Software and mobile applications are equally as important to conservation technology as the hardware used in the field. Increasingly developed specifically for #tech4wildlife needs, there are mobile apps and software options designed to help with protected area management, wildlife crime reporting, and anti-poaching patrol planning, data analysis, community science, data visualization and GIS mapping, outreach and engagement, and even conservation storytelling.
Likewise, mobile games have opened up new avenues for engaging the public in conservation efforts, allowing for immersive storytelling and interactive experiences. By combining cutting-edge technology and important conservation information with a media form already familiar to the public, conservationists are finding exciting ways to make audiences feel personally invested in critical species and habitats.
Whether you're looking for software and mobile app developers to help you with your own conservation tech needs, you have questions about development, you're looking for resources, or you'd like to share your own app, software, or gaming tools, this is the group for you!
Header photo: Trevor Hebert
St. Lawrence University
Professor of Biology at St. Lawrence University
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- @nicoboenisch
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Co-Director FOS Europe, Conservation Strategist and Technical Advisor to the Miradi Software Team, Improving Conservation through Adaptive Management and Evidence-based Learning
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Co-founder and CEO of Goldfish.io
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M.A.P Scientific Services
Co-founder and Director of M.A.P Scientific Services, South Africa
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Natural Solutions
Engineer, Ph.D in Computation Ecology. Interested in developing tools for the massive acquisition of high dimensional data from new technologies (e.g., imaging, omics), their analysis and visualization.
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- @Gody
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Godfrey Nyangaresi, a dedicated Protection Manager with 12+ years of wildlife conservation experience. Skilled in technologies, administration, and law enforcement, he leads protection efforts at STEP, ensuring the sustainable conservation of elephants in southern Tanzania.
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- @jmondragon
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Director of Spatial Planning and Innovation Nature Conservancy of Canada
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WildTrack
Research, development and implementation of non-invasive montoring for endangered species
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Firmware/Electronics Engineer with 10+ years of experience building telemetry devices for wildlife conservation. I'm an avid birdwatcher and enjoy wildlife photography. CTO and Senior Engineer at Cellular Tracking Technologies.
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Program manager and recordist at The Acoustic Atlas
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Article
In 2016, Cambodia reached a landmark for marine conservation when a 405 km2 Marine Fisheries Management Area was declared around the islands of Koh Rong and Koh Rong Sanloem, creating the country’s first large-scale...
8 May 2017
In this From the Field interview, we speak to Dr. Raman Sukumar, a world renowned expert on Asian elephant conservation. He shares his thoughts on how technology could be used for mitigating elephant-human conflict, and...
5 April 2017
Are you ready for this year's #Tech4Wildlife Photo Challenge? In anticipation, we're counting down our ten favourite entries from last year. Do you think you can top these?
1 March 2017
The Conservation Leadership Programme (CLP) is a training and capacity building programme that targets individuals from developing countries who are early in their conservation career and demonstrate leadership...
21 November 2016
Technology by itself will not save pangolins or elephants, but it can help make major progress.
14 November 2016
Do you work on conserving Neotropical migratory birds? Do you need funding? Why not apply for a grant from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service through the Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation Act's grant program? The...
8 November 2016
As a visiting research scholar with UNODC, Isla Duporge asked wildlife crime experts about their experiences using remote sensing technologies to combat illicit wildlife and forest activities. In this article, Isla...
7 November 2016
The Independent Evaluation Office of the Global Environment Facility is requesting Expressions of Interest from individual consultants to conduct remote sensing and geospatial analysis for Evaluation of Programmatic...
4 August 2016
The Sustainable Palm Oil Transparency Toolkit (SPOTT) is an online platform providing practical information for stakeholders in the palm oil supply chain. Alexis Hatto from the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) shows...
8 June 2016
Operating the largest tropical forest camera trap network globally, TEAM Network has accumulated over 2.6 million images. How can large datasets coupled with new techniques for data management and analysis provide...
28 April 2016
A team of researchers is using UAVs to photograph tropical forest canopy with the aim of developing low-cost methods for measuring forest quality and directing restoration management. In this case study for the Drones...
27 April 2016
Thousands of papers and reports about flora and fauna are published each year. While peer-reviewed published information is vitally important to conservation organisations, the ever-increasing mountain of information...
