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.
Developing, testing and validating indicators of wild insect welfare
Grantee: Carl Soulsbury
Institution: University of Lincoln, United Kingdom
Project summary
This project aims to develop and validate practical indicators of welfare in wild insects. Working with three common model species — Dubia cockroaches (Blaptica dubia), two-spotted crickets (Gryllus bimaculatus), and carrion beetles — it will measure a suite of behavioral and physiological stress responses including oxidative stress markers, fat reserves via NMR, and movement patterns tracked using AI-assisted video analysis. These measures will be validated against cognitive bias testing to identify which indicators reliably reflect negative welfare. The most field-accessible measures will be applied to wild carrion beetle populations, testing whether lab-derived welfare indicators hold up under natural conditions.
Grantee: Carl Soulsbury
Institution: University of Lincoln, United Kingdom
Grant amount: $92,148
Grant type: Challenge grants
Focal species: Carrion beetles (Nicrophorus vespilloides) and others
Conservation status: Least concern
Disciplines: Entomology, physiology, animal behavior, cognition
Research location: United Kingdom
Project summary
This project aims to develop and validate practical indicators of welfare in wild insects. Working with three common model species — Dubia cockroaches (Blaptica dubia), two-spotted crickets (Gryllus bimaculatus), and carrion beetles — it will measure a suite of behavioral and physiological stress responses including oxidative stress markers, fat reserves via NMR, and movement patterns tracked using AI-assisted video analysis. These measures will be validated against cognitive bias testing to identify which indicators reliably reflect negative welfare, and the most field-accessible measures will be applied to wild carrion beetle populations, testing whether lab-derived welfare indicators hold up under natural conditions. The goal is a generalizable welfare assessment toolkit that researchers can use across insect taxa in both captive and wild settings.
Why we funded this project
This project provides the first systematic, cross-taxa proof of concept for measuring welfare in wild insects, moving beyond the captive-only focus that has dominated invertebrate welfare research to date. Invertebrates make up the vast majority of animal life on Earth, yet almost nothing is known about their welfare in the wild, so the knowledge generated by this project has the potential to facilitate large-scale impact. Funding this project also deepens our work with an existing grantee.
Find Carl’s other project, studying red foxes and Eurasian hedgehogs, here.
Developing & refining behavioral assays for the measurement of ‘sentient welfare’ in gastropod molluscs
Grantee: Elizabeth Paul
Institution: University of Bristol, United Kingdom
Project summary
Compared to cephalopod mollusks, gastropod mollusks have been neglected in welfare research and public and legislative concern. This project will develop and refine key assays for the behavioral measurement of welfare in two gastropod species: the great pond snail (Lymnaea stagnalis) and the common garden snail (Cornu aspersum). The researchers will study the capacities of snails to experience consequences within two hypothesized domains of affective function: the first relating to a Punishment Avoidance System (associated with an animal’s responses to threats and punishments) and the second to a Reward Acquisition System (associated with an animal’s responses to opportunities and rewards).
Grantee: Elizabeth Paul
Institution: University of Bristol, United Kingdom
Grant amount: $49,476
Grant type: Discovery grants
Focal species: Great pond snail (Lymnaea stagnalis), common garden snail (Cornu aspersum)
Conservation status: Least concern
Disciplines: Sentience, animal behavior, malacology
Research location: United Kingdom
Project summary
The welfare of cephalopod mollusks is a topic of rapidly increasing scientific and public interest. But to date, their close relatives, the gastropod mollusks, have been almost completely neglected in welfare research, as well as in public and legislative concern. This project will develop and refine key assays for the behavioral measurement of welfare in two gastropod species: the great pond snail (Lymnaea stagnalis) and the common garden snail (Cornu aspersum). The researchers will focus on the capacities of snails to experience consequences within two hypothesized domains of affective function — the first relating to a Punishment Avoidance System (PAS; associated with an animal’s responses to threats and punishments) and the second to a Reward Acquisition System (RAS; associated with an animal’s responses to opportunities and rewards).
Why we funded this project
Extensive scientific attention has been paid to the pollutants and other anthropogenic challenges facing gastropod mollusks, but from the point of view of broader environmental damage and effects on vertebrate populations. This project extends that interest to the welfare of gastropod animals themselves. The research team hopes that this project will lead to a larger research program on molluscan welfare.
