Meet our grantees
Wild Animal Initiative funds academic research on high-priority questions in wild animal welfare.
The goal of our grants program is to fund research that deepens scientific knowledge of the welfare of wild animals in order to better understand how to improve the welfare of as many wild animals as possible, regardless of what causes the threats to their well-being.
We showcase our grantees and their projects here and continuously update this page as new projects are added.
Validating welfare indicators in an arachnid and their relationship to leg loss, a common defense strategy
Grantee: Ignacio Escalante
Institution: University of Illinois, Chicago
Project summary
This project will explore the welfare implications of leg loss, or “autotomy” — a common defensive strategy among animals. The project aims to validate welfare indicators within an understudied group of invertebrates, the Opiliones (Arachnida) in southwestern Costa Rica. Field and lab experiments will be used to test three potential behavioral welfare indicators: 1) movement patterns (approach vs. retreat), 2) speed, and 3) exploratory leg-tapping behaviors (count of leg taps) in response to positively and negatively valanced stimuli. These behaviors will be assessed when individuals are alone, in conspecific aggregations, and in barren versus complex housing. All experiments will include individuals with all legs and those with missing legs to assess how leg condition impacts welfare.
Grantee: Ignacio Escalante
Institution: University of Illinois, Chicago, US
Grant amount: $29,946
Grant type: Discovery grants
Focal species: Several species of the arachnid order Opiliones in the genus Prionostemma (family Sclerosomatidae)
Conservation status: Not evaluated
Disciplines: Animal behavior, sentience
Research locations: Costa Rica, United States
Project summary
This project will explore the welfare implications of leg loss, or “autotomy” — a common defensive strategy among animals. The project aims to validate welfare indicators within an understudied group of invertebrates, the Opiliones (Arachnida) in southwestern Costa Rica. Field and lab experiments will be used to test three potential behavioral welfare indicators: 1) movement patterns (approach vs. retreat), 2) speed, and 3) exploratory leg-tapping behaviors (count of leg taps) in response to positively and negatively valanced stimuli. These behaviors will be assessed when individuals are alone, in conspecific aggregations, and in barren versus complex housing. All experiments will include individuals with all legs and those with missing legs to assess how leg condition impacts welfare.
Why we funded this project
If validated, these behaviours will provide a novel set of welfare indicators in an arachnid, a group whose welfare has historically been neglected. The researchers’ previous work also shows that autotomy is very common in this taxon, so this project has the potential to help researchers understand the welfare of a very large number of individuals.
Validation of non-invasive measures for life stage in wild octopuses and AI-Assisted Behavioral Analysis
Grantee: Michaella Andrade
Institution: Federal University of ABC
Project summary
This project aims to develop non-invasive methods to assess the life stage and welfare of wild octopuses. The project will develop an AI approach that learns to recognize complex behaviors, such as body patterns and ventilation rates, in video footage. In addition, the project will develop a methodology to automatically measure the life stage of octopuses in videos and non-invasive in situ measurements of the distance between the octopuses’ eyes and eyeballs. The main goal is to correlate these metrics with different behavioral contexts to determine whether they can be used as reliable indicators of the animal’s affective state. In the long term, the project aims to create an automated tool that accelerates and improves behavioral data analysis.
Grantee: Michaella Andrade
Institution: Federal University of ABC, Brazil
Grant amount: $10,000
Grant type: Seed grants
Focal species: Octopuses (Octopus insularis)
Conservation status: Not evaluated
Disciplines: Animal behavior
Research locations: Brazil
Project summary
This project aims to develop non-invasive methods to assess the life stage and welfare of wild octopuses. The project will develop an innovative AI approach that automatically learns to recognize complex behaviors, such as body patterns and ventilation rates, directly from pre-recorded videos in the field. In addition, the project will develop a methodology to automatically measure the life stage of octopuses in pre-recorded videos based on our database and non-invasive in situ measurements of the distance between the octopuses’ eyes and eyeballs. The main goal is to correlate these metrics with different behavioral contexts to determine whether they can be used as reliable indicators of the animal’s affective state. In the long term, the project aims to create an automated tool that accelerates and improves behavioral data analysis, enabling large-scale studies of the welfare of wild octopuses.
Why we funded this project
This project extends a previous WAI-funded project and uses innovative approaches to analyzing behavioral data for welfare assessment.
A bird’s eye view to the five domains of welfare: a quantitative framework and proof-of-concept evaluation in a cetacean, Orcinus orca
Grantees: Saana Isojunno, Eve Jourdain
Institutions: University of St. Andrews, Norwegian Orca Survey
Project summary
This project will carry out body condition and welfare assessments for inshore-foraging killer whales in the northeast Atlantic. The researchers will use the Five Domains model to categorize likely factors influencing killer whale welfare and quantify some of those factors using aerial photography from drones. They will gather data on foraging time and feeding rates, group composition and surface behavior, body shape as a proxy for body condition and blubber reserves, and reproductive success. The researchers will then develop a proof-of-concept statistical model to infer latent motivational states beneath the observable data. The project will also utilize data from known cases of poor welfare to help define their welfare scale.
Grantees: Saana Isojunno and Eve Jourdain
Institutions: University of St. Andrews, Scotland, and Norwegian Orca Survey, Norway
Grant amount: $28,707
Grant type: Small grants
Focal species: Orca (Orcinus orca)
Conservation status: Data deficient
Disciplines: Animal welfare science, bio/eco-informatics, physiology, animal behavior, marine biology
Research location: United Kingdom, Norway
Project summary
This project will carry out body condition and welfare assessment for inshore-foraging killer whales (Orcinus orca) in the northeast Atlantic as an extension to ongoing research in Scotland and Norway. The researchers will use the Five Domains model to categorize likely factors influencing killer whale welfare, and then quantify some of those factors using aerial photography from drones. Specifically, the researchers intend to gather data on foraging time and feeding rates (nutrition), group composition and surface behavior (behavior), and body shape as a proxy for body condition and blubber reserves (health). Data will also be collected on reproductive success (e.g., calf loss). The researchers will then develop a proof-of-concept statistical model to infer latent motivational states (i.e., “true” welfare as a psychological state) beneath the observable data. The project will also utilize data from known cases of poor welfare (where individual social and nutritional needs are not met) to help define their welfare scale.
Why we funded this project
We funded this project because we see hidden state models as promising statistical tools for representing the relationship between disparate data types and welfare, and would like to see this project provide a proof of the concept. This project will also implement a cost-effective and non-invasive approach method based on photogrammetry to assess cetacean health and behavior. Finally, we wanted to fund this project because it spans multiple universities and a citizen science community, creating significant networking opportunities to promote welfare biology.