5 April 2016
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41 Products
Recently updated products
Description | Activity | Replies | Groups | Updated |
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Marine Monitor (M2) LLC is a small, focused company building scalable vessel monitoring solutions to support Marine Conservation. We are... |
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Marine Conservation, Protected Area Management Tools, Software and Mobile Apps | 11 months 3 weeks ago | |
Hi everybody 👋🏽,I'm a UX designer, and I design interfaces and improve user experiences/flows. I would love to contribute to conservation... |
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Software and Mobile Apps | 1 year ago | |
That sounds like a really neat project! Do fish get re-caught often enough that individual ID is useful? Is sample bias (more data from popular spots) an issue? |
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AI for Conservation, Citizen Science, Software and Mobile Apps | 1 year 1 month ago | |
Hello all! Bluspark is a plateform that allows natural area managers such as natural parks or reserves to optimize their day to day... |
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Citizen Science, Community Base, Connectivity, Conservation Tech Training and Education, Ethics of Conservation Tech, Protected Area Management Tools, Software and Mobile Apps | 1 year 1 month ago | |
Thank you so much for your reply! I'll look in to this now :) |
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Acoustics, Autonomous Camera Traps for Insects, Camera Traps, Data management and processing tools, Drones, Remote Sensing & GIS, Software and Mobile Apps | 1 year 2 months ago | |
Hi Andrea! Although I am a keen user and observer of the Moveapps initiative, my R or Python coding skills are next to non- existing. I am therefore not likely to be contributing... |
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Biologging, Conservation Tech Training and Education, Data management and processing tools, Emerging Tech, Human-Wildlife Conflict, Open Source Solutions, Software and Mobile Apps | 1 year 3 months ago | |
I'm curious to understand how people are using satellite data. What problems does satellite imagery solve for you?... |
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Remote Sensing & GIS, Software and Mobile Apps | 1 year 3 months ago | |
Hi all, In the last couple of months I have started using the Google 'Lens' app on my Android phone and I have been really impressed... |
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Software and Mobile Apps, Wildlife Crime | 1 year 3 months ago | |
Depending on the type of data you're needing to collect, the EarthRanger or SMART platforms might be helpful. They each have mobile apps but also a suite of integrated software to... |
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Software and Mobile Apps | 1 year 4 months ago | |
Hi Jim, could you please update us on your final choice and experience so far? |
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Citizen Science, Software and Mobile Apps | 1 year 4 months ago | |
No, I was never able to figure out how to send these to anyone on here. I was hoping to learn how to clear these videos up if possible! |
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Camera Traps, Data management and processing tools, Open Source Solutions, Software and Mobile Apps | 1 year 5 months ago | |
Fab - thanks Carly! |
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Software and Mobile Apps | 1 year 7 months ago |
Congratulations to Zoohackathon winners, team ODINN!
6 December 2017 12:00am
FIT Cheetahs
4 December 2017 12:00am
Finding Souvenir Data
9 November 2017 5:31am
Has anyone tried out the Forest Watcher Mobile App?
27 October 2017 7:57pm
1 November 2017 11:16am
Hi Liz - Steph encouraged me to have a play for our project in South Sudan. I was surprised the reference area allowed when setting up the app was fairly small but presume this is because it encourages local snapshots rather than a large scale overview. However I don't think there should be a problem with covering a larger reference area that can be zoomed into unless it makes the usability worse. For any sizeable PAs you'd have to create multiple 'areas' and this is quite tricky to do as the PAs didn't show up automatically on the reference map. Great innovative app though and I am happy to be a guinea pig. Rob
HWC Tech Challenge Update: Meet the Judges
20 October 2017 12:00am
What tech challenges do you have?
27 September 2017 2:36pm
4 October 2017 9:31am
Hello John
This is a very generous offer, thank you.
Camera trapping as a tool for researching animal behaviour and ecology is rapidly spreading and growing, but with the exception of the specialist Pantheracams which only take full colour still shots, the cameras are designed for a recreational market, mainly of deer hunters in cold and temperate areas. Consequently, in research applications, the performance of the cameras is often disappointing, and hugely elaborate statistical modelling is used to overcome their deficiencies.
A research grade camera trap at an affordable price, that can do more than a Pantheracam, would be a great tool.
If you want to focus on one component then the passive infrared triggers need a complete re-work.
Peter Apps
4 October 2017 3:50pm
Thanks Peter! And is that something you'd be interested in working on as part of the Botswana Predator Conservation Trust?
4 October 2017 5:58pm
Certainly, John; camera trapping is one of our main tools, especially for work on chemical communication.
