Can AI Save Tigers? with Dr. Jeremy S. Dertien

Defender Radio and The Switch

Tigers are at risk of extinction around the globe. But in India, hard fought conservation has seen the population double since 2006. While this is fantastic news, it does create new challenges to face: such as how to manage poachers, and negative encounters between tigers and animals kept as livestock, and the people who live in the tigers’ range.

Artificial intelligence, matched with innovative trail camera technology may be the answer to not only protecting tigers in India, but other large carnivores around the world.

Published in the October 2023 edition of BioScience, 'Mitigating human-wildlife conflict and monitoring endangered tigers using a real-time camera-based alert system' outlines how the new tech (TrailGuard AI by Nightjar) works, and what implications it may have beyond tigers in India. Lead author of this paper Dr. Jeremy S. Dertien joins Defender Radio to share more about his experience working with AI and tigers, how we can see the solution be used in larger context, and what ethical issues need to be considered.

SHOW NOTES:

Photo of tigress in India by Dr. Jeremy S. Dertien

Dr. Jeremy S. Dertien's website: https://www.conservationdertien.com/

BioScience study: https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/73/10/748/7261057

OneEarth coverage: https://www.oneearth.org/breakthrough-monitoring-technology-to-save-the-worlds-tigers/

TIME magazine calls TrailGuard AI one of the best inventions of 2023: https://time.com/collection/best-inventions-2023/6327141/trailguard-ai/

NGO Resolve and TrailGuard AI: https://www.resolve.ngo/trailguard.htm

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Defender Radio is produced by The Fur-Bearers (www.TheFurBearers.com), a charitable non-partisan organization whose mandate is to advocate on behalf of fur-bearing animals in the wild and in confinement, promote coexistence solutions in communities and protect the habitats of fur-bearing animals across Canada. You can follow The Fur-Bearers on Instagram (www.instagram.com/furbearers), Twitter (www.twitter.com/furbearers) and Facebook (www.facebook.com/FurFree).