Looking for tips about masters in Wildlife forensics and possible places to get some work experience.
10 September 2016 10:21am
7 November 2023 8:48pm
I have not personally done this program but I was considering it at one time. The University of Florida has a virtual wildlife forensics program that I have heard great things about!
8 November 2023 1:30am
Yes, I considered that one as well. At the time of this post (2016) the full masters wasn't available yet, only the online certificate courses. Unfortunately, both the masters and certificate courses were to expensive for me at the time.
Insight; a secure online platform designed for sharing experiences of conservation tool use.
7 November 2023 1:01pm
A secure platform designed for those working to monitor & protect natural resources. Insight facilitates sharing experience, knowledge & tools to increase efficiency & effectiveness in conservation. By sharing we reduce time & money spent to find, test, & implement solutions.
Welcome to Insight
Wildlife crime refers to any illegal activity that involves the taking, trading, or possession of wild animals and plants, or their parts and derivatives.
Insight
Replacement (cheaper) foam mic covers
23 October 2023 3:35pm
3 November 2023 3:04pm
Hi! I got these ones from Amazon. Also, I was tired of creatures eating them so I created a shield using window mesh screen 
Phinus 10 Pack Lapel Microphone Windscreen, Headset Windscreen, Mic Foam Covers Lavalier Microphone Windscreen for Variety of Headset Microphone, Tough Sponge Material, Noise Reduction, Black
Amazon.com: Phinus 10 Pack Lapel Microphone Windscreen, Headset Windscreen, Mic Foam Covers Lavalier Microphone Windscreen for Variety of Headset Microphone, Tough Sponge Material, Noise Reduction, Black : Musical Instruments
6 November 2023 9:31am
Hi - thanks for your reply. I've been thinking along the same lines though unsure where I'd purchase 'acoustic foam' from. I've made 'dead cats' before for some of my active monitoring mics and that material is not too difficult to source but the only acoustic foam I've come across is the type for deadening sound in studio etc. - the exact opposite of what I want!! The search continues ....!
6 November 2023 9:33am
Brilliant - thank you.! Great idea about the screen too - I'm replacing some of them monthly so may try that myself. Have you found any issues with the mesh generating any tones with wind?
TWS2023 - get in touch
5 November 2023 8:13pm
5 November 2023 9:04pm
I'm registered with the TWS2023 app, so feel free to nudge me there as well
Payment for ecosystem services - mobile money case study?
27 October 2023 2:59pm
30 October 2023 10:23am
Huge thank you Carly!
3 November 2023 12:36pm
The folks at AB Entheos in Nairobi are also looking at wild life damage insurance https://ab-entheos.co.ke/
5 November 2023 4:09pm
Thanks Arky!
DeepFaune: a software for AI-based identification of mammals in camera-trap pictures and videos
14 July 2023 3:14pm
24 October 2023 8:46pm
Hello to all, new to this group. This is very exciting technology. can it work for ID of individual animals? we are interested in Ai for identifying individual jaguars (spots) and andean Bears (face characteristics). Any recommendation? contact? thanks!
German
25 October 2023 8:57am
That's a very interesting question and use case (I'm not from deepfaune). I'm playing with this at the moment and intend to integrate it into my other security software that can capture and send video alerts. I should have this working within a few weeks I think.
The structure of that software is that it is two stage, the first stage identifies that there is an animal and it's bounding box and then there's a classification stage. I intend to merge the two stages so that it behaves like a yolo model so that the output is bounding boxes as well as what type of animal it is.
However, my security software can cascade models. So if you were able to train a single stage classifier that identifies your particular bears, then you could cascade all of these models in my software to generate an alert with a video saying which bear it was.
4 November 2023 4:51am
Hi @GermanFore ,
I work with the BearID Project on individual identification of brown bears from faces. More recently we worked on face detection across all bear species and ran some tests with identifying Andean bears. You can find details in the paper I linked below. We plan to do more work with Andean bears in 2024.
I would love to connect with you. I'll send you a message with my email address.
Regards,
Ed
Democratising Access to Earth Observation Data, Saving Wildlife across East Africa with Digital Earth Africa's Dr. Kenneth Mubea
Kenneth Mubea
3 November 2023 1:24pm
15 May 2024 10:16am
PiCAM: A Raspberry Pi-based open-source, low-power camera system for monitoring plant phenology in Arctic environments
1 November 2023 5:34pm
Digital Signals Processing - free online textbook
31 October 2023 1:50pm
I just discovered this freely available book on digital signal processing and love the fact that it is“…intended for students … who may not have much mathematical or engineering training.” Seems like a great resource for bioacoustics, biologing etc!
A SPOTLIGHT ON CUTTING-EDGE BIOMONITORING TECHNOLOGIES
31 October 2023 9:09am
15 November 2023 6:10pm
31 January 2024 7:17pm
How 400km solar-powered fence reduces human-wildlife conflict - The Standard
31 October 2023 7:35am
An electric, solar-powered fence erected by the Rhino Ark Charitable Trust partnering with the Kenya Wildlife Service completed in 2009 evolved into the longest conservation barrier that safeguards vital forests in the Aberdare Conservation Area fostering peaceful coexistence.
Searching for researchers working in Africa
25 September 2023 1:57am
20 October 2023 7:45pm
Hi Andrew,
Rainforest Connection (RFCx) has projects in a couple different countries in that region, and also working with agroforestry systems to monitor biodiversity using acoustic monitoring! You can read more about that project (Kenya) here: https://rfcx.org/blog/monitoring-biodiversity-in-kenyan-agroforestry-parcels. We've also got a project working with small-scale cacao farmers in Colombia to monitor biodiversity in their cacao plots. For some background, RFCx is a non-profit focused using sound and AI to monitor biodiversity and detect threats, and we also manage the Arbimon acoustic analysis platform.
