The last talk of Sharks International just concluded. Day 3 focused on genetic and molecular techniques, which have been used to answer all sorts of interesting questions about sharks. I presented my research for the first time, and it was very well received (which is part of the reason why I haven’t posted in a couple of days- I’ve been very busy answering questions and celebrating being done with my talk).
Day four’s talks were kind of a grab bag of everything that didn’t fit neatly into other themes, which led to some diverse and fascinating talks. Someone used small remotely operated vehicles to study shark behavior without the disruption associated with putting SCUBA divers in the water. Someone did a comprehensive media analysis of the last fifty years to track changing attitudes towards sharks. Someone tested whether an artificially created estuary in Southern California can serve the same ecological role for juvenile sharks that the now-industrialized natural estuaries used to. Our last two keynotes were about South Africa’s shark netting program and shark attacks in Australia.
Tonight is the end-of-conference banquet, and tomorrow I head for Sydney, where I’ll spend a day before I start my incredibly long journey home.
This conference has been a great experience, and I was excited to learn that they are trying to hold one every four years from now on.
-WhySharksMatter