The natural world is facing ongoing threats, mostly caused by anthropogenic activities. Despite various conservation efforts, we have not been successful in providing lasting solutions to decline in biodiversity (Persha et al., 2011). Most of the scientific community remains largely disconnected from the conservation needs of local communities, with a significant gap between scientific research and on-the-ground conservation efforts (Milner-Gulland et al., 2010). Conservation without the involvement of community can never be sustainable in long-term especially in the domain of agrobiodiversity conservation. Agrobiodiversity is largely shaped and maintained by human activities and management practices, and they depend on agrobiodiversity for sustainable livelihood. Indigenous People & Local Communities (IP&LC) have a profound understanding of their environment and its ecology. Their local knowledge, and related gender differences, can be seen as key factors in shaping and influencing agrobiodiversity and hence play a crucial role toward community led conservation. This workshop will explore how community-led conservation can be undertaken at the ground level and be a powerful tool for a sustainable future not only for conserving the rich diversity but also in improving the nutrition security and livelihoods of marginalized communities. The workshop will also highlight the C4 Continuum i.e. Conservation, Cultivation, Consumption & Commerce for sustainable utilization of biodiversity through a Pro-Poor, Pro-women and Pro-nature approach.

Objectives:
To introduce students to community-based conservation principles and methods, using real-world examples to guide in designing conservation initiatives
To raise awareness of both existing and emerging challenges in community-based biodiversity conservation, fostering critical thinking and problem-solving

The lived experiences of fishers give them knowledge about a number of different areas of interest to ecology and conservation researchers, including marine biodiversity biology and ecology, habitat ecology, environmental change and impacts, practical applications of solutions to threats, blue economy, and blue crimes. This workshop introduces participants to different knowledge systems, including fishers’ ecological knowledge, working with fishers as knowledge holders, researcher assumptions and biases and the need for reflexivity, research with fishers using different methods, the potential for research fatigue, and recognising fisher’s contribution to research. While the workshop will focus on research involving fishers, as that is where our experience lies, concepts may also be applied to studies with other ecological knowledge holders.

Acoustic interactions profoundly shape the intricate relationship between humans and animals. Sound serves as a crucial bridge connecting different species through a complex web of communication and perception. This workshop explores how the the ways in which humans and animals experience their shared soundscapes, and how these can be pathways to facilitate coexistence.

Modern research in bioacoustics has revealed how anthropogenic noise affects animal behaviour and human-animal interactions across land and sea. This understanding has increased awareness of acoustic ecology and its importance in conservation efforts, highlighting the role of natural soundscapes in the health of people, animals, and the environment.

Bringing an interdisciplinary approach, this workshop also presents case studies from indigenous cultures, which call attention to the ways in which animal vocalisations have shaped many aspects of the life-worlds of communities. Finally, we make a case for deep listening to build a culture of care that crosses species boundaries.

Monitoring of habitat temperature and humidity are important since they help maintain basic functioning, survival, and reproduction in species. While climatic and weather datasets from satellite is available for many regions of the world, they do not represent the microclimatic conditions that many species are sensitive to. In forests, particularly, the temperature and humidity that the air holds can vary in different microhabitats such as understorey vegetation, tree holes or canopy shades. It is thus important to monitor the holistic habitat conditions in order to have an improved understanding of the ecology and behaviour of forest species. The outcomes can have consequences for habitat management and conservation of species.

This workshop will give the participants a hands-on training on collecting, monitoring, and understanding of microclimatic conditions using ibutton hygrochron loggers. The ibutton logger devices are robust, light, and easy to use. The participants will learn how to deploy the loggers around the IISC campus, retrieve them, and then examine the temperature and humidity patterns using OneWireViewer software. We will then proceed with exporting and cleaning the data which can be used for making graphs and future analysis as needed. While the focus of the workshop will be on forest structures and habitats, the learnings from this hands-on workshop can be applied to any habitat of interest.

A hands-on storytelling workshop for students, scientists, and conservationists

In science and conservation, data is essential—but it is stories that move people. This 2-hour workshop explores how to bring your research to life using non-traditional storytelling tools.

Participants will experiment with a range of hands-on activities—sketching, body mapping, photo triptychs, story arcs, natural materials, and audio-visual elements—to transform complex ideas into emotional, memorable narratives. Whether you are communicating about a field site, a species, or a scientific insight, this session will help you shape stories that inspire curiosity, connection, and care.

