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This group is for anyone interested in applying software to conservation and wildlife research. Whether you're a developer eager to contribute to conservation or a newbie with valuable data and ideas but limited software experience, this group connects people with diverse expertise. It provides a space for asking questions, sharing resources, and staying informed about new technologies and best practices.

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discussion

Getting behavioral data out of datasets that weren't built for it

Maggie Bliss

16 June 2026 3:49pm

Burning question:There's so much monitoring data already- camera trap archives, acoustic recordings, GPS tracks - but almost all of it was collected to answer presence/absence or...

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Maggie Bliss

28 June 2026 10:12pm

This thread is exactly the conversation I was hoping to start - thank you all.

Janelle, your point about context is the crux of it. A crocodile with its mouth open could be thermoregulating, resting, or hunting, and the still frame alone won't tell you which - it's the surrounding signals (eyes, posture, what else is in the scene) that disambiguate. That's the whole problem in miniature: behavior isn't legible without context, and most datasets strip the context out. I love your reframe of observer bias as signal, too - the order in which individuals approach and explore a new camera is behavioral data, not just noise to wait out. And it points at exactly where I think this goes: no single stream is enough. Thermal, acoustic, eDNA, movement - layered together, you start to reconstruct a scene rather than just catalog detections.

Kim, the continuous thermal deployment you're describing is the kind of capture I'd love to understand better - sustained, passive, weatherproof is where the rare and off-frame behaviors actually live. Would be curious how much behavioral signal you're seeing in that data vs. presence/absence.

Henri, your bee work is striking - we're clearly circling the same core idea from different systems. I'd be glad to compare notes; I'll follow up directly.

More soon - this is the good stuff.

Maggie

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discussion

Looking To Connect: Game Developer to Conservation Tech (Built Animal Movement App)

Kristof Klipfel

3 December 2025 1:10am

Hi everyone! My name is Kristof.I'm a game technology developer transitioning into conservation tech, and I'm so excited to have discovered this community - I honestly had no idea...

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Don F. Becker

20 April 2026 4:05am

I am glad to see more programmers coming into the conservation field.  The first big project I did that really got me involved with conservation work, was taking the path finding algorithms I used from learning game programming, and using them to detect and measure the distance of routes that turtles traveled up and down streams in a river drainage.  

Kim Hendrikse

20 April 2026 7:39am

Wolves, cool!

Will this then need collared wolves ?

Ferruge

1 July 2026 11:25pm

Hi Kristof!

It's been quite some time since you made this post, and I hope you're doing well.

I'm an environmental scientist currently working on a project to teach children living near a national park the basics of game development through conservation science focused on the biodiversity of the atlantic forest. I came across your post and thought it would be wonderful to chat with you, if you're still available and interested.

Let me know—I’d love to hear from you!

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discussion

Safe and Sound project report: Is Camtrap DP a suitable standard for (bio)acoustic data?

Julia Wiel

18 March 2026 4:17pm

Dear WILDLABS community,We are pleased to share with you the publication of the Safe and Sound project report: Is Camtrap DP a suitable...

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Kristoffer Noriel Ordoñez

12 April 2026 6:19pm

Your report on extending Camtrap DP to bioacoustics resonated with something we are just beginning to explore in Mindoro Island, Philippines.

We have ongoing camera trap deployments in interior forest habitats and are beginning to examine the acoustic layer embedded in those recordings, particularly for nocturnal species such as the Mindoro Boobook. The discussion around terminology and how datasets are structured feels especially relevant, though I am still trying to understand how frameworks like Camtrap DP would apply in practice to this kind of data.

It is encouraging to see this direction being shaped at the community level. I will be following this closely as we continue to learn and figure out how our own datasets might eventually align.

Catherine Jardine

15 June 2026 11:54pm

Thanks for this!  I've shared this post with the WildTrax (https://wildtrax.ca/) team and CanAvian (https://canavian.ca/) to investigate. We're exploring data standards as part of a recent initiative so this will be very helpful! @jeffcullis 

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discussion

Project Report: Upgrading Software for The Motus Wildlife Tracking System and NatureCounts 

Catherine Jardine

15 June 2026 11:52pm

We’re excited to report the completion of our Boring Fund Project: BEHIND THE SCENES: UPGRADING SOFTWARE PACKAGES IN SUPPORT OF THE MOTUS WILDLIFE TRACKING SYSTEM AND...

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Denis Lepage

18 June 2026 10:41pm

This initiative was such a great motivation to finally tackle some of our tech debt, so thanks indeed Arm and Wildlabs. The boring stuff is really what underpins the exciting one, and it's great to have partners and funders who understand and appreciate this.
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discussion

Spectrolipi v2.0.1

Nishant Bhagwat

8 June 2026 10:34am

Spectrolipi is a tool for visualizing sound, annotating spectrograms, and exporting ML‑ready acoustic datasets.Spectrolipi V2.0.0 is released now. Main new...

