This group is home to the protected area management tools that bring data collection, analysis, and reporting together to enable frontline conservation work in real-time. These integrated systems include many tools and topics related to other community groups, so if you're interested in this space make sure to check out our Sensors and Connectivity groups as well.
Resources for Getting Started:
- Watch the recording of our virtual meetup on Networked Sensors for Security and Human-Wildlife Conflict Prevention, including talks from WWF, SmartParks, and Sensing Clues.
- Check out this Introduction to SMART on our YouTube channel.
- Hear about the work Wildlife Protection Solutions is doing in this space.
- Watch Ted Schmidt's lunchtime lecture on Tech Readiness and Protected Area Management Tools.
- For a marine perspective, watch Max Schofield's Tech Tutors episode: How do I use open access remote sensing data to monitor fishing?
Header image: Save the Elephants
- @HollyCormack
- | she/her
Biodiversity Knowledge Management Intern at the Biodiversity Consultancy Ltd
- 6 Resources
- 5 Discussions
- 6 Groups
- @ZoeDagan
- | She/her
I'm Zoe, an ecologist at the intersection of SaaS, conservation, and community science. I build programs and advance projects that accelerate solutions to our most urgent climate and conservation challenges.
- 0 Resources
- 4 Discussions
- 10 Groups
2023 Bachelor Degree Graduate from the College of African Wildlife Management, Mweka.
- 0 Resources
- 3 Discussions
- 14 Groups
- @crazybirdguy
- | Him
Field Biologist at Yayasan Cikananga Konservasi Terpadu, Indonesia, with experience and interest mainly in ornithology, citizen science and bioaccoustic
- 0 Resources
- 6 Discussions
- 12 Groups
- @ahmedjunaid
- | He/His
Zoologist, Ecologist, Conservation Biologist
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 16 Groups
- @StephODonnell
- | She / Her
WILDLABS & Fauna & Flora
I'm the Executive Manager at WILDLABS.
- 152 Resources
- 665 Discussions
- 30 Groups
WILDLABS & Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS)
I hold a PhD in Biological Sciences and specialize in bioacoustics and passive acoustic monitoring of cetaceans in the Argentine Sea and Antarctica. Recently, I've also embraced computing to leverage technology in enhancing our conservation efforts.
- 0 Resources
- 2 Discussions
- 14 Groups
Sustainability Manager for CERES Tag LTD. An animal health company; animal monitoring, conservation, & anti-poaching/ rural crime. Wildlife, livestock, equine & companion. #CeresTrace #CeresWild #CeresRanch
- 2 Resources
- 19 Discussions
- 24 Groups
- @MattyD797
- | He/Him
PhD Student | Cornell University | Smithsonian Institution; My focus is in computational ecology within fishery acoustics
- 0 Resources
- 10 Discussions
- 12 Groups
Software Engineer
- 0 Resources
- 5 Discussions
- 10 Groups
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 10 Groups
- @jakefaber
- | he/him
Upstream Tech
- 0 Resources
- 0 Discussions
- 4 Groups
In this Conservation Tech Showcase case study from Osa Conservation, you’ll learn about how technology is aiding their long-term efforts to prevent wildlife crime, protect critical species, and build a climate-adaptive...
22 June 2023
JICA, Japan’s International Cooperation Agency is seeking a digital partner with a proven track record in conservation technology as we launch a pilot project to test technologies to mitigate human-elephant conflict in...
19 June 2023
In this Conservation Tech Showcase case study from CyberTracker, you’ll learn how this software application is revolutionizing the data collection processes and enhancing efficiency in the field.
15 June 2023
In this Conservation Tech Showcase case study from Big Life Foundation, you’ll learn about their successes using EarthRanger and LoRaWAN Smart Parks Solution technologies to monitor wildlife in East Africa.
8 June 2023
This Data4Good project has led to immediate conservation impacts for many islands and many different resources. We hope that this project will inspire others to use data science and technology to solve the conservation...
17 May 2023
Are you using or creating tech to protect wildlife? We want to support your organization through two $15,000 grants!
15 May 2023
In this case study, you'll discover how Mount Kenya Trust is using SMART and EarthRanger technology to protect key Kenyan species and serve local communities that co-exist with wildlife.
11 May 2023
Welcome to our new Conservation Tech Showcase, a series highlighting innovative and impactful projects from outstanding organizations around the world.
11 May 2023
Skylight is looking for someone who loves our ocean, has a deep interest in apply cutting-edge tech to protect it, is proficient in English and Spanish, and has a background in partnership building and training.