We will draw from real examples where storytelling sparked action, and explore how narrative frameworks like character, conflict, and emotion can help make scientific communication more engaging. You will practice turning raw data into compelling mini-stories, map your personal conservation journey, and use nature-based objects to imagine stories rooted in place. By the end of the session, you will walk away with practical techniques, a new appreciation for your own voice, and a collection of creative story fragments ready to build on. No artistic background is required—just an open mind and a willingness to explore.

Key Takeaways:
- Learn visual and tactile methods for science storytelling
- Use art-based tools to communicate fieldwork and research
- Build empathy and connection through personal narrative building

Archives hold collections related to natural history and conservation. A major hurdle preventing students from engaging with archives is lack of awareness and specific research skills to navigate archival catalogues.

Archives at NCBS holds collections related to ecology and conservation in the form of fieldnotes, research data, notebooks and journals, photographs, drawings, audio-visual data, letters, media-clippings, as well as oral history recordings. This includes collections from ornithologists like Salim Ali, Ravi Sankaran, Jamal Ara; ecologists such as Madhav Gadgil, Ranjith Daniels, N V Joshi; activists such as Pandurang Hegde and social movements for conservation like WPSS, Narmada Bachao Andolan, ECG etc.

We will showcase possibilities of integrating such records in conservation science and practice. We will introduce exciting archival resources and data related to ecology. Participants can learn how to use archival catalogues, and frame research questions. They will discover ecological research projects centered around archival data, and get an introduction to the field of natural history. We hope to introduce the history of science and archival sciences and showcase how engagement with the archives can help students of ecology to access field data, methodologies, images, reports and publications which can further their research and practice. We’ll also introduce participants to ethics and CARE practices for data related to indigenous and other marginalised groups, traditional knowledge systems and community data. This could help participants frame and align their own data collection and community engagement with best ethical practices. The second part will involve a practical exercise using archival records.

eBird, is now one of the world’s largest citizen science platforms. The spatiotemporal coverage offered by eBird has enabled the quantification of ecological patterns and hypotheses that explain them for entire bird communities and mountain ranges. eBird data has been used in a vast array of ecological applications including ecotype-occupancy, migrational movements, tracking bird population, and highlighting areas important for conservation and more. This workshop introduces participants to the full potential of eBird data for ecological research and conservation planning.

An overview of eBird and the kinds of data it gathers will be given at the start of the session. After that, participants will learn how to use this data to ask insightful ecological questions aboutlong-term trends, seasonality, or species distributions. They will be guided through dataextraction, cleaning, and visualization through a practical walkthrough. Understanding observerand spatial biases that can affect analyses and how to mitigate them with best practices will be emphasized. The workshop will demonstrate how to make valid deductions while recognizinglimitations using case studies from a local context. Additionally, it will concentrate on how to enhance the robustness of eBird data by integrating it with other ecological datasets. This workshop is especially valuable for students and conservation practitioners seeking to work with open-access biodiversity data. By the end, participants will have the conceptual and practical skills to responsibly use eBird data to support their own ecological research or conservation goals.

This is an offline, in-person workshop focused on wildlife content creation and engaging audiences through social media. Participants will learn how to communicate wildlife and conservation topics effectively using various content formats such as photos, short videos, captions, and stories. The workshop will cover the basics of story telling, ethical considerations, and techniques for simplifying complex ecological information for broader audiences.

It will also include discussions on platform-specific strategies (primarily Instagram and YouTube), content planning, audience engagement, and responsible use of social media to raise awareness about biodiversity. Designed for students, educators, and early-career conservationists, the workshop aims to build practical skills for using digital platforms to promote wildlife education and conservation efforts.

A fundamental quest of ecology and conservation is understanding species-habitat relationships and predicting their distributions. In this workshop, we dive into the rapidly growing world of Species Distribution Models (SDMs) and explore how they can be used to overcome common challenges faced by ecologists, especially in data-deficient systems. Over the past two decades, the application of SDMs has been limited to a few elementary methodologies like MaxENT. Recent advances in machine learning techniques have expanded the utility of sparse presence-only datasets by helping account for low sample sizes and their typical biases, leading to an increased understanding of species in their environments worldwide.

This workshop will focus on the theory and philosophy behind building SDMs relevant to your own study systems. We start with an overview of SDMs and their relevance in studying tropical data-deficient species, followed by discussions of guidelines and best practices while building SDMs. We explain the use and implementation of several machine learning algorithms including MaxENT and show how multiple algorithms can be combined to create ensemble predictions.

Through discussions and demonstrations, we show how data quality, quantity, and modelling choices can impact results. We discuss why a universally ‘correct’ set of modelling choices doesn’t exist, and how these choices should be informed by the study system and research objectives. We then discuss making meaningful inferences from the results in the context of these choices.