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discussion

Looking for opportunities in AI for Bioacoustics and Environmental Monitoring

Leonardo Mannini

6 April 2026 10:37am

Hi everyone,My name is Leonardo Mannini, and I’m an AI engineer with a strong interest in bioacoustics and conservation technology.I recently completed a research role at FBK (...

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Brent Pease

17 April 2026 1:19pm

Hi Leonardo,


Let’s chat! I potentially have some opportunities, collaborations or even short-term employment. Send me a message. 

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discussion

Citizen science tool for microplastic mapping in underserved regions

Mykhailo Kravchuk

18 April 2026 3:48am

Hi everyone, I'm a high school student working on a free citizen science tool for microplastic pollution in underserved regions. The idea is simple: a mobile web app where anyone...

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Soledad Gastón

1 May 2026 12:39pm

Hi Mykhailo. That citizen science tool seems interesting. But, how do you expect people to detect microplastics (ranging from 1 µm to 5 mm in size)?

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discussion

Biowatch: a free, open-source desktop app for camera trap analysis

Arthur

21 April 2026 10:07am

Hi everyone  I wanted to share something we've been building that feels right at home in this community: Biowatch, a free and open-source desktop app...

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Mackenzie Leah Askin

22 April 2026 7:50pm

This looks amazing and I look forward to trying it out when I get the chance! 

Just wondering, when it comes to the AI recognitions, is there a way to "rename" the recognitions that were incorrect? 

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discussion

Spectrolipi - A tool for sound data annotation.

Nishant Bhagwat

10 March 2026 4:10am

Hello everyone,I’m Nishant. We have released a tool called Spectrolipi (https://spectrolipi.com) — for visualizing sound, annotating spectrograms...

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Nishant Bhagwat

22 April 2026 11:06am

Hi Kristoffer,

I have tested upto 20 mins long sound files (48kHz /24 bit). It works without any significant lag on a normal office type machine (without dedicated GPU, etc). If required, I can try to provide a paging option which may be able to accomodate longer files.
Can you please inform the expected length of the sound files for your project.  

Regards,

Nishant

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careers

Ecological Data Scientist

Lacey Hughey

21 April 2026 9:22pm

The Smithsonian Institution is the world’s largest museum, education, and research complex, with 21 museums and the National Zoo. This position is located in the Smithsonian's National Zoo and Conservation Biology...

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discussion

Looking for advice: combining AI skills with SCUBA diving marine fieldwork

Daniel Selmin

12 September 2025 1:18pm

Hi everyone!I’m Daniel, a Master’s student in Life Sciences Engineering at EPFL. During my internship and thesis I focused on AI applied to medical images and signals.At the same...

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Henri Busson

1 April 2026 10:35am

Hi Daniel

 

It depends on what you want to be
If you really want to bring something new then I guess do a PhD

I have a weird background, applied mathematician, PhD in econ and now working on this
I am guessing that the transition is doable as the math is the same that's how I kept doing very different subjects

I am currently working in an french engineering school on international shipping and would love to translate AI for conservation of ocean and I have several ideas

So I would be happy to discuss them and if interested let me know?

 

 

 

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discussion

Reproducible Builds in Software Development

Manish Gadhvi

8 September 2025 8:47pm

Hi Wildlabs — quick question for the community: how important is reproducibility in your day-to-day conservation tech work?A few prompts to help:How important is...

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Manish Gadhvi

3 April 2026 2:46pm

Hi Stephen,

My experience of Nix is limited unfortunately but I think it offers a lot of the same benefits. I'm an Emacs/Lisp fan so it's perfect for me :)

There is Cuirass, which is a Guix specific CI and build automation service and a pack command to create containers. It's nice to have everything linked with Guix rather than different systems/frameworks

I built a small POC to explain the benefits. 

Stephen Leard

3 April 2026 6:39pm

Makes sense, I thought there might be a Lisp preference factoring in there 🙂

Cuirass looks cool, I'm going to check it out, and the eco-pulse-monitor project looks great too, well done!

Related to AI sustainability, have you checked out any of the CodeCarbon tools by chance? I've been working on incorporating their library into our daily code tasks at work, seems like a worthwhile project - 

EcoLogits just joined CodeCarbon too I think, also neat - 

Thanks!

Manish Gadhvi

5 April 2026 10:10pm

Thank you. That looks great! I was trying to build something similar but, as usual, there's a Python library already :) I was leaning towards trying SLMs like llama.cpp

 

My end goal is to find ways to use this approach in animal conservation specifically. I'm looking at data sets from the IUCN to see what's possible. I'd love to hear more about your work

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