Sanctuary: The Last Stand For Sharks

Q & A panel following the screening. The film was created by the Pew Environment Group in collaboration with the Coral Reef Alliance (CORAL). The Pew Environment Group is the conservation arm of The Pew Charitable Trusts and has established an international coalition of nongovernmental organizations, scientists and other marine experts to identify solutions to the threats faced by sharks. CORAL unites communities to save coral reefs and is helping establish a number of sharks sanctuaries.

Sharks are decreasing in numbers worldwide and there is growing movement to reverse this trend. Sharks have one of the slowest reproductive cycles and scientists fear that it could take hundreds of years for their populations to rebuild. Sharks are slaughtered for their fins which are valued at $300 per pound. Fishermen often cut off their fins and throw them back in water to die a slow death. Many conservation groups are working hard to educate the cultural traditions surrounding shark fin soup and ocean communities are joining together to protect the waters where the sharks live. Sanctuary: The Last Stand for Sharks is doing just that.

Very few shark sanctuaries exist today. A shark sanctuary is a place where sharks can live and reproduce without the threat of fishing. The island nation of Palau established the very first shark sanctuary. The Marshall Islands created the world’s largest shark sanctuary and are imposing the greatest penalties on those that violate the protected areas with fines up to $250,000. CORAL is currently working in Fiji to help the country establish a sanctuary of their own. Please sign the pledge to help create a Fijian shark sanctuary at http://coral.org/fijisharks and to learn more about CORAL. You can learn more about what you can do help the Pew Environment Group by going to http://www.pewenvironment.org/campaigns/global-shark-conservation/id/8589941059.

Alan Olson at his boat shop in Sausalito

History, Innovation and Education: The Life of a Tall Ship

Tall Ships’ value stand the test of time. With a few surviving over a hundred years, these national treasures are perfect examples of sound construction and design. For example, The Star of India was built in the U.K. in 1863 and is still a seaworthy vessel, sailing regularly in San Diego. What ship builders were capable of in the 1800’s is still relevant today. At any given time there are typically one or two modern Tallships being built in the United State. The San Francisco Bay Area will soon be sailing a new Tall Ship of its own through the supporters of  the Educational Tall Ship (ETS) project. The vessel will be a beacon of educational experience for generations to come and it plans to  launch in time for the 34th America’s Cup.

“Building a Ship, Building a  Community”
Alan Olson built his first boat when he was 20 and sailed it down the Mississippi River to the Caribbean. As one of the founders for the non-profit Call of the Sea, he has been teaching sailing and restoring sailboats his whole life. Influenced by Matthew Turner, a founding member of the San Francisco Yacht club and the prominent Pacific boat builder of the 1850’s, Alan plans to use the ETS as an experiential platform for the Bay Area community. Merging history with modern design, the ETS will provide an on the water and shore-based classroom for students of all ages, both during the construction phase and after its completion. The program will focus on marine ecology, sustainability, teamwork, leadership and the vibrant maritime history of the Bay Area. The ETS will be able to accommodate 40 people on overnight voyages and around 80 for day trips. The project is funded through donations and is aiming for an 18 month construction timeline.

One of the many pictured sailboats in Alan's office.

Sustainable Construction
The ETS will be implementing the most sustainable construction practices possible. Wood is the primary building material and will be purchased within a 750 mile radius from Forest Stewardship Certified lumber. Construction will take place either in Sausalito or San Francisco and will rely on the work of community volunteers. Much attention has been focused on ensuring that rest of the construction materials (paints, glues, sails, metals) are eco-friendly. The ETS will power itself by using a state of the art hybrid engine that is capable of harnessing regenerative power through a combination of propulsion, solar panels and wind generators. By embracing the newest hybrid design technology, the ETS will not be reliant on fossil fuels and will have a waste management system that will repurpose, recycle and reduce all waste. The ETS will stand tall when compared to the technologically streamlined catamarans that dominate the America’s Cup. The extensive history of the America’s Cup began with the racing of Tall Ships and it will be a testament to the institution’s decorated past to see the ETS on the Bay during the upcoming event.

BlooSee is thoroughly captivated by this project and will be following its progress closely. As construction begins we will be updating you with the project’s milestones as well as showing you the people behind the ETS. We will also have some posts examining the lives of other modern Tall Ships and discussing the communities that have made them possible.

For more information on the project please go to educationaltallship.org and callofthesea.org.

