scifund challenge | Southern Fried Science

Thanks for your support of my SciFund crowdfunded shark research!

Posted on March 8, 2014 by David Shiffman

scifund

The SciFund Challenge came to a close last night. In total, more than 15 projects, including mine, were fully funded! More than $45,000 was raised for scientific research!

My minimum funding goal for this project was $3,000, an amount which would have allowed me to use stable isotope analysis to study the feeding ecology of shark species in two different habitats in south Florida, processing a total of 300 samples. This represented the minimum I’d need to perform one of my Ph.D. dissertation chapters. With the SciFund challenge now closed, I can report that (after credit card processing fees and Experiment.com’s fee), I will receive almost $8,000, more than twice my minimum goal and enough to process 800 samples from five different locations throughout south Florida!

I want to thank everyone who donated to my project or helped spread the word about it (it was featured by io9 and Smithsonian Magazine, as well as countless Facebook posts and tweets). 117 people donated to my project, and 12 of them will be joining our lab for a day of shark research. Thanks also to the SciFund Challenge and Experiment.com teams!

Want to name a shark and track it with Google Earth? Donate to my SciFund project!

Posted on February 18, 2014 by David Shiffman

Thanks to the 73 people who have donated to my SciFund Challenge shark feeding ecology project so far, helping me to meet and surpass my minimum funding goal! I can still accept additional funds beyond my minimum funding goal, and all funds raised will still be used exclusively for lab processing fees. As before, donations of any amount are appreciated, but larger donations have rewards. One of the rewards for donating to my project is the opportunity to “adopt a shark,” supporting our lab’s ongoing shark satellite tag tracking research.

A satellite tag being attached to a bull shark

Specifically, the reward for a donation at the $3,000 level is that you get to name one of our lab’s GPS satellite tagged sharks, which can be tracked using Google Earth for up to 2 years. You can also give this reward as a gift, letting a shark lover in your life name the shark. Our tagged sharks, which include bull sharks, tiger sharks, and great and scalloped hammerheads have made amazing migrations sometimes exceeding 1,000 miles!

The movements of Bucky Badger the tiger shark, named by a U Wisconsin alumnus.

In addition to the opportunity to name one of our satellite tagged sharks, a donation at the $3,000 level includes all of the other rewards offered by my project, including the opportunity to join us in the field for a day of shark research.

One of our satellite-tagged hammerhead sharks. Photo credit Dr. Evan D’Allessandro

You can learn more about the satellite tagging project here. You can learn about the steps we take to make our non-lethal research methods as stress free as possible to the sharks here. You can read the answers to some frequently asked questions about satellite tagging of sharks here. You can learn more about my project and make a donation here. Thanks for your continued support!

Want to participate in a day of shark field research? Donate to my SciFund project!

Posted on February 12, 2014 by David Shiffman

After one week, my SciFund project is more than 70% funded! Thanks to the 50 people who have donated so far! I’m making lots of progress, but I still need your help to make sure the project gets completely funded. Any donation helps, but larger donations have rewards, including getting to join me for a day of shark research in the field as a citizen scientist!

Our lab, the RJ Dunlap Marine Conservation Program at the University of Miami, has taken thousands of people out into the field with us to participate in our shark research, and with a $400 donation to my SciFund project, you can join us too! Our participants don’t just sit back and watch; you’ll get to help with every aspect of the research, including fishing, measuring, tagging, and taking samples!

A participants helps us to tag a small blacktip shark as the team secures it.

We also have professional photographers on every trip, so you will get amazing photos of your experience. In addition to making a nice souvenir, this is an important tool in helping us to educate the public about sharks. What can be more effective at convincing people that sharks aren’t a threat to humans than seeing you, their friend or family member, safely interacting with one?

A high school student gets to interact with a large blacktip shark

We’ve caught more than a dozen species of sharks, including nurse sharks, blacktips, bulls, tigers, great and scalloped hammerheads, lemons, and one great white. You never know what you’ll, but I’ve never had anyone say that they didn’t love their trip.

A participant helps us pull in a drumline, the fishing gear we use to catch sharks

Two donors so far have contributed at this level so far, but there’s room for more! The trip can also be given as a gift if there’s a shark lover in your life. You can learn about the projects we’re collecting data for here, and you can learn about the steps we take to make our non-lethal research methods as stress free as possible to the sharks here. Please let me know if you have any questions. We’d love to have you join us as a reward for a $400 donation to my project, but any support you can offer to the project is appreciated!

SciFund Challenge: Help support my shark feeding ecology research

Posted on February 3, 2014 by David Shiffman

I am participating in the 4th SciFund Challenge, a crowdfunding event for scientific research! My project, part of my Ph.D. dissertation research, is looking at the feeding ecology of local species of sharks with the goal of generating data that can help managers to conserve and protect these species. I’d appreciate any assistance you can provide in terms of either donating funds to the project or helping to spread the word.

A donation of any size is helpful, but larger donations have rewards associated with them, including the opportunity to join us for a day of shark research, or the opportunity to name one of our satellite tagged sharks and track it on Google Earth.

I’ll post frequent updates here, on twitter, and on my Facebook page. Please let me know if you have any questions about the project!

My project can be found here.

SciFund challenge background: 6 questions you can answer about shark feeding ecology with stable isotope analysis

Posted on January 14, 2014 by David Shiffman

As many of you have heard, I have a project in the 4th SciFund Challenge, a scientific research crowdfunding organization. My project, entitled “You are what you eat: non-lethal feeding ecology to help conserve threatened sharks,” is part of my Ph.D. dissertation research. You’ll be hearing a lot more about it over the new few weeks here, on twitter, and on my Facebook page once the challenge officially starts on February 1st. I’d really appreciate your support of my research!

I’ll be using a research technique called stable isotope analysis to study the diet and food web interactions of shark species in Florida. My project (and the research technique) will be briefly explained on my SciFund site, but I wanted to go into more detail about the type of research questions that stable isotope analysis can answer, as well as why this kind of data is significant.

Feeding ecology is important to the conservation and management of sharks.

An emerging trend in marine conservation is “ecosystem based fisheries management”, which means that managers would consider the diet and food web interactions of species of interest. An effective ecosystem-based fisheries management plan would require, among other things, detailed diet and food web interaction data. We can better conserve and protect threatened marine life such as sharks if we better understand their biology and ecology, including what they eat. Over 100 priority research questions for shark conservation were identified in a 2011 research paper (available open access here), and several of these are related to feeding ecology and ecosystem role.

The traditional method for studying the diet of sharks is called stomach content analysis, which typically involves cutting open the stomach of a shark to examine what is inside. Southern Fried Science writer Chuck used a non-lethal alternative that involved pumping the sharks’ stomachs, but that is far less commonly performed. While direct and effective, this kind of lethal sampling research may not be appropriate for certain threatened species of sharks. Stable isotope analysis, which requires only a small tissue sample, can be performed non-lethally.

Stable isotope analysis background information