Sensors already equip a range of tools to enhance monitoring capacity for conservation. Some of the higher bandwidth technologies, like camera traps and acoustic monitoring systems, have been essential elements of the conservation toolkit for decades, and thus have enough users that we've created dedicated WILDLABS groups to address them. But a whole range of lower bandwidth sensors beyond these core technologies are being increasingly integrated into conservation monitoring systems, and offer rich new insights into the wildlife and ecosystems we're all working to protect. As with many technologies, cost and access have historically been challenges to the adoption of new sensors, but with low-cost and open-source solutions on the rise, we're excited to see what the future of this space holds.
Getting Started with Sensors:
- Watch Shah Selbe's Tech Tutors episode on scaling FieldKit, an open-source conservation sensor toolbox, from a project to a successful conservation tech product.
- Check out our Virtual Meetup about Low-Cost, Open-Source Solutions in conservation tech, including a talk by Alasdair Davies on the Arribada Initiative's work with thermal sensors in early warning systems.
- For a more in-depth introduction, watch the first video in our datalogger mini-series: Freaklabs: How do I get started with Arduino?
In this group, you'll meet others who are using and innovating diverse sensors in their work, discuss ways to make sensors more effective & accessible for conservationists, learn about what sensors are already helping us accomplish in the field, and have the opportunity to ask and answer questions. Join this group to get started!
Header image: Emma Vogel, University of Tromsø
Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS)
- 1 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 6 Groups
Prof at NC State University and Scientist at NC Museum of Natural Sciences
- 1 Resources
- 19 Discussions
- 4 Groups
- 1 Resources
- 2 Discussions
- 1 Groups
- @NevilleCLS
- | He/Him
CLS (Collecte Localisation Satellites)
- 0 Resources
- 1 Discussions
- 14 Groups
Smart Parks
Founder of Smart Parks - www.smartparks.org / Founder of OpenCollar - https://opencollar.io
- 0 Resources
- 16 Discussions
- 5 Groups
- 0 Resources
- 2 Discussions
- 6 Groups
Technologist, birder, photographer and mountain guide.
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 18 Groups
- @vandita_shukla
- | she/her
PhD candidate studying drone flight planning for enabling tracking and identification of individual characteristics of wildlife; member of the WildDrone, an MSCA Doctoral Network funded by the European Union’s Horizon Europe research
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 20 Groups
- @amykukulya
- | she/her
Amy Kukulya is an ocean tech innovator and conservationist from the US. She has captured thrilling footage of megafauna using novel biologger and oceanrobotCams—SharkCam, TurtleCam featured across the globe on mainstream media outlets.
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 7 Groups
- @aleontiou
- | she/her
- 0 Resources
- 10 Discussions
- 7 Groups
- @Jeffm
- | He/Him
- 0 Resources
- 2 Discussions
- 4 Groups
Environmentalist and Python developer working in the realm of Remote Sensing. Fascinated by the intersection of technology and nature, with a focus on machine learning, ecological modeling, and biodiversity monitoring. 🌍
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 11 Groups
Article
In this blog, Laure Joanny adds her perspectives to an ongoing discussion that we've been seeing in the community about conservation tech and it's relationship to e-waste. How do we tackle the challenge of battery waste...
3 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
Current efforts to track endangered Green Sea Turtles rely on tags that cost upward of $2000 per unit. The Arribada Initiative and the Zoological Society of London have been developing a new open source solution for...
12 March 2019
Article
#Tech4Wildlife Photo Challenge: Our Favourites from 2019
WILDLABS Team
Happy World Wildlife Day! To celebrate, this week we've asked our community to share photos showing how they are using tech in the field or the lab, using the #Tech4Wildlife hashtag.
3 March 2019
Article
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
Article
Launched at the recent The Things conference, OpenCollar is a conservation collaboration to design, support and deploy open-source tracking collar hardware and software for environmental and wildlife monitoring projects...
6 February 2019
Article
FLIR have announced the Kifaru Rising Project, a multi-year effort in collaboration with World Wildlife Fund (WWF) to deploy FLIR thermal imaging technology to help improve wildlife ranger safety and contribute to their...