Assessing anthropogenic fear in a wild decapod crustacean
Grantee: Mark Briffa
Institution: University of Plymouth, United Kingdom
Project summary
This project will investigate whether urban coastal environments alter fear-related behavioral and physiological responses in wild hermit crabs, using two species that differ in their history of exposure to urbanization. Researchers will compare crabs of both species collected from urban and rural shorelines and measure indicators that may be linked to affective state, including startle responses, shell investigation behavior, and resting metabolic rate under field conditions. By repeatedly measuring behavior within individuals, they will also test whether urban disturbance influences behavioral predictability, which may provide additional insight into fear and stress-related processes.
Grantee: Mark Briffa
Institution: University of Plymouth, United Kingdom
Grant amount: $49,656
Grant type: Discovery grants
Focal species: Common European hermit crab (Pagurus bernhardus), St. Pirin’s hermit crab (Clibanarius erythropus)
Conservation status: Not evaluated
Disciplines: Animal behavior, climate science
Research location: United Kingdom
Project summary
This project will investigate whether urban coastal environments alter fear-related behavioral and physiological responses in wild hermit crabs, using two species that differ in their history of exposure to urbanization. Researchers will compare crabs of both species collected from urban and rural shorelines and measure indicators that may be linked to affective state, including startle responses, shell investigation behavior, and resting metabolic rate under field conditions. By repeatedly measuring behavior within individuals, they will also test whether urban disturbance influences behavioral predictability, which may provide additional insight into fear and stress-related processes.
Why we funded this project
This project applies concepts and analytical approaches from animal personality research to the assessment of welfare-related states in free-living animals. It also addresses a priority taxonomic gap in the field: Crustaceans are abundant yet remain largely neglected in wild animal welfare research, despite growing evidence for their behavioral complexity and sentience-related capacities.
Evaluating ice nests: Effects of a welfare intervention on long-lived insect societies and their guests
Grantee: Christina Kwapich
Institution: University of Central Florida, United States
Project summary
When social organisms are translocated, the destruction of multi-generational nests, loss of familiar territory, and disruption of demography could negatively influence the welfare of society members, future generations, and dependent symbionts. This project will translocate Florida harvester ant (Pogonomyrmex badius) colonies by burying replica nests made from ice. The team will measure risk-averse behaviors in ants across generations, as well as the stability of colony foraging routes, demography, and the re-colonization of symbiont populations. By monitoring ants in freshly transplanted and historically transplanted colonies, the project will provide data on the effects of social disruption on ant societies.
Grantee: Christina Kwapich
Institution: University of Central Florida, United States
Grant amount: $10,000
Grant type: Seed grants
Focal species: Florida harvester ant (Pogonomyrmex badius) and others
Conservation status: Not evaluated
Disciplines: Entomology, wildlife management
Research location: United States
Project summary
US laws increasingly require that species of interest be removed from land marked for development and translocated to suitable sites. For social organisms, the destruction of multi-generational nests, loss of familiar territory, and disruption of demography could negatively influence the welfare of surviving society members, future generations, and dependent symbionts. This project will translocate a population of Florida harvester ant (Pogonomyrmex badius) colonies by burying replica nests made from ice. The team will measure risk-averse behaviors in ants across generations, as well as the stability of colony foraging routes, demography, and the re-colonization of symbiont populations. By monitoring ants in freshly transplanted and historically transplanted colonies, the project will provide data on the effects of social disruption on long-lived animal societies made up of short-lived members.
Why we funded this project
The “ice nest” technique represents a welfare intervention that could mitigate some of the negative effects of social disruption associated with research or land development. By publishing on the feasibility of the ice nest technique, social insect well-being may be given serious consideration in future environmental mitigation and research protocols.
Decoding aquatic mollusk welfare: an investigation of potential physiological and cognitive indicators
Grantee: Laura Webb
Institution: Wageningen University, Netherlnads
Project summary
This project aims to explore physiological and cognitive indicators of welfare in two species of aquatic mollusk: highly mobile cuttlefish (dwarf cuttlefish; Ascarosepion bandense) and sessile (blue) mussels (Mytilus edulis). Valid indicators of mollusk welfare can help us better understand their welfare in changing environmental conditions, such as those associated with climate change. The researchers will explore heart rate variability and respiratory variability as possible physiological indicators, and optimism in a judgment bias test as a cognitive indicator of welfare. Following this, successful metrics can in turn be used to explore the impact of environmental changes on these species' welfare.
