Climate change is exacerbating biodiversity and habitat loss and represents a devastating risk to wildlife – there’s a clear need to reverse species decline in the face of an urgent nature crisis. This starts at home in the UK, where creation and restoration of green spaces that connect wildlife-rich habitats are a vital step towards nature recovery. Camera trap footage is vital to monitor species and habitats, but this data takes thousands of hours to analyse and is at risk of human error.

We will maintain Chester Zoo’s Nature Reserve habitats where known populations of threatened species (Harvest mouse, Nathusius’ Pipistrelle Bat, hedgehog) live. Currently, many of these are monitored and surveyed by camera traps; we are working with Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) to train their AI software to recognise species and create a real-time picture of wildlife in the reserve. This will allow us to hugely increase our impact in protecting wildlife and helping nature thrive.