As the wreck of the Costa Concordia evolved over the weekend many were asking the questions why and how? At BlooSee, we were equally stricken with awe and disbelief as the story unfolded. Being such a significant Ocean event, we were quick to notice that initially, the major news outlets were not providing a suitable answer to the question where, as no detailed maps of the wreck were easily located. It only took a moment to plot the GPS location of the wreck into BlooSee and create an infopoint where updates for the story and its images could exist next to the exact location of the event. BlooSee was able to jump into the conversation and add some perspective by mapping out where the accident occurred.

If you haven’t yet, take a look at the Costa Concordia infopoint (http://bloosee.com/infopoints/italy/tuscany/costa-concordia/) and the surrounding area. Remember that as registered users you can comment, add photos and edit the infopoint. Our thoughts are with the families of those lost and we hope that there is some hope for the people that are still missing. The Ocean will always be a dynamic place for current events and captivating headlines. At BlooSee we are doing our best to create a place where all the different elements of a story, like the Costa Concordia, can exist.

We are approaching the end of the year and we wanted to update you on current and future improvements. Our team is busy at work growing the BlooSee platform and we are thankful to have your contributions. The ocean is our largest ecosytem and the ultimate environment for adventure. We are dependent on the sea for so many reasons. The BlooSee team is thrilled to roll out some new features starting this New Year as our community of ocean lovers continues to grow. Going forward we are happy to answer any of your questions. We want to make sure your BlooSee experience is as enjoyable as possible. Here’s a sneak peak of what you can expect.

• We improved the infopoint creation process by adding a step-by-step wizard. But we’ll continue to update it to make the process even easier.
• The Boat Directory is up and running in beta. The directory will be ready for everyone to use early in the new year. We’ll roll out various boat types (sail yachts, motor yachts, tall ships…) in different stages. We’re sure it will be an exciting new feature to play around with soon. We’ll also have pages for companies, organizations and institutions.
• The America’s Cup is coming to San Francisco in 2013, but other events in the world series are planned in different venues. As preparations begin for the race, we will be bringing you as much information as possible, with a dedicated site for it.
• We’ll improve media management, the weather forecast, and add tools like a new review system or digital dive logs for divers.
• A focused commitment to conservation. We at BlooSee plan to do our part to to protect the Ocean and all of her bounty. In 2012 we will be implementing a number of initiatives that will benefit from your participation. As our community grows stronger, so will our efforts.

We will be keeping you updated on these developments as they happen. You can stay up to date on all new features and just about everything ocean related by following us on Twitter. End 2011 with some Geotags and share some infopoints. Let’s take the ocean further.

Photos courtesy of Lindsay Upson

Close to forty boats, from 18’ to 85’, power and sail, are decorated in similar fashion. They are  adorned with festive lights, giant Santa Claus’, peace signs and even sound systems playing a floating rotation of holiday songs. Grand Marshall James Gabbert, Commodore of the Sausalito Yacht Club leads the procession in his 85’ yacht Defiance. Entry is free and awards are given out in a ceremony at the club the following day. If you are unable to participate on a boat of your own, there are still many ways to enjoy the evening. The parade route covers the length of Richardson Bay, so any spot a long the waterfront will give you a great view. Boat charters are available as well as tours on board Potomac, the 165’ Presidential Motoryacht and Historic Natural Landmark.

This year a few boats were delayed by a negative lowtide. Such was the case with Cavalo. While we waited for the tide to fill in we sipped on some cider and enjoyed the company of friends. Occasionally breaking our conversation to comment on the beautiful boats passing by. We were told the boats become brighter and more impressive every year. Jerry, a boat engineer and Sausalito local of 30 years, told me of the 2008 event, where an industrial water craft was decked out with art installations and fire dancing created by the San Francisco based Flaming Lotus Girls (video). The boat stole the show and received that year’s People’s Choice Award.

The evening concludes with a spectacular firework show delivered from a barge anchored near the waterfront. It’s a perfect way to conclude a festive evening for boat lovers and holiday revelers.

Minoru Saito (77 years and 8 months) thought he was going on a record fast solo the wrong way around the world when he left. But he returned to Japan three years and an earthquake, two tsunamis, a knee operation, giant icebergs, towering waves and five typhoons later to a heroes welcome.

Minoru Saito defied all pensioner stereotypes when he sailed in to Yokohama Saturday after a 1080 day epic sailing journey around the globe.