Peter
Kids, Drones & Science At The Water’s Edge
4 October 2017 12:00am
DAS: A Scaleable Solution For Protected Area Management
26 September 2017 12:00am
How to track and count Scarlet Macaws
15 August 2017 6:36pm
27 August 2017 9:20pm
I recomended cybertracker. Is easy and flexible app for android and works without cellphone coverage.
8 September 2017 6:21am
It might be worth looking at this NZ based participatory bird count - https://www.greatkererucount.nz/
I believe they based it on iNaturalist - https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.inaturalist.android
8 September 2017 6:23pm
Hi, thanks jval and smarye for your ideas, I will look into it.
Anonymous SMS
3 April 2017 7:38am
13 April 2017 2:42pm
Hi Will,
We are collaborating with WCS, San Diago zoo and the Wildtrack team from last year's zoohackathon to build a similar solution to the one you describe. The solution uses Twilio and you get a full overview of the work already built here: https://devpost.com/software/wildtrack
It would be good to share requirements and see if there is a way the Wildtrack solution can work for your needs. We would love to work with you to understand your full set of requirements and see if these can be accommodated.
If this is of interest please do drop me an email at [email protected]. I will also be out in Kenya from 25th April for two weeks, so if you'd like to meet we can hopefully do this face to face.
Sophie
15 August 2017 4:50pm
Hi all
I'd be interested to hear if there were any updates on the discussion above. We @marianneteoh are looking at establishing informant networks for reporting illegal fishing and marine wildlife trade and a means of anonymous reporting would be incredibly useful.
Thanks in advance,
Kate
29 August 2017 5:27pm
Hi Kate,
At ZSL, we're continuing to work with the WildTrack team on their solution - now named SmartSkout. We've just had an article published on the Guardian about the project https://www.theguardian.com/vulcan-partner-zone/2017/aug/22/new-app-enable-citizens-report-poaching-real-time
We're currently focussed on producing the MVP for terrestrial SMART sites but we'd be very interested to hear more about your work establishing informant networks to see what potential there is for broader applications of the technology in the future. Feel free to connect with me at [email protected]
Best
Rachael
Wildlife Crime Tech Challenge: Protecting songbirds with the power of citizen science
17 August 2017 12:00am
SMART at IMPAC4 in Chile - September 4-8, 2017
15 August 2017 7:30pm
Operation Ferdinand - a Predator and Livestock Conflict Prevention Video Game!
23 June 2017 7:07pm
18 July 2017 11:29am
HI Gabriela - I'm sorry I missed this. I'm excited to try it out and so awesome to see others making games for conservation.
Gautam!
11 August 2017 1:42am
Hi Gabriela, i`ll check the game. Very interesting!!
11 August 2017 9:04am
Thanks for all the interest everyone! My colleague Jaymie and I are so excited that people are checking out our game. Let us know if you have any questions or suggestions!
Bird identification app needed
13 July 2017 5:52pm
19 July 2017 10:29pm
Have you already tried the Merlin Bird ID App (http://merlin.allaboutbirds.org/)? The photo ID works pretty well. You just need to take a picture of the the whole bird. For offline mode, you can download a regional "Bird Pack", such as "US: Southeast".
Regards, Ed
20 July 2017 9:06am
Dear Ed,
Excellent suggestion, thank you. We indeed need something as user-friendly as this. Right now they do not have all the right species for us (Eastern Europe/Middle East) but we could talk to them to see what is possible. Thanks again!
Fleur
20 July 2017 5:09pm
Hi Fleur,
I see now that the Merlin App bird packs are limited to North America. You could certainly contact the Cornell University Lab of Ornitology (http://www.birds.cornell.edu/) who develop the app. They may be interested in helping with such a problem.
Another option may be iNaturalist (http://www.inaturalist.org/). They have an app for logging nature observations. It is not limited to bird, but includes plants, animals, etc. They are currently adding a deep learning system to help automatically identify species from photos (currently around 10,000 species can be identified). I believe they give a top 10 possibilities. They use GPS location data from the proto or phone to provide localized suggestions. There's a demo web page here:
https://www.inaturalist.org/computer_vision_demo
According to their blog (https://www.inaturalist.org/pages/computer_vision_demo), they have integrated the computer vision module with their iPhone app. I don't think they have added it to their Android app yet. I have Android, so I have not tried the computer vision component from my app.
