Capture & check
Synchronize time, coordinates, calibration and conditions. Find unusable data while still in the field.
WILDLIFE RESEARCH / FIELD GUIDEEnglish · GUIDED BY SIR AIRFFIC GO
Read the sky.
Understand life.
Drones × multisensor observations × AI.
Move from finding wildlife to understanding it.
Design better surveys for animals and researchers.
Your guide to the living worldSir Airffic Go
Welcome aboard.
Counting is just the beginning. Where do animals live, and how do they use their world? Let’s explore what the view from above can tell us.
03research approaches30countries to explore● A guide grounded in sources
THREE FIELDS
Start with what you want to understand.
Individuals, behaviour and habitat. Connect the ecological question to the right sensor—and its limits.
01RGB ＋ THERMAL
Abundance & density
A detection count is not a population estimate. Combine thermal and visible imagery, then check missed animals and duplicates.
02ZOOM ＋ RADIO
Behaviour & biologging
Observe without moving closer. Connect zoom imagery, transmitter signals and time-aligned behavioural records.
03LiDAR ＋ MULTISPECTRAL
Habitat in three dimensions
Read the places animals inhabit. Connect terrain, vegetation structure and seasonal change to habitat use.
THREE PERSPECTIVES
One survey. Three essential perspectives.
The flight is only part of the job.
Return safely, deliver usable observations and make next year’s comparison possible. Design the whole survey.
Read the field guide ↗- Define the question and sampling design
- Agree on welfare monitoring and stop criteria
- Record battery, data and aircraft handovers
Price the decision, not just the flight.
Include repeat surveys, human verification and storage. Compare total cost at the required level of ecological quality.
Read the field guide ↗- Compare the same ecological deliverables
- Measure human review and repeat-flight rates
- Test the utilization needed to recover fixed costs
Turn a collection into a research asset.
Keep observations, estimates and evidence distinct but connected. Simple to interpret, detailed enough to reproduce.
Read the field guide ↗- Join aircraft, survey plot and sample identifiers
- Version models and validation results
- Protect sensitive species locations with access controls
KNOWLEDGE LIBRARY
Follow a question further.
Methods, field practice and implementation designs. Every guide offers a route back to its evidence.
20 articlesUpdated: 31 October 2026
Sensing
Define the ecological question before the flight
Reducing missed animals, field exposure and cost starts with the survey design, not the aircraft specification.
7 minRead article ↗
SensingCombine RGB and thermal without confusing heat with identity
Heat can reveal candidates; shape and colour can help identify them. Their failure modes remain different.
8 minRead article ↗
SensingFrom image counts to defensible density estimates
A model count needs detection probability, duplicate control, an area denominator and uncertainty.
9 minRead article ↗
SensingLink zoom imagery, radio tracking and biologging
Connect location, visible behaviour and physiology with synchronized records and explicit uncertainty.
8 minRead article ↗
SensingMap habitat structure with LiDAR and multispectral imagery
Habitat is more than green cover: height, gaps, water, forage and refuge shape how animals use space.
8 minRead article ↗
Animal welfareNo visible escape does not mean no stress
Build a species- and context-specific flight protocol instead of claiming a universally safe altitude.
9 minRead article ↗
Flight scienceFlight physics behind usable wildlife measurements
Thrust, ground sampling distance, blur and endurance connect aircraft choices to usable evidence.
8 minRead article ↗
Field operationsDesign the whole field survey cycle
Battery rotation, data integrity and recovery decisions determine throughput alongside flying.
8 minRead article ↗
AI analysisAutomate the pipeline while preserving scientific review
Connect ingestion, detection, review and estimation with reproducible records.
9 minRead article ↗
AI analysisValidate beyond familiar images
Test transfer across sites, seasons, sensors and target sizes instead of relying on one accuracy score.
8 minRead article ↗
AI analysisDetect at the edge, verify with deeper processing
Place computation according to latency, power, connectivity and verification needs.
7 minRead article ↗
EconomicsEvaluate cost per decision-quality result
Compare complete survey costs at an equivalent ecological endpoint and uncertainty level.
8 minRead article ↗
Field operationsCoordinate multiple aircraft as one survey operation
Allocate airspace, energy, communication and wildlife exposure before adding more aircraft.
8 minRead article ↗
Field operationsConnect autonomy and drone ports to repeatable monitoring
Separate automation capabilities from Japan-specific operating categories, permissions and animal welfare.
