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Used to pick up signals from tracking gear on the ground, collect images of wildlife and habitats from the air, gather acoustic data with specialized hydrophones, or even collect snot samples from whales' blowholes, drones are capable of collecting high-resolution data quickly, noninvasively, and at relatively low cost.

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UAV-assisted counts of group size facilitate accurate population surveys of the Critically Endangered cao vit gibbon Nomascus nasutus

Diep

13 June 2023 3:51am

This paper explores the use of UAVs equipped with thermal and standard cameras to accurately count the group sizes of the Critically Endangered cao vit gibbon, highlighting how this technology can overcome the limitations of traditional ground-based methods and contribute to more robust population surveys and conservation efforts.

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discussion

ISO Speakers for Emerging Technologies class.

Flor Sangermano

31 May 2023 4:29pm

Hi Everyone, Apologies for posting across multiple groups.  I'm teaching a new course @ Clark University next semester on emerging technologies for conservation. The course...

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Carly Batist

31 May 2023 10:21pm

Definitely interested! I'm in the ecoacoustics/acoustic monitoring space, working at Rainforest Connection and Arbimon.

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discussion

Animal tracking stories

Wildlife Drones

22 May 2023 2:19am

Do you have a wild animal tracking story that involves adventure or misadventure? Share it with us! From going around in circles for hours to discovering predators instead of your...

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Using computer vision to understand bee vision

Ellie Warren

5 May 2023 1:10am

Here's an innovative project from the Harvey Mudd College Bee Lab that could help us understand how bees view their environments, and thus better protect bee habitat. This project uses computer vision and drone imagery to replicate "bee vision" of flowers and how it differs from a human's view of the same habitat.

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Researchers use taxidermy bird drones to monitor wildlife

Stephanie O'Donnell

26 April 2023 2:40pm

Interesting project - “Our main goal for this is to develop a nature-friendly drone concept for wildlife monitoring,” Hassanalian said. “Traditional drones are often disruptive to ecosystems due to issues such as sound and unfamiliarity, so developing quieter, natural-looking alternatives could help wildlife monitoring and research.”

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event

AI for Pelicans Challenge

Tjomme Dooper

20 April 2023 10:04am

In this Challenge, we will use AI to detect and classify pelicans in Romania's Danube Delta to evaluate the breeding population based on aerial photographs.

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discussion

ML-ready datasets for aerial/drone wildlife surveys

Dan Morris

29 March 2023 5:27pm

I got inspired to collect a list of annotated, appear-to-be-ML-ready datasets related to drone/aerial wildlife surveys:https://github.com/agentmorris/agentmorrispublic/blob/main/...

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Dan Morris

12 April 2023 5:53pm

Following up here... a few of us huddled virtually and assembled standardized metadata, standardized sample code, and sample annotated images for all the datasets on that list.  I don't know whether this exercise was useful, but it was fun!  

The URL hasn't changed, but I consider the list open for business now, let us know what we're missing:

https://github.com/agentmorris/agentmorrispublic/blob/main/drone-datasets.md

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discussion

Advice on afforable LiDAR scanners for Amazon forest surveys

Jeremy Dickens

5 April 2023 3:47pm

Dear allFirstly, what a fantastic group! I love following the discussions on this site and am a true believer in the power of the crowd so am hoping someone might have the...

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Eduardo Zanette

6 April 2023 6:21pm

Hi Jeremy, 



With a quick search I've found the paper linked below. It looks like equipments such as Livox MID are sufficient for plot-level analyses, but not for individual trees. Also, it has performed worse in dense canopies and broadleaf forest, thus I believe we won't have a technology capable of doing what you aim for this amount of money (< $1000) in a few years from now.



I hope someone give us an alternative, though. :D



Best,

 

 

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discussion

Exploring storage options for mass data collection

Adam Roberts

22 March 2023 3:20am

Hi all. I'm currently exploring options for data storage en masse. With our project we will be collecting 24hr hydrophone data, drone video 6hr per day, photography &...

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Carly Batist

22 March 2023 7:36pm

Hi Adam!

I mostly live within the ecoacoustics space so I'll just speak on the hydrophone part of your request; Arbimon is a free web/cloud-based platform with unlimited storage for audio files. We've got an uploader app as well for mass-uploading lots of files. There's also a bunch of spectrogram visualization/annotation tools and analysis workflows available. It's AWS running under the hood.

I have some experience working directly with AWS & Microsoft Azure, and I've found personally that AWS was more user-friendly and intuitive for the (fairly simplistic) kinds of tasks I've done.  

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event

Wildlife Conservation Drones & Technologies Summit 2023

Lonnie McCaskill

16 March 2023 11:31am

Engage, learn from, and network with researchers, students, and other wildlife professionals from around the world that are using or interested in using drones to support wildlife conservation, management and research.

