Richard Hedley
Statistical ecologist at the Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute in Edmonton, Canada, researching bioacoustic monitoring, including acoustic detection of gunshots to track poaching.
2
APPEARANCES
1
PODCASTS
Feb 27, 2026
Richard HedleyGUEST
Trail cameras can only detect hunters in a very limited range immediately in front of the camera.
Richard HedleyGUEST
But what sometimes happens when people are monitoring hunting activity with cameras is that often the hunters don't want to be photographed or don't like to be photographed.
Richard HedleyGUEST
So sometimes the cameras can be destroyed by hunters that don't want to be photographed or can, they can also be stolen because they need to be placed right next to a heavily used trail.
Richard HedleyGUEST
In our study, we had quite a lot of beavers in the area, and they would slap their tail in the water, and that sometimes could sound like a gunshot in the distance.
Richard HedleyGUEST
So the challenge is really to identify gunshots and distinguish them from all these other natural sources of sounds that are happening all at the same time.
Richard HedleyGUEST
We ended up throwing out a lot of the data and only looked at the loudest gunshots in the recording.
Richard HedleyGUEST
Trail cameras can only detect hunters in a very limited range immediately in front of the camera.
Richard HedleyGUEST
But what sometimes happens when people are monitoring hunting activity with cameras is that often the hunters don't want to be photographed or don't like to be photographed.
Richard HedleyGUEST
So sometimes the cameras can be destroyed by hunters that don't want to be photographed or can...
Richard HedleyGUEST
they can also be stolen because they need to be placed right next to a heavily used trail.
Daniela HedwigGUEST
And those are most notably breaking tree branches, sometimes also raindrops falling, even other monkey species, they sound very much like gunshots.
Richard HedleyGUEST
In our study, we had quite a lot of beavers in the area, and they would slap their tail in the water, and that sometimes could sound like a gunshot in the distance.
Richard HedleyGUEST
So the challenge is really to identify gunshots and distinguish them from all these other natural sources of sounds that are happening all at the same time.