10 March 2023
WeForest is looking for a consultant(s) to identify the best tool(s) and/or program(s) to standardize M&E data collection and management across all our Forest Landscape Restoration projects, globally. Will you...
21 February 2023
ZSL is seeking to recruit a Monitoring & Technology Technical Specialist for ZSL’s Kenya country programme to provide training and technical support to our partners working to conserve biodiversity in Protected and...
15 February 2023
Technology to End the Sixth Mass Extinction. Salary: $104k-144K; Location: Washington DC or Seattle WA, potential hybrid; 5+ years of Full stack development experience; Deadline March 15th - view post for full job...
10 February 2023
October 2024
April 2024
event
event
7 Products
Recently updated products
Description | Activity | Replies | Groups | Updated |
---|---|---|---|---|
At IUCN, we are collecting examples of best practices and case studies of tech use in and around... |
|
Protected Area Management Tools | 2 years 2 months ago | |
Hi community, We're looking for a mobile lead engineer to help us protect some of the world's most endangered species... |
|
Protected Area Management Tools, Software and Mobile Apps | 2 years 7 months ago | |
Hey everyone, Tomorrow's episode will be with Christine Wilkinson, who will be talking us through how to get started with... |
|
Protected Area Management Tools | 2 years 8 months ago | |
Hi Wildlabbers, We're getting ready for tomorrow's episode with Tech Tutor Lily Xu, who'll talk to us about how machine... |
|
AI for Conservation, Protected Area Management Tools, Wildlife Crime | 2 years 8 months ago | |
Hi everyone, WCS and the SMART Partnership are holding a hackathon next week with the aim of improving SMART (Spatial Monitoring... |
|
Protected Area Management Tools | 7 years 5 months ago |
Share Your Work in a Conservation Technology Video
17 May 2024 9:06pm
WILDLABS AWARDS 2024 - Underwater Passive Acoustic Monitoring (UPAM) for threatened Andean water frogs
30 March 2024 3:54pm
7 April 2024 6:09pm
This is so cool @Mauricio_Akmentins - congrats and look forward to seeing your project evolve!
1 May 2024 5:17pm
Congratulations! My first hydromoth was just arrived yesterday and so excited! Looking forward for the update from your project!!!
The Inventory User Guide
1 May 2024 12:46pm
Introducing The Inventory!
1 May 2024 12:46pm
2 May 2024 3:08pm
3 May 2024 5:33pm
17 May 2024 7:29am
Hiring Chief Engineer at Conservation X Labs
1 May 2024 12:19pm
Job Opening: Associate Curator of International Conservation at North Carolina Zoo
29 April 2024 9:17pm
Backend Software Architect, EarthRanger (Contract Opportunity)
27 April 2024 7:24pm
Program Manager: Integrating movement and camera trap data with international conservation policy
22 April 2024 10:16pm
Postdoc: Biologging & Camera Trap Data Integration
22 April 2024 10:10pm
Early Warning Systems for Human-Wildlife Conflict, Zoonotic Spillover, and Other Conservation Challenges
17 April 2024 5:43pm
Fauna & Flora: Bridging geospatial data and people together for enhanced conservation management
17 April 2024 11:31am
WILDLABS AWARDS 2024 - FinDrop: Accessible Acoustic Monitoring for Mesophotic Marine Environments
5 April 2024 10:22pm
7 April 2024 6:07pm
Congrats @MattyD797 and team!!! We do a lot of work in the underwater bioacoustic realm and your tool certainly seems like it would be a great instrumental addition to the community. Look forward to learning more about your project!
Liz
The Variety Hour: 2024 Lineup
22 March 2024 4:30pm
Are you attending SMART Global Congress 2024?
22 February 2024 11:13am
20 March 2024 4:32pm
Hi!
A number of the sessions have been recorded. I hope that they will become accessible, though I'm uncertain about the audience who will have access to them.
20 March 2024 4:32pm
Here is a quick report of what we have learnt there:
21 March 2024 9:48pm
Awesome, thanks for the summary!
SMART Global Congress 2024: A quick summary
19 March 2024 6:42pm
Here's what you missed at World Wildlife Day 2024
7 March 2024 9:02pm
15 March 2024 2:42pm
A Sensor-Based Approach to Studying Animal Behavior in Light Pollution Research
24 February 2024 9:33pm
27 February 2024 12:38pm
Thanks for helping me!
For now, I'll be testing with mains power (220V). The final prototype needs to be functional using solar panel.
