Blog Archives

Keeping tabs on great white sharks

Australia’s leading expert on great white sharks says new receiving devices installed at north Stockton beach near Newcastle will help to pinpoint the movement of juvenile sharks more accurately.

CSIRO scientist Barry Bruce will give lectures this week at Tea Gardens and Caves Beach on the latest findings of his research team.

Mr Bruce says many of the 30 juvenile sharks tagged since 2007, are returning to Stockton and Hawks Nest beaches.

“We maintain, with the Port Stephens/Great Lakes Marine Park people, a series of acoustic receivers,” he said.

“These receivers can detect the sharks that we’ve tagged in previous years and let us know if they revisit the area and how long they visit for,” he said.

“We certainly did a lot of work on that off Hawks Nest last year.

“We look forward to getti...

Read More

Greenpeace paints trawlers

Greenpeace activists on Monday painted “Stop Subsidies” in large white letters on the side of four fishing trawlers in Spain’s northwestern port of Vigo to denounce overfishing.

The trawlers use nets that are dragged across the seabed to capture their catch, a method that Greenpeace said “destroys everything in its path”.

“Greenpeace wants to help the European Commission to identify excess fishing capacity, which is one of the major problems of our seas,” said the evironmental group’s campaign manager for the defence of oceans, Celia Ojeda.

Spain’s fishing fleet is by far the largest in Europe with a catch amounting to 24.2 percent of the European Union’s total haul.

It will have received more than 1.1 billion euros ($1...

Read More

Marsa Maburak, Egypt

Jumped off back of dive boat and finned S/E to pinnacles. Finned around lovely corals and coral heads with fusion of Anthias. 2 big lionfish; bannerfish and other reef fish. Finned back to main reef and found huge green turtle with 2 remoreas and stonefish on move. Flounder, black sturgeon fish feeding on coral. Lovely topography. Finished dive under boat. Lovely dive!

Read More

A Giant Ocean Simulation

Known as theBlu, the huge collaborative project is the first effort from Wemo, a startup built by a series of Hollywood veterans including Academy Award-winning animator Andy Jones, as well as MIT Media Lab director Joi Ito.

The idea? To let 3D artists design and model many of the creatures of the deep, and to invite everyday users to explore and learn about the digital sea, and to collect–and buy–the artists’ creations. TheBlu launched Tuesday.

Ultimately, Venice, Calif.-based Wemo intends to use its “Maker Media” platform as the basis for a wide variety of environments. But the company decided on the ocean as the launch project.

As a result, thousands of people will soon be spending time following, and searching for, a wide variety of fish species, while those with 3D modeling skills w...

Read More

Most Impressive Coral Reefs

Coral reefs cover less than one per cent of the world

Read More

Less Sharks in GBR

A new study recently published by science journal PLoS ONE has indicated that shark population in Australia’s Great Barrier Reef may be witnessing a sharp decline due to unregulated fishing activities in the area.

Researchers from James Cook University in Queensland said on Wednesday that newly-appreciated evidences have pointed to the likelihood that sharks dwelling in the Reef may be experiencing significant losses in the past years.

Globally, the trend is alarming, according to Professor Sean Connolly as he added that a number of species are presently regarded as endangered.

While Connolly conceded that issuing an accurate estimate on the current numbers and state of shark population around the world could be somewhat challenging, he stressed that new techniques employed in the new rese...

Read More

Toxic Seaweed Poisons Reefs

Read More

Fin Whale Report

The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) confirmed that a further 131 tonnes of Icelandic fin whale has been shipped to Japan and renewed its call for global retailer Yahoo! to immediately prohibit the sale of the endangered species via Yahoo! Japan.

The latest shipment brings the total of fin whale exported to Japan since Iceland resumed commercial whaling to more than 1,500 tonnes, despite the CITES Appendix 1 listing of fin whales clearly prohibiting international trade

In July, the EIA report Renegade Whaling identified Icelandic company Hvalur and its multi-millionaire boss Kristj

Read More

Survey Reveals 148 Species

A total of 148 marine species were logged during a diving survey off the North East coast.

The findings come from a survey of the UK

Read More

Eight Warning Signs for Coral

According to a new study, coral reefs that have lots of coral and appear healthy, may in fact, be heading towards collapse.

Researchers from the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) have identified how overfishing can cause eight big changes that act as a warning of an imminent coral reef collapse.

By using data from coral reef systems across the western Indian Ocean they found that this can cause changes similar to a set of lights

Read More