Some Land Is Too Dangerous for People to Heal.
It Isn't Too Dangerous for a Drone.
Flying Forests uses drone and other automated planting technology to restore land, mangrove, and seagrass ecosystems that are too degraded, remote, or unsafe for manual restoration alone, including sites scarred by mining and industrial extraction. Founded in 2020 by the inventors of the original tree-planting drone technology, the company has run reforestation deployments in Kenya, Panama, Peru, and the United States, planting roughly 200,000 trees in its first five years, with larger-scale projects now underway in the Bahamas, Brazil, Indonesia, and Peru.
Delivery partners: Flying Forests, the working name of Beta Earth LLC
The Land That Needs Help First Is Often the Land No One Can Safely Reach
When forests disappear, the flooding that follows doesn't stay in the forest. When mangroves and seagrass meadows degrade, the fish and other species that depended on them disappear too. On land scarred by mining, sending people back in to replant by hand isn't always possible. Sometimes it isn't even safe.
This is the restoration gap Flying Forests exists to close.
Tree-planting drones already exist. Flying Forests' own founders invented the technology, first at BioCarbon Engineering (now Dendra Systems) in 2013. But that generation of technology was built for governments and large landholders, and it doesn't scale down. Roughly 80% of private forested landholders don't own enough land for a single day's operation with it, which locks them out of the restoration economy entirely.
The land most in need of restoration is often exactly the land existing solutions were never built to reach.
What Flying Forests Is
Flying Forests is a decentralized, drone-enabled ecosystem restoration company. It replaces manual, large-parcel-only replanting with a smaller, cheaper drone platform and a franchise model that puts local organizations, not outside contractors, in charge of delivery.
Mapping and Data
Hyperspectral satellite imagery, drone imagery, and ground surveys feed AI-assisted planting maps that factor in elevation, water distribution, and soil biology before a single seed ball is loaded.
Seed Ball Engineering
Seed balls combine a clay-like base, plant food, and natural anti-predation materials such as garlic or cayenne pepper with seeds selected alongside local ecologists for the specific site.
Rapid Aerial Deployment
A proprietary launch system fires up to 300 seed balls a minute, accurate to within about half a yard, from drones that carry 500 to 700 seed balls at a time.
Phased Restoration
Where soil biology requires it, ground-cover species go in first to draw out toxins and rebuild the biological foundation. Forest species follow once that foundation is established.
What Makes This Different
Goes where people can't
Drone and automated planting technology reaches land, mangrove, and seagrass ecosystems too degraded, too remote, or too unsafe for manual restoration, including sites scarred by mining and industrial extraction.
Restores what communities have already lost
Deforestation drives flooding that reaches far beyond the forest itself. It also degrades the mangroves and seagrass meadows that once sustained fish stocks and other species that, in turn, supported entire communities.
Locally led, not extracted
Local co-ownership and employment are built into every deployment from the start, paired with local seed collection and place-based seedball manufacturing, not an outside operation that leaves once funding ends.
Operating since December 2023
Madre de Dios, Peru
On land stripped by gold mining along the Madre de Dios River near Puerto Maldonado, Flying Forests began seeding ground-cover species by drone in late 2023, with an expanded phase in December 2024 that covered 25 acres with 20,000 seed balls of the legume Crotalaria in a single flight lasting about 90 minutes. The work was carried out with volunteers from the Peruvian Army and researchers from Wake Forest University's Center for Amazonian Scientific Innovation, which helped fund the operation.
Why it matters: Shows the phased, ground-cover-first approach in practice, applied to land too damaged for people to safely replant by hand.
Completed April 2021
Loyalton Fire Burn Area, Nevada, USA
In the Carson Ranger District of the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest, Flying Forests worked with the Desert Research Institute and the Sugar Pine Foundation to reseed a 25-acre section of the roughly 47,000-acre Loyalton Fire burn scar, dropping 25,000 Jeffrey pine seed balls by drone over two days.
Why it matters: Shows the technology applied to fire-damaged land, delivered alongside a federal land manager rather than as a standalone demonstration.
Company-Wide, 2020-2025
Track Record
Flying Forests ran reforestation demonstrations in Kenya, Panama, and Peru, planting roughly 200,000 trees in total. Larger-scale projects are now underway in the Bahamas, Brazil, Indonesia, and Peru.
