How to Tell a Leopard from Its Roar: Making A Shazam For Conservationists

Via Nautilus, a report on how to tell a leopard from its roar and the potential to make a Shazam for conservationists: The leopard’s roar is a distinct sound. A repetitive pattern of hoarse and guttural calls, it is often compared to the rough music of a saw being pushed and pulled through a giant

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Digitizing Forests To Prevent Wildfires

Via The Economist, a look at initial steps to digitize our forests by using new technology to sniff out fires long before they spread out of control: The fires went on for three relentless days in the summer of 2021, scorching over 13,000 hectares of western Sardinia. Residents “saw their whole world go up in flames

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The Race to Translate Animal Sounds Into Human Language

Via Wired, a look at how – with big cash prizes at stake and AI supercharging research—interspecies translation is closer than ever. But what, if anything, would animals want to tell us? In 2025 we will see AI and machine learning leveraged to make real progress in understanding animal communication, answering a question that has

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AI: Changing The Way We Study Bird Migration

Via MIT Technology Review, a look at how – after decades of frustration – machine-learning tools are unlocking a treasure trove of acoustic data for ecologists: A small songbird soars above Ithaca, New York, on a September night. He is one of 4 billion birds, a great annual river of feathered migration across North America.

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Environmental Sensing Is Here, Tracking Everything from Forest Fires to Threatened Species

Via Wired, a report on how the internet of things turned every device in your house into a smart something. Now it’s coming for nature—to track forest fires and tree health or to listen out for threatened animals. You are in a lush forest. Sunlight filters through the bright green canopy, casting dappled shadows on the

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Conservationists Turn To AI In Battle To Save Red Squirrels

Via BBC, a look at how conservationists are turning to AI in their battle to save red squirrels: An artificial intelligence (AI) tool which has been trained to tell the difference between grey and red squirrels could be “an absolute game changer”, conservationists say. The system, called Squirrel Agent, has been trained on thousands of

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ABOUT
Networked Nature
New technical innovations such as location-tracking devices, GPS and satellite communications, remote sensors, laser-imaging technologies, light detection and ranging” (LIDAR) sensing, high-resolution satellite imagery, digital mapping, advanced statistical analytical software and even biotechnology and synthetic biology are revolutionizing conservation in two key ways: first, by revealing the state of our world in unprecedented detail; and, second, by making available more data to more people in more places. The mission of this blog is to track these technical innovations that may give conservation the chance – for the first time – to keep up with, and even get ahead of, the planet’s most intractable environmental challenges. It will also examine the unintended consequences and moral hazards that the use of these new tools may cause.Read More