Southern Fried Science

7 ways to make beaches safer without killing sharks

January 26, 2014January 27, 2014 David Shiffman 12 Comments

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This past weekend, the shark cull officially began in Western Australia as the first shark was killed. The scientific evidence is clear that culls do not lessen people’s risk of shark attacks, and more than 100 scientific experts from around the world have signed an open letter opposing this cull. While the only sure way to reduce the risk of a shark bite by 100% is to stay out of the water, there are many strategies that actually can reduce someone’s risk significantly without harming populations of threatened animals.

1) Aerial patrols. Planes or helicopters flying above the beach can help identify when potentially dangerous sharks are present. The Australian Aerial Patrol has done this for decades. Though the spotting rate is relatively low and the patrols are expensive, new technologies like drones can help reduce the cost of these patrols.

Your help needed: Oppose a weakened shark finning ban in Maryland

January 26, 2014January 26, 2014 David Shiffman 56 Comments

Science

The state of Maryland is proposing new regulations that would, among other things, weaken the state ban on shark finning by allowing fishermen to remove the fins of smoothhound sharks at sea, as long as the ratio of the weight of the fins does not exceed 12% of the ratio of the carcasses. These “fin ratios” are already troubling and ineffective ways to enforce finning bans. Landing sharks with fins naturally attached is considered the best practice for shark fisheries management. A 12% ratio is exceptionally high (3.5-5% are common ratios worldwide) and risks enabling unscrupulous fishermen to remove the fins of not only smoothhound sharks, but other species whose fins could be passed off as such. This makes it harder for managers to track how many sharks of which species are being killed.

In New York, smoothhounds are landed with fins naturally attached. They should be in Maryland, too! Photo credit: Sonja Fordham. — Some fishermen claim that smoothhound sharks can’t be landed with fins naturally attached, but this photo from New York challenges that notion. Photo provided anonymously for this post.

Maryland’s Department of Natural Resources is taking public comments on this policy, which means that you can help!

Please send an e-mail to fisheriespubliccomment@dnr.state.md.us by the end of the day on Monday, January 27th containing the following information:

Abnormal is the New Normal: Shifting Baselines, Polar Vortices, and Climate Change

January 24, 2014January 24, 2014 Andrew Thaler 1 Comment

Science

The Polar Vortex, a mass of cold air usually centered around points within the Arctic Circle, made a visit south for the second time in 2014. The Vortex brings freezing weather, snow, and ice to regions that are unaccustomed to such extreme conditions. It also brings with it a new spate of “so much for global warming” talking-points, fresh on the heals of a recent report revealing that Climate Change Denial is at an all time high.

Unfortunately for the climate change denial industry, Polar Vortices are well-understood atmospheric phenomena. They were documented as early as 1853 as currents of cold air that essentially circle the poles. High-altitude observations in the 1950’s revealed the occurrence of sudden stratospheric warming (SSW) in the Arctic Polar Vortex. These SSW’s can cause a the vortex to weaken or reverse directions, allowing it to drift off axis or split into several smaller vortices. When weakened vortices contact the jet stream, cold arctic air is forced south, resulting in anomalously cold temperatures.

The obvious next question is: Is the weakened polar vortex caused by climate change?

Quick Tips for Graduate Student Life – Eat Good Food

January 24, 2014January 18, 2014 Andrew Thaler

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Over the last few years, I’ve written several posts on surviving graduate school, including dealing with expectations, managing your finances, coping with failure, and some more general advice. During that process, I’ve also come up with some small, helpful tips that just don’t fit into a broader theme. It seems a shame to let those tips disappear, so, for the next week I’ll be posting Andrew’s Quick Tips for Surviving Graduate School.

Tip #5: Eat good food

Don’t eat like a rabbit*. Maintaining a healthy lifestyle in the midst of grad school can be extremely challenging for some people. Your schedule is often unpredictable. Your income is limited. You might have a university dining hall that just seems so convenient. You may think that you simply don’t have the time to prepare a decent meal. It seems so easy to grab a quick burger from the fast food joint down the street, grab a cheesy burrito to go from the dining hall, or pop a frozen pizza into the oven.

Quick Tips for Graduate Student Life – Write a Book Review

January 23, 2014January 19, 2014 Andrew Thaler

Uncategorized

Over the last few years, I’ve written several posts on surviving graduate school, including dealing with expectations, managing your finances, coping with failure, and some more general advice. During that process, I’ve also come up with some small, helpful tips that just don’t fit into a broader theme. It seems a shame to let those … Read More “Quick Tips for Graduate Student Life – Write a Book Review” »

Fisherman catches cosmopolitan planktonic tunicate. You’ll never guess what various news agencies are calling it.