Why it matters: Shows the model moving from single-site demonstrations toward multi-country deployment.
Who Delivers It
Dr. Lauren Fletcher
Dr. Lauren Fletcher invented the original tree-planting drone technology and founded BioCarbon Engineering (now Dendra Systems) before co-founding Flying Forests. He holds a PhD in Physics from Oxford, an MS in Environmental Engineering from Stanford, and a BS in Engineering Physics from the University of Nevada, and spent more than 20 years as a NASA engineer and scientist. He is Founding Partner at the Beta Earth Venture Studio, founding faculty of Singularity University, an advisor to the Desert Research Institute in Nevada, and an Unreasonable Fellow and SOCAP Fellow.
Dr. Irina Fedorenko-Aula
Dr Irina Fedorenko-Aula holds a DPhil from the University of Oxford in Geography and the Environment. She has served as Managing Director of the Caux Dialogue on Environment and Security for the Swiss NGO Initiatives of Change and consulted for the World Bank, specialising in nature-based solutions, climate technology, and carbon markets. A co-founder of BioCarbon Engineering, Vlinder Climate, and Flying Forests, she has pioneered the use of technology to restore landscapes at scale. She is a Nasdaq Milestone Maker and Re.Generation Fellow of the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation, specialising in Blue Economy.
How a Partnership Moves Forward
The first step is not a procurement commitment. It is a readiness conversation.
- 1
Site and partner assessment
We start by reviewing the land itself, what damaged it, and whether a local organization is already positioned to lead delivery on the ground.
- 2
Ecological and technical design
Local ecologists help select species and seed-ball composition suited to the site's soil biology, sequenced so ground cover goes in first wherever the land needs it.
- 3
Local training and deployment
Under the franchise model, we hire and train local drone operators, technicians, remote-sensing analysts, and seed-ball manufacturers, so delivery capacity stays local.
- 4
Monitoring and long-term stewardship
Post-planting monitoring is paired with a revenue-sharing arrangement intended to keep local partners incentivized to maintain the forest well beyond the planting itself.
Need to Prove What Restoration Achieves?
Restoration is only as valuable as the evidence behind it.
Verified, ground-level data turns restored land into evidence that holds up to outside scrutiny — whether from a buyer, financier, regulator, or community stakeholder. This is exactly the kind of measurement that TraceForce, another One Thriving Planet delivery partner, provides.
Experience and Recognition
The broader One Thriving Planet network includes recipients of the 2024 Nobel Sustainability Award, the 2023 Innovation in Politics Award (Europe), and the CANEX Prize, Jury Chair (Africa), among other honors. (See all awards.)
For this offering specifically: Flying Forests is built by its co-founders, Dr. Lauren Fletcher (Unreasonable Fellow, SOCAP Fellow) and Dr. Irina Fedorenko-Aula (Nasdaq Milestone Maker, Re.Generation Fellow), who previously founded BioCarbon Engineering, now Dendra Systems, the company that built the first tree-planting drone technology.
Request the Flying Forests Overview
An overview covers what the technology does, how it applies to your land or programme, and what a deployment involves.
Related Initiatives
These initiatives show how the same regenerative principles extend across infrastructure, energy, land, food systems, and nature.
Sovereign AI: From Village to Nation
Compute campuses and community nodes designed so the value AI creates stays where it is built.
Waypoints
Electricity, clean water, connectivity, and compute at the community level.
Ferocious & Fantastical Farms
Regenerative agriculture designed to support food security, livelihoods, climate resilience, and multiple land-based businesses.
TraceForce — Digital MRV
Ground-level measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV) that turns sustainability claims into evidence.
Flying Forests
Drone-enabled reforestation for land too damaged, unsafe, or inaccessible to plant by hand — and for any land that needs restoring faster than hand-planting allows.
Leading From Wholeness™
A 90-day executive leadership experience through The River Journey™, for queens, princesses, and women leaders of Africa and the Diaspora.
Regenerative Africa Library
African-authored articles, essays, poems, and short stories on the climate and biodiversity crisis, open to everyone.
Full Spectrum Capital Partners
Moving approximately US$100 million a year into initiatives aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Full Spectrum Advisors
Helping capital stewards align their own resources with their values, across a coherent strategy.