They may also have limited species for your area, however, the great thing about iNaturalist is that anyone can upload observations. I believe for the computer vision to be effective, they want to have at least 20 verified observations of a species by 20 different people before they add it to their model. The app is from the California Academy of Science. You may want to contact them to see if you can accelerate the process.
Best of luck!
Ed
Rhino Carpentry: The Making of Lola the Rhino in Augmented Reality
19 July 2017 12:00am
SMART 2016 Annual Report
5 July 2017 7:26pm
18 July 2017 1:10pm
Thanks for sharing this, Drew! We have a number of SMART focused case studies and articles in our Resources area that might also be worth checking out if you're considering using SMART in your work:
- The Spatial Monitoring and Reporting Tool (SMART) - Alexa Montefiore gave a nice introduction to SMART in this first overview article
- Video: Discover the SMART Approach - recorded in June 2016, this talk was presented by Barney Long (@Barney_Long ), Emma Stokes (@estokes ) , Jonathan Palmer (@jpalmer ) and Alexa Montefiore, this talk explains the origins of SMART, offers case studies of successful applications and outlines future development plans for the methodology. The session concludes with an interactive Q&A session, which offered the opportunity to delve deeper into the practicalities of implementing SMART.
- Getting SMART in Cambodia - In this talk, Kate West (@katewest ), Manager of our Marine Conservation Group, shares her key lessons learnt from implementing SMART in a marine context and dives deep into the limitations and considerations that need to be taken into account when implementing the SMART approach. This is a valuable talk for any team considering deploying SMART in a marine context.
From the Field: Developing a new camera trap data management tool
7 July 2017 12:00am
Website developers; engaging research to those working on the ground
1 June 2017 12:33pm
29 June 2017 7:58pm
Hi Kate try www.ushahidi.com based in Kenya.
I have no affiliation with them I have seen the work they do.
5 July 2017 2:48pm
Hello Baker,
What kind of website you are trying to create? Like do you just want to share research data to those organizations or is it just to share reports (as in complete report based on the data but the actual data are not shared) or is it something else? I think Vizzuality is a good option since they have background working with big data, I am not really sure about other firms that offered data science in their development works since not many firms offer that type of development.
Ting Wai
Leverage Space Technology for Wildlife Protection with the European Space Agency Kick-start Grant
5 July 2017 12:00am
Deploying poaching monitoring with Sapelli app
28 June 2017 2:38pm
Open source mobile mapping with Leaflet
21 June 2017 4:59pm
Naturewatch: Lessons from the field of app development
21 June 2017 12:00am
2017 Write Speak Code Conference for Women in Tech
6 June 2017 8:50pm
From the Field: Eric Becker and designing sensors for wildlife
22 May 2017 12:00am
Wildlife Crime Tech Challenge: Mars Omega LLP Boosts Wildlife Crime Intelligence
11 May 2017 12:00am
Getting SMART in Cambodia
8 May 2017 12:00am
From the Field: Dr Raman Sukumar and Technology Developments Needed to Conserve Elephants
5 April 2017 12:00am
Modeling techniques
29 March 2017 1:20pm
29 March 2017 1:38pm
Hi Priyanka,
From your post, I believe you mean applications for modeling data, right? There are many depending on the area or environmental topic you are working on, such as QGIS, Movebank, Google Fusion Tables, iPlover, etc. What does everyone else in the community have to say about this?
@sivakumar @Hangiw @dave @wai.yee @StephODonnell - What are your thoughts?
29 March 2017 2:42pm
Hi Priyanka,
I'll second what John's posted - it would be helpful to know a little more about what you're looking to do before we can answer your query. What is you project? What sort of data do you have? What are you looking to model?
Steph
29 March 2017 3:11pm
Hi Steph,
Actully, it's my presentation topic in class, Now I don't have a data but have to deliever an information in general. So can I produce depctive data to show how to represent any model.
Priyanka
#Tech4Wildlife Photo Challenge: Our favourites from 2016
1 March 2017 12:00am
Big Ocean Button Challenge
16 February 2017 3:42pm
9 November 2017 6:18pm
Hi Rosemary,
Great idea!
Just thinking outloud here, but is it wise to tell people where to find unsafe souvenirs? Wouldn't this be helping people who want to find ivory, fur, medicinal animal products, etc. more easily find sources? You might want to create a "blacklist" without being overly specific as to the types of procucts they are selling, and give a "seal of approval" for souvenir stores that are not selling illegal wildlife products and use this as a "carrot" to attract consciencious customers to the better stores.
Regards,
Drue