I'd be happy to talk through ideas further if you'd like, feel free to reach out! [email protected]
All the best,
Carly
21 October 2023 12:13am
HI Andrew,
I am replying to the "elsewhere". I am based in Aus but travel and work in the Arts/ Science field of field recording, often with scientists. I have been acoustic monitoring a peri-urban site in Victoria with a local council. The subject is a wetland, transferring from farmland to a wetland public space that is now surrounded and impacted by urban infrastructure. I was lucky enough to get sounds before, during and after CoVid lockdowns so we can hear a stark comparison of anthropogenic sound.
I'd love to chat further about this and other work I do if this fits your collaboration criteria.
Best,
Vicki
31 October 2023 1:56am
Hi Vicki,
I've sent you a private message.
Ecoacoustic Bird Survey White Paper
30 October 2023 3:48pm
Technology Aids Desert Tortoise Conservation Efforts
30 October 2023 1:33pm
Hardshell Labs advances desert tortoise conservation efforts by duping one of its biggest predators—ravens—by combining 3D-printing and spraying grape scent.
Technology aids desert tortoise conservation efforts
Hardshell Labs advances desert tortoise conservation efforts by duping one of its biggest predators—ravens—by combining 3D-printing and spraying grape scent.
autodesk
Nepal's tiger conservation gets tech boost with AI-powered deer tracking
30 October 2023 1:23pm
Researchers in Nepal are using vertical cameras and AI technology to track and profile individual spotted deer (Axis axis), similar to the methods used for tigers.
Nepal’s tiger conservation gets tech boost with AI-powered deer tracking
KATHMANDU – In the golden hours of twilight, as a tiger tries to hide its long shadows, a herd of spotted deer graze in tranquil oblivion. Every rustle in the bushes nearby prompts members of the herd to quickly raise their head, look for signs of danger and then continue grazing. Yet they are unable […]
Mongabay Environmental News
PAM workflow and file question
27 October 2023 3:50pm
29 October 2023 10:59am
Like this:
ffmpeg -i input.wav -f segment -segment_time 60 -c copy output%03d.wav
30 October 2023 1:17pm
Thank you!
30 October 2023 1:17pm
Thank you!
A Market Reduction Approach to Illegal Ivory Markets in Tanzania
30 October 2023 7:41am
Seismic detectors
20 December 2015 1:10pm
31 August 2018 2:51pm
Hi Nilaksha,
Congratulations! That is great news! Please do keep us posted on how it goes and do let us know if you need varied field sites in which to test the tools. @Teun , how's your prototype coming along?
Best,
Nilanga
30 March 2021 6:01pm
Dear all, any update on this subject?
All the best.
29 October 2023 6:39pm
Hi Antoine,
Sorry about the late reply. The field trials were abandoned mainly due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We're planning to improve our prototype and conduct field trials in this December. I'll post an update here.
regards
Movebank tutorial on uploads of tag acceleration and magnetometer data
27 October 2023 2:14pm
In case you missed it... (no.2)
27 October 2023 1:20pm
Takeaways from the First-ever Africa Climate Summit: Conservation Technology is Still New(ish)
27 October 2023 11:54am
Introducing The Debrief: Season 1
27 October 2023 10:48am
Update 2: Cheap Automated Mothbox
23 October 2023 8:32pm
24 October 2023 9:05am
Hi Andrew,
thanks for sharing your development process so openly, that's really cool and boosts creative thinking also for the readers! :)
Regarding a solution for Raspberry Pi power management: we are using the PiJuice Zero pHAT in combination with a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W in our insect camera trap. There are also other versions available, e.g. for RPi 4 (more info: PiJuice GitHub). From my experience the PiJuice works mostly great and is super easy to install and set up. Downsides are the price and the lack of further software updates/development. It would be really interesting if you could compare one of their HATs to the products from Waveshare. Another possible solution would be a product from UUGear. I have the Witty Pi 4 L3V7 lying around, but couldn't really test and compare it to the PiJuice HAT yet.
Is there a reason why you are using the Raspberry Pi 4? From what I understand about your use case, the RPi Zero 2 W or even RPi Zero should give enough computing power and require a lot less power. Also they are smaller and would be easier to integrate in your box (and generate less heat).
I'm excited for the next updates to see in which direction you will be moving forward with your Mothbox!
Best,
Max
25 October 2023 6:21pm
Thanks for these tips!
We are using a RPI4 because the people I am building it for want images from the 64MP camera from Arducam and so we have to use that to make that work.
27 October 2023 6:44am
Thanks a lot for this detailed update on your project! It looks great!
Modifying GoPro cameras to be IR sensitive.
25 October 2023 6:38pm
27 October 2023 6:35am
Hi Jay!
Thanks for posting this here as well as your great presentation in the Variety Hour the other day!
Cheers!
Acoustic Monitoring Specialist
26 October 2023 7:32pm
Climate Storytelling from the Global South
26 October 2023 11:21am
AI + Environment Summit
26 October 2023 11:15am
Entomological Research Specialist for Automated Insect Monitoring
25 October 2023 7:21pm
Cheap Automated Mothbox
31 August 2023 10:19pm
25 October 2023 5:04pm
I'm looking into writing a sketch for the esp32-cam that can detect pixel changes and take a photo, wish me luck.
25 October 2023 5:11pm
One question, does it even need motion detection? What about taking a photo every 5 seconds and sorting the photos afterwards?
25 October 2023 6:23pm
It depends on which scientists you talk to. I am an favor of just doing a timelapse and doing a post-processing sort afterwards. There's not much reason i can see for such motion fidelity. For the box i am making we are doing exactly that, though maybe a photo every minute or so
5 November 2023 10:35am
Did you find anything?