Fauna identification service

Acoustics

Increasingly, technology is improving the options for fauna survey, but this comes with a need for advanced tools to analyse the vast amounts of data that can be collected. This is especially apparent in the world of eco-acoustics. NSW DPI is using artificial intelligence to develop tools for identifying key forest species from acoustic recordings.

Currently, open-source software AviaNZ (Marsland et al. 2019) is being used for this purpose.

Recognisers for different species are still in the developmental stage. Read the Fauna Call Recogniser Report (PDF, 633.74 KB), the final report prepared for the NSW NRC outlining early progress.

Examples of Dingo, Yellow-bellied Glider and Koala calls can be viewed here (displayed on Kaleidoscope software).

Download koala recogniser

Development of a recogniser for koala bellows has been prioritised to allow analysis of a substantial volume of acoustic recordings made over the last few years. The recogniser provides a balance between maximising true positives and minimising false positives. Click here to download the koala recogniser files (ZIP, 4170.99 KB) which can be run in the AviaNZ software and view the metadata information reporting the test results.

It is important to note that all output from these recognisers must be validated manually as results from true positives will be mixed with false positives. Note that recognisers are continually being improved, so this website should be checked regularly for updates.

Also, like all survey methods, perfect detection is not possible and detection probability ideally should be modelled for different species to identify how much survey effort is required for 90% confidence of detection.

View a video showing the use of AviaNZ, especially in relation to call validation.

Release notes

Koala_CNN_LG_010822 – released September 2022

• Improved recall and precision compared to DPI_Male_Koala_V3_CNN15_10-02-23

DPI_Male_Koala_V3_CNN15_10-02-23 – released June 2022

• Initial release. Please contact author if you would like access to this release

Ultrasonics

DPI Forest Science also has a long history of using automated methods to identify the thousands of bat calls that can be recorded with bat detectors. Software called Anascheme (developed by Matt Gibson) has been used for this purpose, in association with identification keys developed by DPI for different regions of NSW. More details on the identification keys and the software can be found in this publication. DPI can provide a service of using Anascheme to analyse large datasets.

Fauna identification service

DPI researchers have extensive experience in developing recognisers and validating their outputs, and we offer this identification service for larger datasets.

Fees for this service can be obtained by contacting brad.law@dpi.nsw.gov.au.