diff --git a/src/poli/core/util/isolation/instancing.py b/src/poli/core/util/isolation/instancing.py
index 3d312816..89015f04 100644
--- a/src/poli/core/util/isolation/instancing.py
+++ b/src/poli/core/util/isolation/instancing.py
@@ -3,6 +3,7 @@
 import configparser
 import importlib
 import logging
+import shutil
 import subprocess
 from pathlib import Path
 
@@ -307,6 +308,16 @@ def instance_function_as_isolated_process(
     quiet: bool = False,
     **kwargs_for_black_box,
 ) -> ExternalFunction:
+    # Check if the user has conda installed
+    if shutil.which("conda") is None:
+        raise RuntimeError(
+            "Conda is not installed. For poli's isolation mechanisms to work, "
+            "we need conda to be installed.\n"
+            "If you are not interested in using conda, you can install all the "
+            "relevant dependencies for black boxes using pip and optional arguments.\n"
+            "Check the documentation of the black box you are interested in for more information."
+        )
+
     # Register the problem if it hasn't been registered.
     register_isolated_function(name=name, quiet=quiet)
 
diff --git a/src/poli/objective_repository/ehrlich/register.py b/src/poli/objective_repository/ehrlich/register.py
index 48cd689d..8f7d9614 100644
--- a/src/poli/objective_repository/ehrlich/register.py
+++ b/src/poli/objective_repository/ehrlich/register.py
@@ -25,6 +25,8 @@
 
 from __future__ import annotations
 
+import warnings
+
 import numpy as np
 
 from poli.core.abstract_black_box import AbstractBlackBox
@@ -106,6 +108,12 @@ def __init__(
         num_workers: int = None,
         evaluation_budget: int = float("inf"),
     ):
+        warnings.warn(
+            "The EhrlichBlackBox class is deprecated and will be removed in a future version. "
+            " Please use EhrlichHoloBlackBox after installing with pip install poli[ehrlich].",
+            DeprecationWarning,
+        )
+
         super().__init__(batch_size, parallelize, num_workers, evaluation_budget)
         self.alphabet = alphabet
         self.sequence_length = sequence_length
@@ -434,6 +442,11 @@ def create(
             Closed-Form Test Functions for Biophysical Sequence Optimization Algorithms.
             arXiv preprint arXiv:2407.00236. https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.00236
         """
+        warnings.warn(
+            "The EhrlichProblemFactory class is deprecated and will be removed in a future version. "
+            " Please use EhrlichHoloProblemFactory after installing with pip install poli[ehrlich].",
+            DeprecationWarning,
+        )
         if seed is not None:
             seed_python_numpy_and_torch(seed)