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Lonnie McCaskill

30 March 2023 4:15pm

Hi Emmah,Thanks again for inquiring. At this time there is no plans for streaming of the presentations. I'm hoping in the future we can add this option but right now doesn't look...
Wildlife Drones

12 April 2023 5:18am

We are looking forward to attending the event! 
Lonnie McCaskill

15 April 2023 3:26pm

That's Great! We're looking forward to the event and all of the networking and collaborations that might result from it! 
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discussion

Computer Science student looking to work for wildlife

Virgile Foussereau

5 March 2023 10:04pm

Hello everyone,I am a master student in Computer Science, with a specialization in AI and computer vision. I like to work with AI, computer vision, drones, sensors, autonomous...

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Devi Hall

14 March 2023 2:00pm

Great information! Thank you for sharing this. I actually have Masters in Zoology and have done some field work in Marine Conservation. Since then I have worked in Science education and eventually switched to Software Programming. My dream has always been to work in Conservation, however life happened and I had to give up on this pipe dream. I currently work as a Developer in a contractor role for the Federal Government. Would someone with my experience have an advantage in conservation Tech?

Tom August

14 March 2023 2:58pm

I think the real demand in conservation tech is for transdisciplianry individuals. If you look at all the stand-out people in this space they are people who occupy multiple domains that are traditionally isolated. These are people who talk fluently in computer science and ecology, for example. Not only this, they are also people who create and imagine in ways that intertwin ideas and concepts across these domains. Its these people, thinking in these ways, that lead to innovations that really move us forward. Some of these people started out where you are now, having crossed domains through their career and then seeing opportunities to bring these skills together in imaginative ways. 

Stephanie O'Donnell

14 March 2023 9:53pm

I couldn't agree more with both of these comments tom! I'm reading hundreds (literally hundreds) of applications for open WILDLABS roles at the moment, and the ones that stand out are those where it's really clear they're following genuine curiosity across different disciplines. If you're in conservation, it's the evidence of interest in tech (courses, projects, things you're trying and learning yourself). For tech, it's getting into conservation - all the things you mentioned. 

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discussion

Drones for GIS - Best Practice

Adrian Hughes

17 October 2017 8:22am

I thought I would share our best pratice document we created as part of the Drones for GIS project we we are running at the RSPB. The aim of the document is to provide insight...

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Adrian Hughes

31 March 2020 10:38am

We've just created a new version. General updates throughout

 

version notes

 

General refresh and update based on knowledge acquired over the last couple of years

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Updated CAA regulations, drone model advice including Yuneec, sensor advice (including thermal), classification advice, hydrological modelling advice, and nest survey info

Stephanie O'Donnell

15 February 2023 9:39am

This thread continues to be one of the most useful, evergreen resources - even 5+ years later! Who would have thought? 

I was speaking to a colleague from another conservation ngo last week - and it came out that she was having to start from scratch developing some consistent internal guidance to support staff members using drones. I've poiinted her here and it's already been super useful, but I'm curious if anyone has newer guidance they've developed to support drone use their organisation that they'd be able to share? If you've updated your guidance, what have you changed or found to be most important? 

Reinvigorating this thread might turn out to be super useful for lots of folk and save a lot of time in developing supporting documentation - I appreciate anyone who is able to share! 

Thanks 

Steph 

Alex Sams

24 February 2023 12:30pm

Hi all,

I've been quickly developing in-house drone services in the UK for Providence Ecological and have found some useful information for building a workflow with Rich Charpentier's YouTube channel. There are loads of good resources on YouTube but Rich's channel seems to be more useful with regard to budget/free software etc. 

It has occurred to me that there may not be very good "Best Practice" guidance for drone pilots with regard to wildlife disturbance so when considering employing a drone pilot, please bear this in mind. It is useful to talk through their experience of avoiding/mitigating disturbance to wildlife during drone operations asnd provide guidance where you feel it is required. 

Hopefully this is helpful!

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discussion

Call for Data: A Global Database of Tree Crown Footprints from RGB Imagery

Matt Allen

3 February 2023 11:22am

Hello! I am putting together a benchmark dataset for tree crown segmentation - do you have data and would you like to join our effort?Call for data: we're looking for...

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Carly Batist

3 February 2023 7:01pm

You should definitely talk with Ben Weinstein and co (the folks behind DeepForest), if you haven't already!

Liz Scott

10 February 2023 4:18pm

Bluesky have a commercial tree crown dataset available covering most of Great Britain (England, Wales and parts of Scotland). There is a canopy layer with approximate outlines of each canopy (the image on this page shows just circular crowns). It's created using aerial imagery.

 

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How daredevil drones find nearly extinct plants hiding in cliffs

Stephanie O'Donnell

10 February 2023 11:07am

Nice article about one of the Rainforest XPrize semifinalist teams - using drones to sample plant species. 'Nyberg and the National Tropical Botanical Garden (NTBG) team, working with the State of Hawaii's Division of Forestry and Wildlife, have rediscovered three species thought to be extinct or locally extinct from Kauai and uncovered larger populations of many other critically endangered species with populations smaller than 100 individuals.'

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