Protecting Europe's Last Primeval Forest in Białowieża National Park, Poland
Poland
The Problem
Białowieża National Park, the epicenter of biological richness in Polish forests, offers a picturesque landscape that serves as a haven for tens of thousands of organisms leading peaceful lives, undisturbed by human interference.
Since 1979, the park has been a proud feature on the UNESCO World Heritage List as one of the two natural sites in Poland, functioning in tandem with the rest of Białowieża Forest since 2014. It is celebrated as a unique exemplar of ongoing ecological processes and as an area housing representative natural habitats of immense universal value. This includes significant biodiversity typical of natural forests in temperate climate zone.
With over a century of rigorous protection, human activity within a substantial area of Białowieża National Park has been significantly reduced. Consequently, this section of the Białowieża Forest stands as one of the few locations in Europe that still possesses the characteristics of a primeval forest.
Geographic Background:
Białowieża Forest, situated on the Poland-Belarus border, is the last lowland temperate forest in Europe (Karpińska et al., 2023). Covering 142 ha of primeval forest, Białowieża National Park (BNP) hosts hundreds of bird species amid various forest micro-habitats. BNP’s bird diversity is one of the highest of any temperate forest, making it a unique wildlife and conservation hotspot
In 2022, Huawei’s global TECH4ALL program was manifested in Poland’s Białowieża Forest. The initiative, in collaboration with Białowieża National Park and the Rainforest Connection (RFCx) startup, led to the creation of an innovative acoustic monitoring system. This method aids in studying local animal species and protecting biodiversity.
Objectives
The sound material collected through the TECH4ALL initiative will help develop a report analyzing biodiversity in Białowieża National Park. Insights and observations will enhance the protection of rare species in the area. The Białowieża Forest, one of Europe’s last natural forests, is home to thousands of species of animals and plants, including the European bison and the Eurasian lynx. This initiative marks Huawei’s first use of technology for monitoring and protecting wild nature in a Polish national park.
Implementation
We implemented passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) within Białowieża National Park, Poland, from March 27, 2023 to June 9, 2023.
We used arbimon's PM (pattern matching) to automatically identify 21 species: 17 birds, 3 mammals, and 1 amphibian (These species were selected based on two primary criteria: species' ecological traits which help to understand overall biodiversity patterns, availability of good species call templates)
We used a semi-automated approach to significantly reduce the amount of time to correctly identify species.
We developed multi-species occupancy models (MSOM) for 17 of the bird species with validated detections from PM. These models allow us to estimate the occurrance of particular species (specifically designed to address imperfect detection- false negatives- in dynamic environments).
The acoustic monitoring system in the park includes 70 offline AudioMoth Edge and 3 Guardian devices designed by Rainforest Connection. The devices record nature’s sounds, especially the vocalizations of various species. Collected data is transferred to the cloud for analysis using artificial intelligence. This advanced technology facilitates real-time observation of wild animal activities, marking a significant step in the protection of unique natural areas like the Białowieża Forest.
Impact
Each recorder collected data for an average of 37 days, resulting in 1,081,790 one-minute recordings.
Identified 56 species (52 birds, 3 mammals, 1 amphibian), which represents about 36% of the 145 species found in Białowieża.
The mammals we detected included: grey wolf (Canis lupus), roe deer (Capreolus capreolus), and domestic dog (Canis lupus familiaris). Species from the woodpecker (Picidae) and tit (Paridae) families were the most prevalent in this study. Białowieża Forest hosts 9 woodpecker species, all native to Eastern Europe (Tomiałojć & Wesołowski, 2005). We detected 5 of these, including the comparatively rarer Eurasian wryneck (Jynx torquilla, pictured below). This is a migratory species that leaves Europe in late summer, limiting the time in which it can be acoustically detected.
We detected two game bird species, the hazel grouse (Tetrastes bonasia) and common pheasant (Phasianus colchicus), which can be hunted locally. Although the hazel grouse has a wide distribution, ranging from central Europe to Japan, it is considered locally-threatened in many countries due to habitat loss and hunting.
We have developed an Arbimon Insights dashboard to report, display, highlight, and summarize the main results from this project. This webpage allows partners to interact with the data in a non-coding, user-friendly environment, which facilitates educational applications and provides the general public with access to the results of the study along with information on the calls, behavior, and biology of the species detected in the survey recordings
Our results reinforce the broad applicability of passive acoustic monitoring for a variety of species, including apex predators such as the grey wolf. Taken together, our results provide important insights into the presence, distribution and occupancy of wildlife in Białowieża National Park.
