How do you help save endangered caribou? Stop the invading moose!

Populations of the endangered woodland caribou are in decline, and the ABMI’s Caribou Monitoring Unit (CMU) at the University of Alberta is part of collaborative efforts to understand the problem and find sustainable solutions. New research—led by CMU manager Dr. Rob Serrouya, supported by Dr. Stan Boutin of the U of A / ABMI, and [...]

Who is the ABMI? Get to know Jerome Cranston, GIS Analyst

While other children were reading comic books, Jerome Cranston was poring over atlases of the world. As a child he also spent many hours in the air getting a bird’s eye view of Canadian landscapes from the cockpit of his father’s plane. “I really need a picture to understand something,” says Cranston, a GIS1 Analyst [...]

Field tech.

The Secret Life of Fieldwork at the ABMI

Now that it’s finally spring and our world is turning green, many of us are probably thinking about gardens and backyard BBQs and quality time outdoors. Here at the ABMI, we wish we had more time for BBQs, but we’ve got the outdoors part covered as we gear up for another season collecting data on [...]

Mapping Portal

New Data & Analytics Portal Launched!

Albertans have a new resource at their fingertips that provides detailed information on hundreds of Alberta’s plant and animal species. Welcome to the ABMI’s new online Data & Analytics Portal—a one-stop-shop that provides easy access to our extensive biodiversity-related data, reports, and maps. A key part of the Data & Analytics Portal is the ABMI [...]

Putting our best foot forward: A new Human Footprint Inventory for Alberta

The Alberta Human Footprint Mapping Program (AHFMP)—a joint initiative of the ABMI and the Government of Alberta—has recently completed a major update to Alberta’s Human Footprint Inventory. Over the next few months, we’ll be highlighting key elements of this comprehensive new dataset. Human footprint is all around. Not the muddy kind in your front hallway; [...]

The BERA Project: Advancing Ecological Recovery Monitoring in Alberta

What do you get when you put together a room full of experts in remote sensing, environmental science, and the Internet of Things? It sounds like the start of a joke, but the answer is the Boreal Ecosystem Recovery and Assessment (BERA) Project. Hailing from academia, industry, government, and ENGOs including the ABMI, this diverse [...]

Filling the Gaps: Conserving Biodiversity through Alberta’s Protected Lands

We all know that biodiversity, like exercise and broccoli, is good for us. For the most part, governments and land managers recognize this too. For example, the Alberta Government maintains a network of parks and protected areas (PPAs) throughout the province as part of its vision of sustainable resource development. Many Albertans use these spaces [...]

Announcing a new ABMI Science Letter: Effects of industrial sectors on species abundance in Alberta

Periodically, the ABMI releases an ABMI Science Letter to share the methodology and results of our latest scientific endeavours. Today, we’re excited to release our fifth Science Letter: Effects of Industrial Sectors on Species Abundance in Alberta. Read on to find out more! We at the ABMI spend a lot of time thinking about biodiversity. You’ve heard [...]