About WildSignal
The signal between
observation and action.
WildSignal bridges the people who see wildlife and the people who protect it — anonymous reports in, organizational response out. Born as a hackathon project, now the first platform under Vaelkor.
See wildlife
an animal, an injury, a disturbance
Report it
in under two minutes, from anywhere
Turn it into a signal
scored, routed, and acted on
Inspiration
Wildlife reporting is still surprisingly disconnected from the people who actually encounter wildlife. Someone can spot an animal, an injured creature, or a potential threat to wildlife, but there isn't always an easy way to turn that observation into useful conservation data.
For the hackathon, we wanted to build something that could bridge that gap: a platform where anyone could report what they see and contribute to a larger picture of wildlife activity.
That idea became WildSignal.
What it does
WildSignal is a wildlife reporting platform where people can submit wildlife sightings and incidents. A report can contain information about the animal, what happened, where it was observed, and supporting evidence. The goal is to turn individual observations into structured data that can eventually be useful to researchers, conservationists, and wildlife organizations.
See wildlife → report it → turn the observation into a signal for conservation.
How we built it
We built WildSignal as a web platform using Next.js and TypeScript, with a backend designed to store and organize wildlife reports.
We focused on keeping the reporting process simple enough for anyone to use while still collecting structured information that could become useful for analysis later.
Although it started as a hackathon project, we built the foundation with the possibility of continuing development beyond the competition in mind.
Challenges we ran into
The biggest challenge was balancing ease of reporting with data quality. People aren't necessarily wildlife experts. They may not know the exact species, may only have a brief observation, or may provide incomplete information. We had to think about how to collect useful data without making the reporting process complicated.
We also realized that verification is a major part of making wildlife data genuinely useful. A platform like this needs ways to identify inaccurate reports and establish trust in the information being collected.
Accomplishments we're proud of
We're proud that we took the idea from a hackathon concept to a working platform within the time constraints of the event.
We're especially proud of the fact that WildSignal has potential beyond the hackathon. What started as a competition project became the first platform we decided to continue developing under Vaelkor. It gave us a real starting point for building technology around problems that exist outside the digital world.
What we learned
We learned that collecting data is only the beginning. For crowdsourced wildlife data to actually matter, it needs to be structured, reliable, and eventually actionable.
We also learned how important UX is when your platform depends on people voluntarily contributing information.
Most importantly, we learned how quickly a relatively simple hackathon idea can grow into a much larger product once you start asking, “What could this actually become?”
What's next for WildSignal
We're planning to continue WildSignal beyond the hackathon as the first platform under Vaelkor. The next steps include better report verification, species identification assistance, richer analytics, and tools that allow conservation organizations and researchers to make use of the collected data.
Our long-term vision is for WildSignal to become a wildlife intelligence network connecting the people who observe wildlife with the people working to protect it. What started as a hackathon project could become something much bigger.
Where it lives now
A hackathon project became the first platform we decided to continue developing under Vaelkor — a starting point for building technology around problems that exist outside the digital world.
Put signal behind every sighting.
Try the full loop — log a report, watch it get scored, and see the team that can act on the pattern. No setup required.
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