January 22, 2014January 22, 2014 Andrew Thaler 3 Comments

Science

“Translucent fish leaves New Zealand fisherman stunned” ~UK Metro

“Shrimp-like Translucent Sea Creature Found off Northland’s East Coast” ~Science World Report

“Now that’s a jelly fish! Stunned fisherman catches wobbly shrimp-like creature” ~Daily Mail

And another half-dozen variations on translucent, fish, shrimp, and baffled.

This creature, whose image has gone viral in the last few days, is a salp. Salps are pelagic tunicates that drift through the open ocean, sometimes solitary, but often in large aggregations. It both swims and feed by pumping water through its body, filtering out plankton and expelling a jet of water from an organ called the excurrent siphon. In the water they look quite majestic.

Quick Tips for Graduate Student Life – Ask for Free Textbooks

January 22, 2014January 22, 2014 Andrew Thaler 2 Comments

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Tip #3: Ask for free textbooks

This one is so simple it’s often completely overlook. Textbooks are expensive. They get more specialized and more expensive as you advance. If you’re lucky, you have access to an awesome library that will stock whatever you need. Sometimes, you won’t be that lucky.

First systematic threat analysis reveals that 1/4 of sharks, rays, and chimaeras are threatened with extinction

January 21, 2014 David Shiffman

Conservation, Science

It took a team of over 300 scientists nearly two decades, but the first systematic analysis of the conservation status of chondrichthyans (sharks, rays and chimaeras) has been completed. The results, published today (open access) in a paper titled “Extinction risk and conservation of the world’s sharks and rays,” are chilling.

“Our unprecedented analysis shows that sharks and their relatives – which make up one of the earth’s oldest and most ecologically diverse groups of animals — are facing an alarmingly elevated risk of extinction,” said Dr. Nick Dulvy, IUCN SSG Co-Chair and Professor at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia.

As of the writing of this paper, the IUCN Shark Specialist Group recognized 1,041 species of chondrichthyans. However, a new species is described, on average, every two or three weeks! Out of these 1,041 species of chondrichthyans, approximately one in four are considered “Threatened” by IUCN Red List criteria; 113 species are Vulnerable, 43 are Endangered, and 25 species are Critically Endangered. 487 species are considered Data Deficient, but the IUCN Shark Specialist Group estimates that 68 of them are likely to be Threatened as well! Most alarmingly, only 23% of known chondrichthyan species are considered Least Concern, the lowest percentage out of any group of vertebrates on land or sea!

A hierarchy of IUCN Red List categories. Note that "Threatened" includes Vulnerable, Endangered, and Critically Endangered — A hierarchy of IUCN Red List categories. Note that “Threatened” includes Vulnerable, Endangered, and Critically Endangered

One of the two main factors influencing Threatened status is the size of the animal. Larger bodied species are sensitive to overfishing because they typically have a life history with slow growth, late age at maturity, and relatively few offspring. Additionally, living in coastal habitats (in other words, close to humans) makes a species more likely to be Threatened.

Quick Tips for Graduate Student Life – Invest in a Good Navy Blazer

January 21, 2014January 18, 2014 Andrew Thaler 1 Comment

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Tip #2: Invest in a good navy blazer.

We’ve all heard the line: “you can dress however you want, as long as you do good science.” This is a lie. Don’t believe it. You will, during the course of you graduate student career, actually find yourself in situations where you will, most certainly, need to dress a bit more professionally than ripped jeans, keens, and a t-shirt. Scientific conferences, professional workshops, or meeting the people who fund your grants all require at least an attempt a formality. And for that, there is the Navy Blazer*.

Quick Tips for Graduate Student Life – Get a Shop-Vac

January 20, 2014January 18, 2014 Andrew Thaler

Uncategorized

Tip #1: Get a Shop-Vac

Bear with me, here.

There’s a million different kinds of vacuum cleaners on the market, from super-cheap uprights to $1,500 technological behemoths. Unfortunately, graduate students live on a small-stipend, and cheap vacuums are cheap for a reason: they just don’t last. During my graduate school career, I burned through three dirt-cheap models (granted, we had a lot of square footage thanks to the low cost-of-living in rural North Carolina). You could scale up, get one of those nice, $200+ models that should last for years, but there is another option.