks
Protecting elephants from conservation's most pressing issues like poaching and human-wildlife conflict requires big, bold, and innovative solutions. Hackster.io, Smart Parks, Edge Impulse, Microsoft, and several other...
11 August 2020
Article
Grassroots Innovations for Wildlife Conservation
Aditya Gangadharan
In the fourth installment of his case study series focusing on preventing human-wildlife conflict, Aditya Gangadharan discusses how local communities develop, test, and implement their own solutions. This article...
19 May 2020
Article
Get To Know FIT
WILDLABS Team
We're excited to welcome the WildTrack FIT group to our community! Today, we'd like to introduce you to the Footprint Identification Technique (FIT) and share how you can incorporate this tracking method into your field...
6 May 2020
Article
Era of the Condor: A Species' Future in Recovery
Ellie Warren
In this three-part WILDLABS feature article, we'll take a look at the various technologies used to fight the greatest threat to endangered condors, explore the innovations that may change the way we study and understand...
5 May 2020
Article
Locally-Brewed Conservation Technology from a Small Town in North Bengal
Aditya Gangadharan
In the third part of his series of case studies focusing on preventing human-wildlife conflict within communities, Aditya Gangadharan looks at how one village in North Bengal maximised the potential of an early alert...
10 April 2020
Article
Aditya Gangadharan's latest case study looks at how sensor technology can provide solutions for human-wildlife conflict instances along the Indo-Bhutan border. This project, which aimed to get the local community...
11 March 2020
Article
Using technology in the field allows us to innovate new solutions to very old problems like human-wildlife conflict, but are you giving enough consideration to how your high-tech tools fit into long-term plans? Before...
9 March 2020
Article
#Tech4Wildlife 2020 Photo Challenge In Review
WILDLABS Team
2020 marked our fifth year holding our annual #Tech4Wildlife Photo Challenge, and our community made it a milestone to remember. Conservationists took to Twitter last week to share their best high-tech snapshots from...
4 March 2020
The Esri Conservation Program is now accepting applications for grant assistance to access its ArcGIS Solutions for Protected Area Management Application. This system provides access to a suite of both mobile and web...
4 March 2020
Funding
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
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
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November 2018
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WILDLABS Team
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| Description | Activity | Replies | Groups | Updated |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hi @Tim+Vedanayagam Thank you for posting this. I'd be happy to contribute to the thermal sensing work under way. Can you confirm - have you built a thermal AI model... |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 5 years 2 months ago | |
| A neoteric solution:- ADSMO(HWC): https://youtu.be/yG0Z5HaL_tc |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 5 years 6 months ago | |
| Hi everybody! The IUCN Species Survival Commission (SSC) Human-Wildlife Conflict Task Force, the Global Environment Facility-funded and... |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 5 years 6 months ago | |
| Thanks Drue for your valuable input. This is certainly not to encourage killing venomouse snakes. We can actually incorporate the featurs you pointed out to save venomouse... |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 5 years 7 months ago | |
| Tusk are illegally traded by the poachers for earning profit out of it. This needs to be stopped. |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 5 years 9 months ago | |
| Hi Aditya, If you haven't already found it, you should check out our last virtual meetup, it was all about tools and spaces for collaboration and we featured a number... |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 5 years 11 months ago | |
| Cool idea Ashwan. Looks similar to the virtual parks idea that Laurens is leading. Have you seen it? Also check out rewilding.io and get an entry in to the contest! |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 6 years 2 months ago | |
| A very good summary all-round Nilanga. Only a wholistic approach can truly resolve conflict. |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 6 years 3 months ago | |
| Hi all, We often think about complicated tools when people refer to the use of tech in conservation. But mobile phones can be highly... |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 6 years 3 months ago | |
| Thanks both for your comments, very interesting indeed! Also great to hear that so many people are eager to get involved in this kind of research and will participate with great... |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 6 years 3 months ago | |
| Dear Femke, I am actually looking for studying the crop damages using drones and also tracking the movements, may be using GPS collars. But I do not actually know about these... |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 6 years 4 months ago | |
| Dear Femke, Thank you for your email. I hope I can hear from Mohan Raj. Electric fencing is one area where it can play very important role in human wildlife conflict management... |
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Human-Wildlife Conflict | 6 years 4 months ago |
