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Genysys Engine<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\nAn artificial intelligence (AI) tool which has been trained to tell the difference between grey and red squirrels could be “an absolute game changer”, conservationists say.<\/p>\n The system, called Squirrel Agent, has been trained on thousands of images of the animals allowing it to tell them apart with 97% accuracy, its developer says.<\/p>\n It can then be used to automatically control access to squirrel feeders – with only reds being allowed into those containing food, and only greys into those where food has been replaced with contraceptive paste.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a real showcase of what AI can do,\u201d said Emma McClenaghan, co-founder of Genysys Engine, which developed the tool.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s working in real time to do a task that we don\u2019t have enough [human] volunteers to do.\u201d<\/p>\n Squirrel Agent is currently being tested in sites around the UK in conjunction with five wildlife charities. <\/p>\n Genysys Engine hopes it will eventually be used much more widely not just with squirrels but with other species which would benefit from sophisticated digital monitoring.<\/p>\n Ian Glendinning, from Northern Red Squirrels – one of the conservation groups involved in the trial – told the BBC that, for the animals he is trying to protect, help from technology was urgently needed.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are in the bar of the last chance saloon, and the landlord has just called last orders,” he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Grey squirrels are largely responsible for the huge decline in the numbers of red squirrels. <\/p>\n This is partly because there are so many of them, and also because they can carry a virus which they have immunity to but is lethal to red squirrels. They arrived in the UK around 200 years ago.<\/p>\n \u201cRed squirrels are hanging on in Scotland and Ireland, and there are some island populations like Anglesey and the Isle of Wight”, explained Mr Glendinning.<\/p>\n “But mainland England and Wales is in dire straits, and they will become extinct if we are unable to reverse this trend.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Efforts to preserve red squirrels are further complicated by the fact that, despite their name, not all red squirrels are red. <\/p>\n There are other markers including their tails, ears, size and weight which can also distinguish them from grey squirrels \u2013 the vastly dominant population – even if they are the same colour.<\/p>\n The detection process is time-consuming for human observers – but Squirrel Agent uses the power of AI to rapidly analyse all those markers and decide with an extremely high level of accuracy which is which.<\/p>\n It can then automatically decide whether to boost their survival chances by allowing them extra food – or reduce their likelihood of reproducing by steering them towards contraceptives.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Genysys Engine says the next step in the evolution of the tech is to go beyond just distinguishing between the types of squirrel and instead identify individual animals.<\/p>\n This will be done, Emma McClenaghan says, by focusing on their whiskers, which are unique to each animal.<\/p>\n “Whiskers are like a human fingerprints,” she says.<\/p>\n By distinguishing between each creature\u2019s whisker tips, as well as their base and length, she hopes AI will enable wildlife experts to track and monitor individual members of the population.<\/p>\n \u201cOver time this data will build up, allowing scientists and researchers to start tracking family lines,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n There are already other examples of AI’s ability to process huge amounts of data very quickly being useful for conservationists.<\/p>\n For example, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) used the tech to analyse millions of photographs<\/a> of a large area of Australia wiped out by bushfires, in order to find places where animals had survived.<\/p>\n It has also been taken up by hobbyists, with a British man telling BBC News last year how he had devised a tool – dubbed the Furbinator 3000 – to stop foxes and badgers fouling his Surrey garden<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nRed peril<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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Genysys Engine<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\nBy a whisker<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n