Wildlife Tracking

Wildlife tracking for research

BST provides an extensive range of VHF radio tags and collars and GPS satellite collars. Radio tags/collars start at 0.55g for finches and bats and go up to 360g for vultures etc and 460g for buffalo. Implantable and fish tags are also available. Radio tags have been fitted to virtually every animal across the world ranging from meerkats to mongoose and echidna to elephants.

Three variants of WildTraX® GPS collars are available: 500g, 650g and 800g. WildTraX® GPS collars have been fitted to a wide range of animals across the world including wild pigs, coyotes, kudu, lions, tigers, sheep and cattle.

VHF radio tags are a low cost tracking solution enabling many animals to be tracked at once. Mapping accuracy is often poor particularly in the process of transcribing an estimated position in the field to a grid co-ordinate. However, by tracking down an animal on a daily basis allows the field biologist to “get up close” to observe the animal and monitor the effect the collars has on the animal’s behaviour.

WildTraX® GPS collars reply on the Global Positioning System to determine their location. GPS works day and night and in most locations across the world and in most weather systems. GPS is highly accurate (>5m) and is repeatable. Data is stored on board the collars for later retrieval either by radio modem in the field over a range of 2km or by deploying DropTraX™ to enable the collar to fall off the animal remotely. GPS collars are generally more expensive than UHF radio tags/collars.