18 January 2019
Funding
The Ecosulis Rewilding Tech Challenge
Cain Blythe
With the aim of advancing rewildling-related technology in the UK and introducing new talent and ideas into the field of rewildling, Ecosulis is thrilled to announce the launch of their first ever Rewilding Tech...
14 January 2019
Article
HWC Tech Challenge Update: Testing our prototype thermal cameras in the Arctic
Arribada Initiative
Arribada just returned from their first thermal camera field trials in Greenland, where they tested the image quality and detection abilities of their chosen thermal sensors in an arctic climate, assessed their...
9 January 2019
Article
Monitoring Ecosystems through Sound: The Present and Future of Passive Acoustics
Ella Browning and 1 more
As human impacts on the world accelerate, so does the need for tools to monitor the effects we have on species and ecosystems. In this article, Ella Browning and Rory Gibb share insights from their recent review paper...
4 December 2018
Article
A comprehensive aerial survey of whales and dolphins off the coast of South Africa supported by a range of organisations including Fauna & Flora International (FFI) has recorded an astounding 1,106 southern right...
22 November 2018
Article
Camera traps designed for animals are now invading human privacy
Rogelio Luque-Lora
Although invaluable for conservation and ecological research, camera traps frequently take pictures of people as well as wildlife. This has important implications for privacy and human rights and may ultimately...
22 November 2018
November 2023
September 2023
16 Products
Recently updated products
117 Products
1 R&D Projects
81 Organisations
Recently updated products
Recently updated R&D Projects
Recently updated organisations
| Description | Activity | Replies | Groups | Updated |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hi @Ebennitt, we do have a working solution that works with all our OpenCollar devices. We connect to sub skin implants and then send and store those readings using Bluetooth,... |
|
Sensors | 3 months 2 weeks ago | |
| Hi Simon,We (Reneco International Wildlife Consultants) have an ongoing collaboration with a local University (Abu Dhabi, UAE) for developing AI tools (cameratrap/drone... |
|
Acoustics, AI for Conservation, Animal Movement, Camera Traps, Citizen Science, Connectivity, Drones, Early Career, eDNA & Genomics, Marine Conservation, Protected Area Management Tools, Sensors | 4 months 1 week ago | |
| No, not yet. The player we attached does support slower/faster replay up to a certain precision, but I'm not sure that this will be sufficiently precise for the kind of offsets we... |
|
Animal Movement, Data management and processing tools, Sensors, Software Development | 5 months ago | |
| Hello everyone,I built Brave Puffin (https://bravepuffin.com) - a small, autonomous, long range, solar powered boat. It is designed to... |
|
Build Your Own Data Logger Community, Marine Conservation, Sensors | 5 months 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... |
|
Acoustics, AI for Conservation, Citizen Science, Sensors | 5 months ago | |
| So, updated the text a bit with images cropped at 100% zoom :) we are already happy with the time reductions we got, but... would like to get at least 90% time reduction instead... |
|
Data management and processing tools, Latin America Community, Sensors | 5 months ago | |
| Thanks! The Teensys are nice for processing power if choosing an external Lora board I’d say that’s a good choice. I started with teensies, there was a well supported code base... |
|
Camera Traps, Sensors | 5 months 2 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... |
|
AI for Conservation, Camera Traps, Human-Wildlife Conflict, Sensors | 6 months ago | |
| The PCB mount terminals are actually quite robust and paired with a lock washer and something that would better secure the nylon (e.g., a piece of flat grooved plastic to add... |
|
Acoustics, Conservation Dogs, Sensors | 6 months 1 week ago | |
| No problem at all Yu (@JY) and good luck with your studies! Happy to discuss this and any other ideas any time.All the best,Rob |
+10
|
Sensors, Animal Movement, Connectivity, Drones, Open Source Solutions, Emerging Tech | 6 months 3 weeks ago | |
| @cmwainaina please take a look |
|
Animal Movement, AI for Conservation, Camera Traps, Connectivity, Data management and processing tools, East Africa Community, Emerging Tech, Ethics of Conservation Tech, Human-Wildlife Conflict, Marine Conservation, Protected Area Management Tools, Geospatial, Sensors, Software Development | 10 months ago | |
| A community device isn’t just about the technology; it’s also about creating a collaborative community. Shout out to all innovators... |
|
Animal Movement, Marine Conservation, Open Source Solutions, Sensors | 10 months 3 weeks ago |
