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
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Samantha is a founding member and runs the Kelp Forest Foundation which looks to fill the gaps in the science around kelp cultivation.
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Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust (WWT)
Technological support in WWT's Conservation Evidence Department - recently made redundant
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University of Melbourne
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Retired engineer, with long term interest in ecology and all things tech.
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World Wide Fund for Nature/ World Wildlife Fund (WWF)
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CSIR-Central Scientific Instruments Organisation
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Columbia University
Graduate Student in the department of Anthropology
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| Description | Activity | Replies | Groups | Updated |
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| Will your startup be involved in sensor networks for conservation? I'm very interested. Currently we create sensor networks for developmental infrastructure and agriculture... |
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Sensors | 6 years 5 months ago | |
| Hi everyone. I'm Akiba and I'm an engineer by trade specializing in wireless sensor networks and communications. I generally work with groups like World Bank on... |
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Sensors | 6 years 5 months ago | |
| Subcutaneous pittags that also read temperature (frustratingly) read only a limited range of temperatures - however, I hear that can be... |
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Sensors | 6 years 6 months ago | |
| Hi Ted, This is all very interesting. The solution you describe seems eminently doable and in fact quite cheap. So doable and cheap that it may behoove one to... |
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Sensors | 6 years 6 months ago | |
| Yes, I agree it's a tough problem - i'm certainly stumped ;) but thanks so much for your reply and counter question - the goal is to find these gillnets and... |
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Sensors | 6 years 8 months ago | |
| Hi Tony, I'm leading a cross disciplinary group of researchers at Deakin University in Australia to build new technology for monitoring wildlife and engage citizen scientists... |
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Sensors | 7 years 4 months ago | |
| The current project is in open plains. From a handler perspective the distance will be from 20m -100m. I will be working at night so it will be looking for me target, the Plains... |
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Sensors | 7 years 4 months ago | |
| @hikinghack used twitter to flag a thread on hackteria that members of this group might be interested in about DIY time-lapse soil... |
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Sensors | 7 years 4 months ago | |
| Also if you are still looking for a solution this was published earlier this year and gives recommendations for soundscape microphones : http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10... |
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Sensors | 7 years 9 months ago | |
| If anything belongs in the 'have you seen this' group, it's this project: Researchers at Binghamton University have created... |
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Sensors | 7 years 10 months ago | |
| The University of Washington is reporting that they've shattered the long-range communications barrier for devices that consume almost... |
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Sensors | 7 years 11 months ago | |
| My own experience is with the FLIR iphone attachment, just informal testing, but hasn't been that great at finding animals. I also think it would work better in the... |
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Sensors | 7 years 11 months ago |
