Question

Protected areas aim to safeguard biodiversity, preserve ecosystem services and ensure the persistence of natural heritage [1]. Despite their essential role in conservation, the allocation of resources to cope with an increasing variety of regular activities and unforeseen circumstances remains generally insufficient [2], severely affecting overall effectiveness [3]. Besides, protected areas subjected to international and national agreements must resolve their acquired responsibilities to maintain their legal status [4]. Hence, there is a demand for cost-effective, versatile and practical initiatives to attend a disparity of requirements to guarantee conservation, including a wide range of natural solutions [5], technological advances, and methods or innovative application of existing technologies [6]. In the last decade, drones (also known as unmanned aerial systems, remotely piloted aircraft systems, RPAS, UAS, UAV) have been the subject of a growing interest in both the civilian and scientific sphere, and indeed avowed as a new distinct era of remote sensing [7] for the study of the environment [8]. Drones offer a relatively risk-free and low-cost manner to rapidly and systematically observe natural phenomena at high spatio-temporal resolution [9]. For these reasons, drones have recently become a major trend in wildlife research [10,11] and management [12–14]. The success of drones can be partially explained by their great flexibility to carry different sensors and devices. The scope of application determines the best combination of aerial platform and payload. Although drones come in many different shapes and sizes, widespread small fixed-wing and rotary-wing aircrafts are frequently used for video and still photography. These consumer grade mapping solutions at a fraction of a cost than previous photogrammetric techniques. Medium size drones can be equipped with compact thermal vision cameras, hyperspectral sensors and laser scanning such as LiDAR, with great prospects for wildlife ecology, vegetation studies and forestry applications respectively [15–17]. Even though visible and multispectral band cameras encompass the most obvious sensing devices, drones can indeed incorporate a diversity of instruments to measure many distinct physical quantities such as temperature, humidity or air pollution [18]. Additionally, large aerial platforms can lift heavier payloads and represent an appropriate solution for integrating complex systems with the capacity to remotely assist sampling, hold cargo or deliver assistance.

Considering the ample range of possibilities, it is not surprising that some protected areas are adopting drones for various applications. For example, to assist search and rescue [23]; protect endangered turtles from feral species [24]; monitoring invasive plant species [25]; document illegal logging and mining [26]; wetland management [27]; anti-poaching [28]; and marine litter detection [29]. Recently, a team of scientists discovered a biodiversity hotspot using drones [30], which could be argued as a convenient procedure to adequately expand protected areas as established by the Aichi Target 11 [3]. In addition, we are witnessing a continuous development of sophisticated drones and ingenious methods that target particular conservation actions, such as wildfires firefighting [31]; whale health monitoring [32]; disease vectors control [33]; or seed planting for habitat restoration [34]. The fast pace of technological advances and novel applications probably exceeded previous expectations, but also gives rise to singular circumstances that must be placed in the context of management. Some authors have identified negative aspects of drones use in conservation. Potential wildlife disturbance effects [35] need to be further investigated. The use of drones as tools of coercion could weaken the environmental commitment of communities in protected areas [36], and therefore may prove counterproductive for conservation. On the other hand, the massive amount of data acquired with drones require modern, robust and computationally intensive methods to derive accurate and meaningful information [37], which may represent a technological barrier to the effective use of this technology in protected areas. Likewise, the connection of drone advances with the most important features guiding effective management has not yet been specifically weighted and would be necessary to better align research efforts to conservation priorities. In addition, whether decision makers can take practical advantage of present and oncoming advances in the discipline remains questionable for several reasons. To find early answers to these remarks, we conducted an extensive literature review of drone applications with potential to enhance the effective management of protected areas. This perspective may help identify plausible scenarios where drones can be used in a rational and efficient manner.

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Summary

This airticle is about the application of unmanned aerial systems, remotely piloted aircraft systems known as drones or RPAS, UAS, UAV in the effective management of protected areas of biodiversity. There are various advantages of "Drone system" that make its efficient to conserve protected wildlife including risk-free and low-cost manner to rapidly and systematically observe natural phenomena at high spatio-temporal resolution . But at the same time, some researchers , as lot of computational power is required to derive meaningful information from drones, it is not a good choice to conserve protected areas. Therefore, it is a matter of research to find how effectively we could use drones to maximize it use in the conservation of biological species.