The camera focuses on a colony of puffins, tracking their movements throughout their four-month breeding season on land, writes Tom Heap.
David Steele has an eye for birds.
He has spent most of his working life as a warden in some of the most active seabird colonies, has lived in seabird colonies for decades, and studies seabirds for work. increase.
But now he has serious competition. It’s an unblinking iris with an optic nerve connected to a supercomputer. A robot birdwatcher.
“One day, I might just be sitting in my office staring at a screen. , helps us understand these seabirds.”
For wildlife lovers, David has a dream job as a reserve manager on the Isle of May. A rock outcrop about a mile long on the outskirts of Edinburgh.
Take a 20-minute speedboat ride across the mouth of the Firth of Forth on a powerboat. On a clear day when we visited, it offers a magical mix of steep and gentle rocks. The rippling white sea of Campion’s pillow rises above the jagged cliffs.
It is home to 46,000 pairs of puffins, many other seabirds, 4 human researchers, and now 2 surveillance cameras powered by artificial intelligence .
This is a project backed by energy company SSE and technology companies Microsoft and Avenade.
Their cameras focus on puffin colonies, tracking their movements throughout their four-month breeding season on land. Watch as they land with their beaks full of fish and rush into their burrows to feed their chicks.
Puffin numbers are slowly recovering here, but are still well below peak. Information is the foundation of protection.
“This will allow us to monitor puffin colonies 24 hours a day. It gives us great data on what’s happening to puffins in the wider world, and what’s happening to puffins at scale.” At scale, what’s happening in the North Sea. ”
Seabirds face multiple threats. Climate change exaggerates rapid changes in water temperature, bird flu that has wiped out some colonies, and commercial fishing, especially for sand eels, a favorite food of puffins.
And a new occupant of the sky that can harm seabirds: wind turbines. A proposed wind farm has been blocked because it could pose a danger to the sea.
Martyn O’Neill, Digital Project Manager at SSE Renewables, said: [a windfarm] It will, so that we can take action to deal with it. ”
Similar AI technology is being used to study seagulls and migrating salmon from drones.
“I think this is very important and has a very big role to play when it comes to conservation and sustainability. Having the opportunity to see and collect means that we can make better decisions in terms of how to protect our biodiversity as a whole,” said Microsoft UK. added Musidra Jorgensen, Chief Sustainability Officer at .
AI’s ability to study vast amounts of data, identify patterns, and learn what those patterns mean on the ground, from calculating carbon emissions to unlocking key areas of rewilding. It is used globally for all applications, from
While some see artificial intelligence as a threat to humanity, artificial intelligence is emerging as a defender of nature.
