Conservation – Page 44 – Southern Fried Science

Beyond the Ivory Tower: Experts in the Masses

July 15, 2010July 15, 2010 Bluegrass Blue Crab

Conservation

This is a reposting from our old website. I encourage you to take a look at the comments here before writing your own new ones.

Living among a community comprised largely of scientists and fishermen has recently made me wonder where the dividing line between scientist and citizen falls. A recent discussion at Science Online 2010 also raised the question of what is the role of the Ivory Tower in research? Should we consider the scientific community more broadly or is there really something to be said for the role of the ‘expert’ as certified by degrees and a corner office at an academic institution?

Swine Lagoons in NC

July 6, 2010July 5, 2010 Bluegrass Blue Crab 6 Comments

Conservation, Science

Just some food for thought – a picture really says 1000 words here. What you may not be able to see is the conservation areas completely covered up by the dots representing hog lagoons.

Introducing the Summer SharkTakular photo contest!

July 2, 2010July 4, 2010 David Shiffman

Conservation, Science

I am pleased to announce that I will be working with Cindy and Alexa of Oceans 4 Ever during their Summer Sharktakular! The week of July 19th will be dedicated to shark conservation education. As with most things involving Oceans 4 Ever, a major component of the SharkTakular is a contest- specifically a shark conservation photo contest. Here are the rules:

Whale Quotas and Sea Shepherd

June 30, 2010June 30, 2010 Andrew Thaler 37 Comments

Conservation, Popular Culture, Science

We sparked a good debate over the effectiveness of direct action conservation movements over at the post “Is Sea Shepherd really saving whales?” One of the most difficult questions raised was if Sea Shepherd wasn’t there, would the Japanese make their full quota? The data presented in that post was inconclusive, because the quota increase corresponded to the beginning of SSCS’s Southern Ocean campaign, so we have no time period in which the Japanese quota was increased while Sea Shepherd was absent.

Ghosts in the Molecular Machine

June 24, 2010June 24, 2010 Andrew Thaler 5 Comments

Conservation, Science

The extent of migration among populations drives population structure. With enough migration, populations become homogeneous and behave as a single larger population. As migration rates decrease, populations drift apart and become differentiated. By measuring the amount of differentiation, we can determine the extent of migration between them. But what happens when there are unsampled populations also exchanging migrants?

god damn

June 22, 2010June 23, 2010 Andrew Thaler

Conservation

This is what 60 days of oil pouring into the Gulf of Mexico looks like. This is what reckless disregard for safety and the precautionary principle looks like. This is what irresponsible energy policy looks like. This is what the end of Gulf Coast fisheries for the foreseeable future looks like. This is what government … Read More “god damn” »

Expedition Great White: A response from Dr. Michael Domeier

June 14, 2010November 16, 2011 David Shiffman 9 Comments

Conservation, Popular Culture, Science

Last week, I wrote about National Geographic’s Expedition Great White. In that post, I mentioned that the practice of removing great white sharks from the water for research was controversial, and that I would ask the lead scientist in the show about it. Here are answers to my questions from Dr. Michael Domeier and his colleague Nicole Lucas. They also wanted me to point out that their website has an FAQ page about this technique, which can be found here.

Is Sea Shepherd really saving whales?

June 7, 2010December 28, 2010 Andrew Thaler 51 Comments

Conservation, Popular Culture, Science

Sea Shepherd claims that their actions in the Southern Ocean opposing Japanese whaling fleets has effectively reduced the number of whales killed. What always rubbed me the wrong way about these claims is that they always compare their success against the Institute for Cetacean Research (the Japanese organization that oversees ‘scientific whaling’) Quotas. So at some point you have to ask the question, in absolute numbers, has Sea Shepherd really reduced the number of whales killed?

To answer that we need three pieces of information:

When did Sea Shepherd begin it’s campaign against Japanese ‘scientific whaling’?
What are the ICR quotas for that time frame?
What are the absolute catches for that time frame?

Sea Shepherd provides a comprehensive timeline for their whaling campaigns that indicates serious opposition in the Southern Ocean began in December 2002. For the two other questions, we turn to Whale and Dolphin Conservation International, who have produced a truly exceptional interactive graph of the history of whaling since the inception of the International Whaling Convention by the numbers. The relevant figure is reproduced below:

Check out “Expedition Great White” on the National Geographic Channel!

June 4, 2010November 16, 2011 David Shiffman 6 Comments

Conservation, Popular Culture, Science

“How do you study one of the world’s fiercest predators in the wild?” the cover of the “Expedition Great White” DVD screener that National Geographic sent me asked. I was delighted to discover that my sarcastic answer of “very carefully” is exactly what the back cover of the DVD case read! I knew I was going to like this show from that point on, and I was right.

Sea Shepherd and Whale Wars

June 3, 2010February 16, 2011 Andrew Thaler 19 Comments

Conservation, Popular Culture

We have been and continue to be critical of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. Although their goals are admirable their methods are not only ineffective, but in some cases impair the achievement of those goals. With the premier of Whale Wars season 3 tomorrow evening, we’d like to take a moment to highlight the issues we’ve raised concerning the SSCS. Over the last two years we’ve written a number of post summarizing our problems with Sea Shepherd:

Our friends at Deep Sea News and Underwater Thrills have been critical of SSCS, too:

The above links cover many of the issues we have with this organization. The New York Times recently published an excellent breakdown of the Japanese Whaling Industry. Below are our main criticisms of SSCS: