A University of Florida research team has developed a more accurate way to count wildlife using drones — an innovation that helped confirm the world’s largest known nesting site for a threatened turtle species.

By combining aerial imagery with statistical modeling, the researchers documented more than 41,000 Giant South American River Turtles gathered along the Amazon’s Guaporé River. Their findings, published in the Journal of Applied Ecology, offer a new tool for conservationists seeking to monitor vulnerable animal populations with greater precision.

“We describe a novel way to more efficiently monitor animal populations,” said lead study author Ismael Brack, a post-doctoral researcher within the UF Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences’ (UF/IFAS) School of Forest, Fisheries and Geomatics Sciences. “And although the method is used to count turtles, it could also be applied to other species.”

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