The main system will be a Raspberry Pi, as the Brain of this project, receiving and storage all the measurements from the other devices, controlling the system. The measurement devices will be a microcontroller (still searching for which one to use) with differents sensor, such Lux sensor like TSL2561 or 2591, AudioMoth to record animals sounds, temperature and some other measurements.
For synchronization, must be effective, because the measurements must be or have the same time, so the storage data from differents devices can be grouped by it's timestamp and have full control for animals and fauna. So, probably it will be a lot of data per day.
The distance between each devices I haven't study yet, consider 20 meters within each device.
27 February 2024 1:49pm
Beware that the AudioMoth in itself will drift. It can be hooked up with a GPS to allow for GPS time synchronization, though.
https://www.openacousticdevices.info/gps-sync
27 February 2024 3:11pm
Unless you are planning on making a mesh network between nodes then the total distance spanning the location of all the nodes is important to know, not just the intra node distance.
If you have a Raspberry Pi as a main master node then you could install my sbts-aru project as a base project and you would get a sub-microsecond master time base by default as well as the GPS synchronizes the main system time with typically less than 0.1 microsecond, and SD card corruption resilience due to the in-memory overlayFS architecture.
If the total distance was 20m across all nodes, then the approach above could also combined the audio gathering capability as the sbts-aru project does audio logging as it would be within 20m of an audiomoth anyway, then you also have time-synchonized audio. If the distance is spanning 100m for example and it's just the intranode distance that is 20m then everything is somewhat different with respect to synchronization.
SMART Global Congress 2024
22 February 2024 11:00am
SMART Partnership Director
21 February 2024 4:32pm
Southern African Wildlife Management Association Conference 2024
6 February 2024 12:20pm
Conservation Technology for Human-Wildlife Conflict in Non-Protected Areas: Advice on Generating Evidence
22 January 2024 11:36pm
23 January 2024 1:54pm
This is an area where my system would do very well in:
Also, as you mention areas dominated by humans, there is a high likelyhood that there will be enough power there to support this system, which provides very high performance and flexibility but it comes with a power and somewhat a cost cost.
Additionally, it's life blood comes with generating alerts and making security and evidence gathering practical and manageable, with it's flexible state management system.
Ping me offline if you would like to have a look at the system.
4 February 2024 8:16am
Hi Amit,
The most important thing is that the livestock owners contact you as soon as possible after finding the carcass. We commonly do two things if they contact us on the same day or just after the livestock was killed:
- Use CyberTracker (or similar software) on an Android smart phone to record all tracks, bite marks, feeding pattern and any other relevant signs of the reason for the loss with pictures and GPS coordinates. [BTW, Compensation is a big issue -- What do you do if the livestock was stolen? What do you do if a domestic animal killed the livestock? What if it died from disease or natural causes and was scavenged upon by carnivores afterwards?]
- In the case of most cats, they would hide the prey (or just mark it by covering it with grass or branches and urinating in the area). In this case you can put up a camera trap on the carcass to capture the animal when it returns to its kill (Reconyx is good if you can afford it - we use mostly Cuddeback with white flash). This will normally only work if the carcass is fresh (so other predators would not be able to smell it and not know where it is yet), so the camera only has to be up for 3-5 days max.
This is not really high-tech, but can be very useful to not only establish which predator was responsible (or if a predator was responsible), but also to record all the evidence for that.
Jupyter Notebook: Aquatic Computer Vision
25 January 2024 5:50am
26 January 2024 1:46pm
This is quite interesting. Would love to see if we could improve this code using custom models and alternative ways of processing the video stream.
27 January 2024 4:07am
This definitely seems like the community to do it. I was looking at the thread about wolf detection and it seems like people here are no strangers to image classification. A little overwhelming to be quite honest 😂
While it would be incredible to have a powerful model that was capable of auto-classifying everything right away and storing all the detected creatures & correlated sensor data straight into a database - I wonder if in remote cases where power (and therefore cpu bandwidth), data storage, and network connectivity is at a premium if it would be more valuable to just be able to highlight moments of interest for lab analysis later? OR if you do you have cellular connection, you could download just those moments of interest and not hours and hours of footage?
27 January 2024 6:11am
Am working on similar AI challenge at the moment. Hoping to translate my workflow to wolves in future if needed.
We all are little overstretched but it there is no pressing deadlines, it should be possible to explore building efficient model for object detection and looking at suitable hardware for running these model on the edge.
Power managment/Recharging System and Communication System
2 January 2024 4:06pm
26 January 2024 8:49am
"Seychelles and South Africa did not allow Starlink to operate"
This is not good, has implications for anti-poaching measures.
