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.
Towards welfare-centered prescribed fire
Grantee: Dale Nimmo
Institution: Charles Sturt University, Australia
Project summary
This project will investigate how prescribed burning affects wild animal welfare, and whether welfare state helps determine survival and harm suffered. The team will study bush rats (Rattus fuscipes) in forest blocks scheduled for prescribed burns and in control sites, combining behavioral, body-condition, injury, and non-invasive physiological measures to infer welfare changes. Lightweight telemetry will enable tracking of survival and severe harm, while fire-severity mapping, refuge measurements, and camera traps will help identify the mechanisms involved. The goal is to generate evidence to help burns be planned and implemented in ways that reduce avoidable suffering.
Grantee: Dale Nimmo
Institution: Charles Sturt University, Australia
Grant amount: $98,700
Grant type: Challenge grants
Focal species: Bush rats (Rattus fuscipes) and others
Conservation status: N/A: Multiple focal species
Disciplines: Climate science, physiology, animal behavior, mammalogy
Research location: Australia
Project summary
This project will investigate how prescribed burning affects the welfare of wild animals, and whether an animal’s welfare state before exposure to fire helps determine survival and harm suffered. The research team will study bush rats (Rattus fuscipes) in forest blocks scheduled for prescribed burns and in control sites, sampling individuals before fire, shortly after fire, and during early recovery, combining behavioral, body-condition, injury, and non-invasive physiological measures to infer changes in affective state and welfare. Lightweight telemetry will enable tracking of survival and severe harm through the burn window and post-fire period, while fire-severity mapping, refuge measurements, and camera traps will help identify the mechanisms involved. The goal is to generate practical evidence for welfare-centered prescribed fire: burns planned and implemented in ways that retain refuges, maintain escape options, and reduce avoidable suffering.
Why we funded this project
By combining welfare indicators with telemetry, fire-exposure metrics, refuge measurements, and predator activity, the project helps move wild animal welfare beyond descriptive assessment toward identifying the mechanisms and management choices that could reduce suffering.
Validating acoustic monitoring as a non-invasive welfare indicator in urban coyotes: Linking vocalizations to health status, social dynamics, and environmental quality
Grantee: Caroline Rowley
Institution: Duke University, United States
Project summary
Urban coyotes face welfare challenges including disease, parasites, habitat degradation, reliance on anthropogenic food sources, and stress from human-wildlife conflict. This project is a pilot study aimed at validating passive acoustic monitoring as a welfare assessment tool. Data will be collected via GPS collars fitted with microphones, autonomous recording units, thermal camera traps and biological sampling. Using models and machine learning, the researchers will test whether vocal features correlate with established welfare indicators and whether individual coyotes can be identified from their howls alone. The aim is to develop a scalable, non-invasive framework for monitoring the welfare of free-ranging animals.
Grantee: Caroline Rowley
Institution: Duke University, United States
Grant amount: $49,978
Grant type: Discovery grants
Focal species: Eastern coyote (Canis latrans)
Conservation status: Least concern
Disciplines: Animal behavior, mammalogy
Research location: United States
Project summary
Coyote populations have expanded dramatically across North America, but population-level success does not necessarily equate to good welfare. Urban coyotes in particular face welfare challenges including disease, parasites, habitat degradation, reliance on anthropogenic food sources, and stress from human-wildlife conflict. This project is a pilot study aimed at validating passive acoustic monitoring as a welfare assessment tool. Data will be collected via GPS collars fitted with microphones, autonomous recording units, thermal camera traps and biological sampling. Using models and machine learning, the researchers will test whether vocal features correlate with established welfare indicators and whether individual coyotes can be identified from their howls alone. The goal is to develop a scalable, non-invasive framework for monitoring the welfare of free-ranging animals.
Why we funded this project
By systematically linking acoustic features of coyote vocalizations to established welfare indicators across multiple domains, this study positions passive acoustic monitoring as a scalable, whole-animal welfare assessment tool that is likely transferable to other similar species using vocalizations for communication.
Comparative assessment of capybara (Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris) welfare in protected, semi-anthropized, and anthropized environments in Argentina
Grantee: Débora Silvia Racciatti
Institution: Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina
Project summary
This project will assess how different levels of human disturbance are associated with behavioral, physiological, and health-related welfare indicators in capybara (Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris). Using camera traps, direct observations, non-invasive fecal sampling, and body condition assessments, the team will evaluate a suite of indicators and test not only whether they vary in predicted directions across environments, but how consistently they converge across welfare domains, identifying which measures most reliably discriminate conditions of higher versus lower welfare in free-ranging populations.
Grantee: Débora Silvia Racciatti
Institution: Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina
Grant amount: $45,400
Grant type: Discovery grants
Focal species: Capybara (Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris)
Conservation status: Least concern
Disciplines: Human-wildlife conflict, physiology, animal behavior, mammalogy
Research location: Argentina
Project summary
This project compares capybara (Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris) populations living in protected, semi-anthropized, and highly anthropized environments in Argentina to assess how different levels of human disturbance are associated with behavioral, physiological, and health-related welfare indicators. Using camera traps, direct observations, non-invasive fecal sampling, and body condition assessments, the team will evaluate a suite of indicators and test not only whether they vary in predicted directions across environments, but how consistently they converge across welfare domains, identifying which measures most reliably discriminate conditions of higher versus lower welfare in free-ranging populations. By integrating validated measures into a comparative welfare assessment framework, the project aims to advance the empirical foundations of wild animal welfare science and generate evidence to inform welfare-aware wildlife management and coexistence strategies.
