Cacophony Project – a winning strategy of failing faster and giving away information
For self-described ‘data geek’ Matthew Hellicar, the strategy of failing faster and giving away intellectual property are shortcuts to finding effective IT-based solutions to New Zealand’s pest-animal problems.
Hellicar, a Christchurch-based IT specialist and volunteer pest trapper, is part of a five-person team offering their brainpower and software programs on an ‘open source’ basis – in other words, anyone can access online their product designs, software, and learnings for free. Called The Cacophony Project, the team of software, electronics and hardware engineers are enabling the development of sophisticated pest-monitoring devices and the collection of real-time data from the bush.
“We’ve got to get fast feedback loops,” says Matthew. “We need real-time data from the environment to tell us what’s happening, to tell us whether the impact we’re having on the environment is positive or negative. We need to know the things that help and we need to know the things that don’t help.”
He says most pest-monitoring data takes a long time to be collected, collated, analysed and shared, which means the information conservationists and pest eradication experts are working with is out of date, sometimes by many years.
By fostering a collaborative rather than a competitive approach to pest eradication technology, and making Cacophony’s insights, ideas and information accessible, the not-for-profit project has enabled conservation stakeholders and product designers to accelerate their mahi.
The Department of Conservation, for example, is supporting the development of thermal imaging cameras and an online data collection platform utilising Cacophony’s input. The camera uses AI to more reliably detect and identify fast moving predators as small as mice and rats, and is designed to send automated reports to personnel monitoring invasive species.
“Normally ‘open source’ refers to software, but we also give away all our ideas, all of our research, all of our designs. Everything gets published,” says Matthew. ‘We want people to grab it and do their own thing.”
Cacophony’s social enterprise partner 2040.co.nz, has been involved in production and implementation of the camera.
Rangers from the Christchurch City Council are also showing interest in Cacophony’s cutting edge intellectual property.
Another embryonic idea that is now a product on the market is a large ‘trawling’ trap that guides pest animals into it. Although the concept might conjure up pastoral images of a sheep dog herding its quarry into a pen, this type of entrapment device relies on technical elements, strategic placement and accurate data about trails frequented by pest animals.
All of which may significantly help DOC achieve goal 4 of its pest eradication strategy, of developing “a breakthrough science solution that would be capable of eradicating at least one small mammal predator from the New Zealand mainland”*. Overall, the government’s Predator Free 2050 plan, introduced in 2016, is to eradicate five of the country’s main predator animals: rats, stoats, ferrets, weasels and possums.
Matthew accepts that continual modification of potential software and solutions is part of Cacophony’s methodology in helping devise ways to outwit these pests.
“The approach to take is to learn fast, solve problems fast,” he says. “We are all going to fail initially to some extent, we just need to understand how we are failing, and we need to get back fast feedback so we can fail a little bit less next time. If we keep failing a little bit less, we’ll get to success. But we’ve got to go through that loop fast.”
For him, and the 5000 other groups and iwi currently working towards a pest-free future, timely data – and failing less – is key.
* Predator Free 2050 biennial progress report, Department of Conservation (June 2023), p.3 (https://www.doc.govt.nz/globalassets/documents/conservation/threats-and-impacts/pf2050/2021-2023-biennial-progress-report.pdf)
(August 2023)
[Photos L to R:
Matthew Hellicar (photo: Megan Blakie), thermal imaging camera & bird monitor (photos courtesy of Cacophony Project website)]