9 minRead article ↗
Research platformsDesign the relationships of an ecology operating platform
Separate surveys, flights, assets, detections, observations and estimates so tools can change without losing provenance.
9 minRead article ↗
Research platformsProtect wildlife when sharing ecological data
Precise locations can support research and expose vulnerable wildlife. Design access and generalization together.
7 minRead article ↗
History & casesMilestones in drone-enabled ecology
Follow the shift from obtaining aerial images to validating ecological measurements and operational value.
9 minRead article ↗
EconomicsChoose a system through field, investment and platform perspectives
Work back from the research outcome and connect responsibilities across acquisition, analysis, validation and operations.
8 minRead article ↗
History & casesCase study: Bear heart rates reveal an unseen observer effect
Behaviour, physiological response and habituation answer different questions. Read two bear studies without turning them into universal flight rules.
8 minRead article ↗
History & casesCase study: From replica seabirds to koalas in forests
Controlled references and independent field checks answer different questions about counting performance.
9 minRead article ↗
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ANIMAL WELFARE FIRSTUnderstand their world.
Understand their world.
Respect their space.
A lack of visible escape does not establish a lack of stress. Plan from species, breeding context, habitat, aircraft and observed responses.
Read the welfare protocol ↗“What altitude is safe?”
There is no single answer.Species evidence → limited pilot → response monitoring → stop and reassess
There is no single answer.Species evidence → limited pilot → response monitoring → stop and reassess
FROM PIXELS TO ECOLOGY
Plan beyond the image collection.
Connect capture, AI, validation and reporting. Put quality gates in place before claiming full automation.
Detect at the edge
Record candidates without connectivity. Retain raw evidence and timestamps for later omission audits.
Process in the cloud
Align, tile, detect and deduplicate. Track processing versions and failures.
Verify with people
Sample negatives as well as low-confidence detections. Measure omissions and false positives.
Estimate abundance
Return to the sampling design. Account for detection probability and uncertainty.
Support a decision
Deliver comparable maps, time series and coverage, with a path back to the evidence.
This is an implementation design guide. This website does not control aircraft or run image inference.
GLOBAL RESEARCH DESK
Connect knowledge across 30 countries.
What was studied, where and how? Follow original sources, review depth and limitations.
The target is 30 relevant sources per country. Comparable public national readership data is unavailable, so this is not a most-read ranking. Actual coverage and shortfalls are shown. Editorial policy & coverage ↗
837country-associated records
825distinct source URLs
19full-text reviewed records
0verified national rankings
Loading research records…
FIELD WORKBENCH
Make the next survey concrete.
Replace assumptions and check readiness. Your inputs are not sent to a server.
Compare survey costs
An illustrative comparison for equivalent research outputs. Defaults are fictional, not market prices or predicted returns. Amounts are in JPY.
Excludes tax, interest, residual value and grants. The repeat-survey rate scales the entire variable survey cost. Ecological accuracy and animal burden may differ.
Show formulas
Baseline = surveys × (baseline hours × rate + travel). Drone = capex / allocation years + maintenance + surveys × [(flight + review hours) × rate + travel + AI/storage] × (1 + repeat rate). Simple payback = capex / annual cash savings before capex allocation.
Seven checks before the field
A preparation memo for researchers, operators and site managers. This does not replace permissions or animal ethics review.
0 / 7 checks complete
Checks live only on this page. Use export to keep a local copy.
SENSOR GEOMETRY LAB
Connect height, speed and image detail
Explore ground sampling distance and motion blur for an ideal nadir camera above flat ground. Starting values are illustrative, not specifications for a particular aircraft.
This is a geometry model. It does not determine legal or welfare-safe altitude, or whether an animal can be identified. Use the actual focal length, not a 35 mm equivalent.
Assumptions and equations
GSD = H × S / (f × W); footprint width = H × S / f; motion blur (px) = v × t / GSD.
H: height in m; S: sensor width in mm; f: focal length in mm; W: image width in px; v: ground speed in m/s; t: exposure in seconds. Terrain, tilt, distortion, vibration, animal motion and rolling shutter are excluded. Effective thermal resolution and identification performance require separate validation.
Your guide to the living worldSir Airffic Go
What will you explore next?
What we know, what we don’t, and how we can find out. That boundary is where the next good survey begins.