Why we funded this project
This project addresses a critical but underexplored question in wild animal welfare science: how anthropogenic landscape transformations affect not just population-level metrics, but also the welfare of individual wild animals. It provides a methodological proof of concept by evaluating a multi-domain suite of non-invasive behavioral, physiological, and health-related indicators that can be validated under real-world field conditions, explicitly assessing their sensitivity, directionality, and cross-domain convergence across contrasting anthropogenic contexts.
An Evaluation of Effective Disturbance Mitigation Measures for European Badgers (Meles meles) Occupying Setts During Forestry Operations
Grantee: Stephen McAuliffe
Institution: University of Brighton and Forest Research
Project summary
In order to avoid possible disturbance to European badgers, forestry guidance in England states that activities using heavy machinery should be prohibited within 20 meters of active badger setts. This research aims to validate that the approved noise and vibration mitigation buffer distances intended to prevent disturbance from anthropogenic activities are effective. Observations of badger behavior will be made in woodland habitats, and fecal cortisol metabolites will be collected for analysis. If changes in behavior and increases in cortisol levels are not found following exposure to forestry noise and vibration greater than 20 meters away, robust evidence will be provided to validate that badger welfare is not being adversely impacted by legally sanctioned forestry activities.
Grantee: Stephen McAuliffe
Institution: University of Brighton and Forest Research, United Kingdom
Grant amount: $10,137
Grant type: Seed grants
Focal species: European badger (Meles meles)
Conservation status: Least concern
Disciplines: Animal behavior, physiology, mammalogy, human-wildlife conflicet
Research locations: United Kingdom
Project summary
In order to avoid possible disturbance to European badgers (Meles meles), forestry guidance in England states that activities using heavy machinery should be prohibited within 20 meters of active badger setts. However, this commonly adopted mitigation measure has never been scientifically assessed. As a result, it relies on the untested assumption that noise and vibrations do not disturb badgers if a buffer zone of 20 meters is maintained between forestry operations and setts. This research aims to validate that the approved noise and vibration mitigation buffer distances intended to prevent disturbance from anthropogenic activities are effective. Observations of badger behavior will be made in woodland habitats, and fecal cortisol metabolites will be collected for analysis. If changes in behavior and increases in cortisol levels are not found following exposure to forestry noise and vibration greater than 20 meters away, robust evidence will be provided to validate that badger welfare is not being adversely impacted by legally sanctioned forestry activities.
Why we funded this project
This project will help us understand the welfare impacts of anthropogenic disturbance on a common mammal, and could lead to a very near-term intervention to mitigate them if the project results in a recommendation to increase buffer distances. We hope it will set a precedent for testing and improving animal welfare protection methods routinely advised and adopted by many land-based sectors such as forestry, utilities providers, construction and agriculture.
The impact of road noise on the welfare of free-living juvenile white-footed mice
Grantee: Michael Sheriff
Institution: University of Massachusetts Dartmouth
Project summary
This project will examine how road noise impacts the ability of juvenile white-footed mice in Massachusetts to respond to the threat of predation. Preliminary work has shown that experimental manipulation of road noise disrupts the foraging responses of (adult) small mammals to predation risk, possibly by masking their ability to perceive predators’ auditory cues. Perception of predation threat will be experimentally manipulated by auditory playback of owl noises at sites near and far from the highway, paired with controls at the same distances from the highway without auditory playback. Anxiety-related behaviors will be recorded in juveniles in an open field trap, and their feces will be studied to assess physiological stress and nutritional status.
Grantee: Michael Sheriff
Institution: University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, United States
Grant amount: $60,000
Grant type: Challenge grants
Focal species: White-footed mice (Peromyscus leucopus)
Conservation status: Least concern
Disciplines: Human-wildlife conflict, animal behavior, population ecology, mammalogy
Research location: United States
Project summary
This project will examine the impact of road noise on juvenile welfare in white-footed mice in Massachusetts. The project will focus on how road noise impacts the ability of juveniles to respond appropriately to the threat of predation (the most common cause of juvenile small mammal mortality). Preliminary work has shown that experimental manipulation of road noise (played at 62-65dB, which is equivalent to 100m into the forest from a major thoroughfare to Boston, MA) disrupts the normal foraging responses of (adult) small mammals to predation risk, possibly by masking their ability to perceive auditory cues of predators. Perception of predation threat will be experimentally manipulated by auditory playback of owl noises at sites near and far from the highway, paired with controls at the same distances from the highway but without auditory playback. Anxiety-related behaviors will be recorded in juveniles in an open field trap (which they voluntarily enter for feed), and their feces will be studied to assess physiological stress and nutritional status.
Why we funded this project
Road noise has dramatically increased and is potentially a major anthropogenic threat to wild animal welfare, and one which might be easily ameliorated through policy changes (e.g., improved sound barriers). This project is especially interesting because it focuses on a less obvious effect of road noise, potentially increasing the risk of predation by masking predator cues. This becomes even more interesting in the context of growing literature on the “ecology of fear,” sublethal effects of predators on prey behavior. If road noise makes prey unaware of risks, it could actually reduce their chronic stress despite exposing them to greater risk of death. We are excited for this project to explore those issues, although we are prepared for a complex result. Additionally, we wanted to support this PI because of their strong record of engaging students in their research and influencing their career trajectories.
