The Cacophony Project
PurePods was founded by Grant Ryan, a serial inventor. Half of the founding shareholding profits from PurePods are going to Grant’s not-for-profit The Cacophony Project. This project is focused on helping to make New Zealand predator-free and bring back “The Cacophony” of bird song. The Cacophony Project believes with technology it is absolutely possible to make eradication of predators in New Zealand dramatically more efficient. So far The Cacophony Project team have developed:
- An inexpensive bird monitoring device to automatically tell you if bird numbers are going up or down. It can also identify some individual species with more to come.
- A sophisticated thermal camera that can automatically count the number of predators, typically “sees” 10-20 times more predators than trail cameras and it is less work given artificial intelligence does the counting for you. Standard trail cameras are designed for pigs and deer and miss most fast-moving small predators of interest (rats, stoats, possums, feral cats).
- A series of products and traps for a higher predator catch rate. Traps use artificial intelligence and have a trigger rather than a simple mechanical box. Traps developed catch more predators and fewer birds.
- Tools for understanding animal behaviour to enable better trap and lure product development.
Given the value of making New Zealand pest-free, The Cacophony Project is set up as a totally non-profit open-source project so it can reach the goal as fast as possible. Anyone with software development skills, mechanical engineering or project management can contribute to developing the devices.
The Cacophony team has put a lot of work into building the data and project structures to make sure they are best-of-breed open source.
Please feel free to comment on or contribute to the project. Your input will directly help get rid of pests from New Zealand and bring back a cacophony of bird song.