PRESS RELEASE: World-first tracking of invasive Asian Giant Hornets using Wildlife Drones

The Washington State Department of Agriculture (WSDA) has partnered with Australian tech startup Wildlife Drones to implement the world’s first drone radio-telemetry of invasive Asian Giant Hornets, otherwise known as Murder Hornets.

The Asian Giant Hornet is the world’s largest hornet and nests of this invasive species were first discovered in North America in 2019, with additional nests discovered over the past two years as well. These hornets pose a serious threat to the honeybee industry, as well as billions of dollars of agricultural crops that rely on bee pollination each year.

The hornets are accustomed to collecting materials and carrying them back to their nests, and so they can also carry tiny tags back to their nests, revealing their locations so they can be eradicated. WSDA will capture and tag the invasive insects and release them back into the wild so they can more strategically control these pests before they establish more nests.

“However, once they are released, they move very fast and it’s difficult to keep up with them from on the ground. So this year we will be using Wildlife Drones’ radio-telemetry receiver to help us keep up with all the tagged hornets at the same time, and to be able to identify their nest locations in real-time. This means our team will then be able to quickly and safely locate and treat the nests of this aggressive species on the ground” said Sven-Erik Spichiger, WSDA managing entomologist.

“This is certainly the smallest animal we have been tasked with tracking, but our technology has been designed for this purpose. The hornets tags weigh less than 0.5g and are the same as tags we have previously tracked to find endangered bats. So it’s exciting to also now be able to contribute to hornet eradication efforts as well”, says Dr Debbie Saunders, Founder and CEO of Wildlife Drones.

Using traditional hand-held receivers for tracking invasive species movements is extremely time consuming given it only allows one animal to be tracked at a time, and the animals often move fast across complex landscapes. This includes forests with dense vegetation full of thorns where the hornets have previously been found nesting, making it very difficult to follow the tagged insects to their nests.

Understanding the movements of invasive species is crucial for many strategic control or eradication programs. This includes tracking everything from Asian Giant Hornets in Washington state, to feral pigs in Texas and Mississipi, and Burmese pythons in Florida. The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) also supports WSDA’s hornet work, and has previously used Wildlife Drones to track other invasive species as well.

“Using drone radio-telemetry we were able to detect and locate many tagged animals at the same time, including both native and invasive species. We were also able to focus search efforts on the ground using their real-time mortality signal data, which saved us a lot of time and effort compared to radio-tracking feral pigs by hand” said Justin Fisher USDA Wildlife Services.

With 1000s of traps now being set to catch the Asian Giant Hornets near the previous nest locations, it is now a waiting game to see how many emerge this season, and can be lured into traps and tagged. Then the drones can get to work and help find any remaining nests so that this pest can be efficiently removed from the landscape.

About Wildlife Drones:

Wildlife Drones is an award-winning startup that provides innovative drone sensor technology to support land managers and researchers in the collection of meaningful data on threatened and invasive species and the ecosystems in which they exist, paving the way for more sustainable land management in the face of global change.

About Washington State Department of Agriculture:

Washington State Department of Agriculture’s Pest Program aims to protect the state’s resources by preventing the establishment of high-risk invasive insects, terrestrial snails, plant diseases and noxious weeds. The program’s core functions are detection, identification, inspection, eradication, and outreach.