sea turtles
Chesapeake Requiem, the Black Friday for Climate Change, whale earwax, killing the GRE, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: November 26, 2018
Foghorn (A Call to Action!)
- Friend of the blog and submarine legend Erika Bergman is leading an expedition to Belize’s Blue Hole! Follow along as she maps this unique ocean feature: Belize Blue Hole 2018. Some dudes are tagging along, too.
Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)
Climate change affects the natural, built, and social systems we rely on individually and through their connections to one another. These interconnected systems are increasingly vulnerable to cascading impacts that are often difficult to predict, threatening essential services within and beyond the Nation’s borders.
- Meanwhile: The Trump Administration’s Attempt to Bury a New Climate Report on Black Friday Totally Backfired.
- Government Climate Report Lays Out How Screwed We Are If We Don’t Act Now.
The Gam (conversations from the ocean-podcasting world)
- Speak Up for the Blue on art and the ocean.
Angry Canadian Crabs and Extinct Australian Sea Stars: Thursday Afternoon Dredging, September 27(8)th 2018
It’s a special Friday morning edition of Thursday Afternoon Dredging because I was traveling!
Cuttings (short and sweet):
- Follow Nova the White Shark, a great white shark tagged in Canada by OCEARCH, on twitter! The day after Nova was tagged, I spent a day with the OCEARCH team- check out this Facebook live interview.
- Canadian crabs with bad attitude threaten coastal ecosystem. By the Associated Press.
- More minnow misconceptions. By Brandon Peoples, for the Fisheries Blog.
- Discovery of vibrant deep-sea life prompts new worries over seabed mining. By Amy Maxmen, for Nature News.
Spoils (long reads and deep dives):
- Eulogy for a seastar, Australia’s first recorded marine extinction. By Tim O’Hara, for Earth Touch News.
- The future of fish farming may be indoors. By Laura Poppick, for Scientific American.
- Strengthening mussels for cleaner rivers. By Madeline Bodin, for the Revelator.
- Food Fight: Why the next big battle may not be fought over treasure or territory—but for fish. By Katie Higgins-Bloom, for Foreign Policy
- How much plastic is too much plastic for sea turtles? By Shreya Dasgupta, for MongaBay
- Off Tanzania, in one of the world’s richest seas, why is the catch getting smaller? By John Vidal, for the Guardian
Rules of the road (news about regulations governing the ocean)
- Washington Rolls Back Safety Rules Inspired by Deepwater Horizon Disaster. By Coral Davenport, for the New York Times
- A summer review of the Trump administration’s national ocean policy. By Amy Trice, for the Ocean Conservancy Blog.
SCALLOPPPPPPPPPPPP WARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR (An update on the brewing BREXIT-related war over scallop fishing rights between the UK and the EU):
Please add your own cuttings and spoils in the comments!
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2 minutes to midnight, 3D printed turtle eggs, awkward fiddlers, Egyptian welders, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: January 29, 2018.
Fog Horn (A Call to Action)
- Good morning. The time is now 2 minutes to mid-night. Doomsday Has Never Been Closer. Good luck.
Despite the fact that we live in extremely dangerous times, the scientists in charge of the clock said there is hope. The clock has been wound backwards before, in the wake of the Cold War or during times when nuclear superpowers expressed interest in not mutually assuring destruction.
The scientists argue that civil society should turn the screws on government to reduce carbon emissions and push for even more ambitious climate action than what the Paris Agreement calls for. That sounds like a more fruitful plan than huddling in a bunker.
Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)
- Some technology is pretty good, though: Cracking down on poaching with 3D-printed fake turtle eggs
Snot Bots for whale health, critical dolphins, lobster considerations, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: January 15, 2018.
Fog Horn (A Call to Action)
- 2018 is almost certainly going to be a record year for FOIA requests. Learn how to do them right and get results thanks to Pro Publica: I’ve Sent Out 1,018 Open Records Requests, and This Is What I’ve Learned.
Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)
- Dr. Michelle LaRue is off to Antarctica and you can follow along through the magic of Twitter. #AccioAntarctica!
- The Cinematic Legacy of Jacques Cousteau: The man, the myth, the legend, and his persistent influence on screen.
- Lake Michigan’s Latest Ice Ball Outbreak Was Incredible. Earther has the best GIF game in town.
Paul May via Storyful.
Jellyfish sleep, shark-sucking bots, mole crab parasites, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: September 25, 2017
Fog Horn (A Call to Action)
- The fight for our Marine National Monuments isn’t over. We now know of the contents of Zincke’s monument review memo, and it is not good. The DOI wants to see commercial fishing return to the Pacific Remote Islands and Rose Atoll Marine National Monuments. Longline fishing in these regions has historically been conducted by foreign fishing fleets which have been documented using slave labor. Many ecologists believe that maintaining these protected zones serve as a refuge that boost populations of many important commercial fish and improve the overall health of the fishery. Any change to monuments created under the Antiquities Act must be approved by congress. You’ve got a lot of reason to call you representatives this week, so why not add “I opposed the reintroduction of ecologically and economically destructive commercial fishing to the Pacific Remote Islands and Rose Atoll Marine National Monument.” to your script?
Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)
- Jellyfish sleep. Mind. Blown.
- Our Pacific Monuments are also extremely important scientific sites. Commercial fishing could jeopardize decades of research efforts in the remote Pacific. Scientists pan proposal to open pristine Pacific islands to fishing.
Palmyra Atoll. Erik Oberg/Island Conservation/Flickr
Cuttlefish camouflage, climate change, ShellBorgs, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: June 19, 2017.
Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)
- This cuttlefish:
- Thanks to Nik Hubbard for bringing it to our attention.
Thursday Afternoon Dredging: February 16th, 2017
Cuttings (short and sweet):
Logo by Ethan Kocak
- Watch cownose rays migrate past Destin, Florida, filmed by a parasailer
- Follow Abby Lawson, a Ph.D. candidate researching alligators, on twitter!
- Debunking myths about ocean garbage patches. From the NOAA restoration blog
- What does BREXIT mean for UK fishing rights? By Daniel Boffey, for the Guardian
Blue Pints Episode 10: Lionfish and Turtle Tales
Swordfish, certifications, and sustainable seafood
Jordan Nikoloyuk is the Sustainable Fisheries Coordinator of the Ecology Action Centre, a membership-based community environmental organization based in Nova Scotia, Canada. The Marine Issues Committee of the EAC was founded in 1995 after the collapse of the Atlantic Canadian groundfish stocks and works towards conserving and protecting marine ecosystems and maintaining sustainable fisheries and vibrant coastal communities.
As part of its sustainable seafood work and through its Friends of Hector campaign – www.friendsofhector.org – the EAC has participated in many Marine Stewardship Council assessments for Atlantic Canadian fisheries and encouraged retailers to support certified fisheries. Jordan has written this guest post to share his recent experiences with a certification that has left the EAC and other conservation organizations wondering whether seafood certification can contribute to sustainable fisheries management in the long term, or if the conflict between keeping an eco-label rigorous on the one hand and expanding its market appeal on the other is just too difficult to manage. What do you think?
The best way to buy seafood responsibly is to read a sustainable seafood guide and ask your retailer the two big questions: where is this from and how was it caught? When getting these answers is tough, many people turn to eco-certifications and labelling. Despite some increasingly controversial certifications, the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) is considered to be the most trusted and reliable label, but how many unsustainable fishery certifications will it take to ruin this credibility?
Last week, after lengthy and widespread opposition, the MSC approved certification of the Atlantic Canadian longline swordfish fishery, which catches 100,000 sharks and 1,400 endangered sea turtles every year. The Ecology Action Centre spent almost two years working to oppose this greenwashing. Now we are left asking: how can we promote sustainable fisheries with organizations the size of the MSC working against us? When a definition of sustainability is so weak that it lets the status quo continue, can this be seen as an effective ‘market-driven solution’?