Grantee: Laura Webb
Institution: Wageningen University, Netherlands
Grant amount: $10,000
Grant type: Seed grants
Focal species: Bobtail squid (Euprymna berryi), dwarf cuttlefish (Ascarosepion bandense), blue mussel (Mytilus edulis)
Conservation status: Not evaluated
Disciplines: Malacology, cognition, physiology
Research location: Netherlands
Project summary
This project aims to explore physiological and cognitive indicators of welfare in two species of aquatic mollusk: highly mobile cuttlefish (dwarf cuttlefish; Ascarosepion bandense) and sessile (blue) mussels (Mytilus edulis). Valid indicators of mollusk welfare can help us better understand their welfare in changing environmental conditions, such as those associated with climate change. The researchers will explore heart rate variability (mussels) and respiratory variability as possible physiological indicators, and optimism in a judgment bias test as a cognitive indicator of welfare (cuttlefish). Following this, successful metrics can in turn be used to explore the impact of environmental changes on these species' welfare.
Why we funded this project
This project is highly innovative and exploratory in nature, focused on neglected species in welfare research, with sentience accepted for cuttlefish in EU law but not yet for mussels. This work will raise attention to the topic of aquatic mollusk welfare and possible assessment methods in these species.
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.
A quest for a non-lethal method to assess spiders’ welfare in the urban environment
Grantee: Alessandra Costanzo
Institution: University of Milan
Project summary
This pilot project aims to develop welfare indicators for the orb-weaver spider Araneus angulatus, a species commonly found in urban settings. Juveniles will be exposed to urban stressors such as non-lethal mosquito-repellent pesticides, elevated temperatures simulating the Urban Heat Island effect, and changes in food availability. Once they reach adulthood, the effects of these stressors on individuals will be assessed using physiological (biomarkers of oxidative stress, detoxification, neurotoxicity, and energy metabolism) and morphological (body size, mass, and fluctuating asymmetry) indicators, and behavioral endpoints (prey capture rates and web structure). By integrating these measures, the project aims to triangulate spider welfare across multiple domains and improve our understanding of how urban stressors affect individual well-being.
Grantee: Alessandra Costanzo
Institution: University of Milan, Italy
Grant amount: $27,000
Grant type: Discovery grants
Focal species: Orb-weaver (Araneidae) and long-jawed orb-weaver spiders (Tetragnathidae)
Conservation status: n/a
Disciplines: Physiology, animal behavior
Research locations: Italy
Project summary
Urban areas are the fastest-growing habitat type worldwide, causing significant loss of other types of habitats and biodiversity declines, while also potentially reducing the welfare of some individual animals through sublethal stress. While urban wildlife research has mainly focused on charismatic species like birds and pollinators, less attention has been given to neglected taxa such as spiders. This pilot project aims to develop welfare indicators for the orb-weaver spider Araneus angulatus, a species commonly found in urban settings. Juveniles will be exposed to urban stressors such as non-lethal mosquito-repellent pesticides, elevated temperatures simulating the Urban Heat Island effect, and changes in food availability. Once they reach adulthood, the effects of these stressors on individuals will be assessed using physiological (biomarkers of oxidative stress, detoxification, neurotoxicity, and energy metabolism) and morphological (body size, mass, and fluctuating asymmetry) indicators, and behavioral endpoints (prey capture rates and web structure). By integrating these measures, the project aims to triangulate spider welfare across multiple domains and improve our understanding of how urban stressors affect individual well-being.
Why we funded this project
This project advances wild animal welfare science by introducing a multi-indicator framework for assessing welfare in an arachnid, a taxonomic group largely neglected in welfare research.
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.
Field tests of bee welfare
Grantee: Vivek Nityanada
Institution: Newcastle University
Project summary
The goal of this project is to develop a cognitive judgment bias test for wild bees and pilot its use in the field. The project will investigate how bee cognitive biases and reward responses vary with factors expected to cause high or low welfare, such as light and vehicular pollution. The researchers will also develop a “lick-o-meter” for assessing welfare based on individual variation in the bees’ consumption of a sugar-water reward, with the expectation that bees in low-welfare environments will display less enthusiasm for consuming the sugar-water.