26 January 2024 9:03am
Power usage for microcontrollers with solar is much more manageable. For Raspberry Pi's and higher it gets expensive and big.
I'm quite impressed by the specs from the Goal Zero Yeti devices. This can have high capacity and be charged with Solar. Not small though. And the price is not in proportion to the Pi's.
So this 200x model for example, would be close to 16 days running the audio recorder. Let's say 10. without solar. Add solar? Depends on the size of the panels I guess. Power usage for mobile networking? Depends on how much you transmit.
Probably some well documented experiments would be really nice for people here. Sounds like something nice for the next set of grants :)
26 January 2024 2:11pm
Real nice video. I'll have another look in the weekend in detail.
How are Outdoor Fire Detection Systems Adapted for Small Forest Areas, Considering the Predominance of Indoor Fire Detectors?
8 January 2024 4:27pm
22 January 2024 6:35pm
Fire detection is a sort of broad idea. Usually people detect the products of fire, and most often this is smoke.
Many home fire detectors in the US use a radioactive source and measure the absorption of the radiation by the air. More smoke means more absorption.
For outdoor fire detection, PM2.5 can be a very good smoke proxy, and outdoor PM2.5 sensing is pretty accessible.
This one is very popular in my area.
Recycled & DIY Remote Monitoring Buoy
15 January 2024 1:14am
15 January 2024 9:17pm
Hello fellow Brett. Cool project. You mentioned a waterseal testing process. Is there documentation on that?
18 January 2024 10:25am
I dont have anything written up but I can tell what parts we used and how we tested.
Its pretty straightforward, we used this M10 Enclosure Vent from Blue Robotics:
Along with this nipple adapter:
Then you can use any cheap hand held break pump to connect to your enclosure. You can pump a small vacuum in and make sure the pressure holds.
Here's a tutorial video from blue robotics:
Let me know if you have any questions or if I can help out.
Looking for a Supervisor/Research Group - ML-driven Marine Biomonitoring
3 January 2024 2:05pm
5 January 2024 11:07am
Hi Filippo,
Nice to read your message. Have you thought of contacting anyone in the Bioscience department at UCL? In our group "the People and Nature Lab", a few PhD students (Ben and Jason) are working on ML methods for coral reef monitoring. Might be interesting to reach out to them. List of People at CBER.
Best, Aude
7 January 2024 6:06pm
Thanks Aude, very useful. Will reach out to them!
Tranforming Conservation Together: Highlights from the 2023 EarthRanger User Conference
2 January 2024 10:11pm
10 January 2024 5:23am
14 January 2024 3:06am
15 January 2024 9:54pm
Data Viz Inspo for the Holidays
11 December 2023 8:42pm
Wishlist for kit in a field-based Research Station or tech testing space?
27 November 2023 10:41am
28 November 2023 3:25am
Regine Weckauf over on linkedin:
'Little to do with research and tech development, but given how hard it is to attract and retain experienced staff to field based positions, I know it makes a difference how nice the space is. Just because it's the "field", shouldn't mean staff living in basic conditions, regardless of how many times we've been told to see it as a badge of honor. If you have the money, put in nice bathrooms, kitchen, living spaces, and private accommodation. Maybe even a nursery? It creates more local employment opportunities and people genuinely want to visit.'
28 November 2023 2:25pm
Love the idea for in-house gear/supplies! It can be SOO difficult to travel with batteries, electronics parts with airline regs, country policies, etc. and shipping recorders/trail cams/etc. gets VERY (prohibitively) pricey in some countries with customs and taxes. Would be great to have an in-country place to source that kind of equipment.
Housing educational resources related to that tech (in the form of people, print materials, computer tutorials) in-house would be similarly awesome. Particularly/especially in local languages.
Having in-country wet labs as well helps the eDNA/genetics folks, since sample import/export permitting can be (always seems to be?!) a nightmare, so if you can even just do PCR and/or extractions in-country that helps a ton.
In terms of overall field-station-wishlist - honestly, just the promise of continued funding and staff. Every field station I've been to or worked at is in a constant search for enough money to get through the next month/year, because the funding comes in the establish a station but then not to maintain it long-term. It's not sexy for a wishlist per se, but boy is it over-looked and much-needed.
@hikinghack from Dinalab would probably have lots of good insights on this!
29 November 2023 7:59pm
My suggestion would probably be a 3D printer and Solder Station with a stock of common components. With those two things you can solve most problems.
5 April 2024 12:13pm
Congratulations, very exciting! Keep us updated!