Grantee: Vivek Nityananda
Institutions: Newcastle University, United Kingdom
Grant amount: $194,317
Grant type: Challenge grant
Focal species: Buff tailed bumblebees (Bombus terrestris)
Conservation status: Least concern
Disciplines: Animal welfare science, entomology, animal behavior
Research location: United Kingdom
Project summary
Studying affective states in animals has been a key component towards assessing their welfare. Most studies that have used this approach have focused on vertebrates. Yet, the rapid decline in insect numbers calls out for novel methods to monitor their welfare and measuring their affective states would be an important approach. A few recent papers have indicated the presence of affective states in insects, especially bees. These papers have used judgement bias tests in laboratory settings. Recent findings using an active choice test in our lab have also shown robust evidence of affective states in bees due to changed expectations of rewards. However, there is no research looking at these states in the wild. To address this gap, this project seeks to develop and validate new tests for bee affective states in the wild and use these to assess the welfare of bees in the field.
This project will assess whether environments predicted to induce poor welfare and negative valence for bees– such as ones with poor nutrition or light pollution- induce changes in predicted markers of poor welfare. We will use performances in judgement bias tests and reduced responses to rewards in the wild as behavioral markers of welfare. We will also measure the role of neuromodulators (dopamine, serotonin) by measuring the differences in their expression, and of genes involved in their synthesis pathways, in the brains of wild bees in different environments. Measuring changes in these three different markers across different low-welfare environments will help validate them as measure of bee welfare and develop novel markers for wild bee welfare. They will thus providing vital tools for further biological and environmental research in a variety of pollinators.
Why we funded this project
We are generally excited to support this project because it focuses on a wild insect. Insects are extremely abundant and their welfare is typically neglected. Validating a cognitive judgment bias test that can be implemented in the field for a wild insect would be a powerful step forward.
Measuring health and frailty in wild insects
Grantee: Jelle Boonekamp
Institutions: University of Glasgow
Project summary
The aim of this project is to develop a non-invasive frailty index that measures the health of individual insects in their natural habitat and can be applied across species. Using traits applicable to many different insect species, it will develop an insect frailty index, validating it against mortality and fitness data in an insect population by testing whether frail individuals have increased mortality risk and reduced fitness. The project will use data from a long-term field study of a natural population of crickets, which recorded adult crickets from their emergence to death using a network of 140 video cameras. Fitness was measured by genotyping and counting the number of surviving genetic descendants in the following year.
Grantee: Jelle Boonekamp
Institutions: University of Glasgow, United Kingdom
Grant amount: $63,536
Grant type: Ad hoc
Focal species: Field cricket (Gryllinae)
Conservation status: Least concern
Disciplines: Physiology, entomology
Research location: United Kingdom
Project summary
From an evolutionary perspective, health and well-being is best expressed in terms of fitness variation, the logic being that animals who are optimally adapted to their local environment should be healthy. Hence, health and fitness are intimately entwined on a conceptual level. Morphological, behavioral, and physiological traits that are predictive of fitness could provide potential biomarkers of health, and such approaches have been developed for many different wild vertebrate species. However, due to their small size and mobility, it has proven exceedingly challenging to follow individual insects longitudinally in the wild, let alone their descendants, to measure individual performance and fitness. Consequently, there is a paucity of literature on wild insect health and well-being.
The aim of this project is to address this knowledge gap by developing a non-invasive frailty index that measures the health of individual insects in their natural habitat and that can be applied across species. Analogizing to frailty indices used in human patients, this project will develop an insect frailty index using relevant traits applicable to many different insect species. In humans, the frailty index is highly predictive of morbidity and remaining life expectancy. Similarly, this project seeks to validate the insect frailty index against mortality and fitness data in an insect population by testing whether “frail” individuals have increased mortality risk and reduced fitness.
This project is made possible by the work that we have done to establish a long-term field study of a natural population of crickets (WildCrickets.org). Using a network of 140 video cameras, all the adults in the population are longitudinally monitored from their emergence in early spring to their natural death in late summer. All their movements, reproductive behaviors, fights, and predation events are recorded, and fitness is measured by genotyping and counting the number of surviving genetic descendants in the next year.
Why we funded this project
Willingness to investigate the welfare of insects is somewhat rare, as are creative ways to assess their welfare. This project both proposed a potentially usable metric, and has access to an unusually useful resource through the WildCrickets.org project. While any particular approach to assessing welfare in insects is unlikely to work, we are hoping to seed enough approaches and strategies that others take up the call, eventually drawing in enough different approaches to produce usable strategies for assessing insect welfare in the wild. Finally, because many of the project resources were already acquired through other sources, we were to fund exclusively the welfare-focused aspects of the project.