Saito was a very respected and accomplished sailor already when he left. He had done seven solo journeys around the world, but this was his first time west to east adventure. East to west around the globe is by far the hardest route, as it directly against all prevailing winds and currents. The days beating in to hard headwinds with ice cold spray pounding you and the boat every is hard both physically and mentally. But not for this 77 year old sailor.

Saito now the oldest person to sail around the globe single handed, oldest east to west, and the only one to have done the circumnavigation alone 8 times.

“I’m very, very happy to be back but it was difficult. It was my longest trip. It went on for months and months and years and years, I had so many problems. But it’s great to be back,” he told the Sunday Telegraph, and added;

“I missed a lot of things, mostly cherry blossoms and Japanese food. But I feel very young in both mind and body and I feel I’m in great shape.”

In October 2008 Saito set off from Yokohama on a trip he hoped would take only 287 days on board his steel 56-foot sailing boat, Nicole BMW Shuten-dohji III. But when he came to the notorious Cape Horn a gale punished his boat so hard that he had to be rescued by the Chilean Coast Guard. He spent the winter months on shore in Punta Arenas to repair his boat and he also had to do an emergency hernia operation that delayed him even more.

The Chilean earthquake in 2010 also took its toll on the boat, but he managed to fix the boat yet another time. Forced to stop in Hawaii he was hit by a car, and had to do a knee operation in hospital. Then the tsunami from the Tohoku earthquake hit him, and caused yet another delay.

Read more: http://www.upi.com/Science_News/2011/09/22/Indian-Ocean-study-seeks-climate-clues/UPI-61431316735526/#ixzz1YsoXRKEy

Photo Credit: www.conservationreport.com

Scientists are starting a novel project to investigate whether overfishing alters fish behaviour and changes their pattern of development.

Overexploitation of stocks has already been shown to select for smaller fish.

A team reporting at the meeting of the European Society for Evolutionary Biology in Germany will deliberately remove the largest individuals from populations of lab-bred guppies.

The experiment is designed to uncover what is happening in our oceans.

“There are clear indications that almost all… commercial fish are shrinking,” said marine biologist Carl Lundin, who directs the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s Global Marine and Polar Program.

For mass spawning fish such as cod, there is a great advantage to maintaining older, larger females because they are very efficient at restocking the population.

And if industrial fishing selectively removes the largest individuals, explained Dr Lundin, the industry suffers as populations are reduced to the smallest fish.

However, smaller seafood is unlikely to be the only consequence of industrial fishing; research has also shown that fish in the oceans are reproducing earlier.

Experimental evolution
Now evolutionary biologist Beatriz Diaz Pauli and her colleagues from the University of Norway have begun an experiment that they hope will help uncover what other changes we can expect to see in the oceans’ fishes.

The team established nine populations of guppies, each comprising 500 to 900 individuals. Over the next few years, Ms Diaz plans to remove all the fish that measure over 16mm from three of her tanks.

In the remaining tanks, Ms Diaz will purge fish under 16mm, or take fish independent of their size – regimens that will act as a control for the effects of changing the density of fish in the tanks.

The team will then painstakingly record the changes that they see in the fish’s growth rate, age and size of maturation, reproductive effort, and mating and feeding behaviours.

The team hopes to unpick whether the shifts they see are a result of fish moulding themselves to a new environment – a so-called plastic response – or are a consequence of genetic changes.

Plastic responses are not inherited. For example, an organism might reach a smaller body size if it gets little food as a juvenile, but its young would not inherit this propensity to be small.

Genetic responses, by contrast, are inherited, and even if a future generation is returned to an environment where food is plentiful, it would remain small.

Determining the nature of the changes in the fish will help scientists understand how stocks might recover if overexploitation stopped or breeding grounds were protected.

“If we set aside 20-30% of the habitat where reproduction… of key commercial fish stocks [occurs], we are much more likely to avoid these types of problems,” said Dr Lundin.

He added that carrying out experiments of this type allows researchers to control other factors that could affect the fishes’ survival and concentrate on just the consequences of overexploitation.

Source: bbc.co.uk

Photo Credit: conservationsafaris.com

NEW YORK, Sept. 22, 2011 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ — Bahamas, Colombia, Honduras, Maldives, Marshall Islands, Mexico, Micronesia, and Palau Commit to More Sanctuaries; International Action

Leaders from eight countries launched an initiative today to prevent the extinction of sharks, symbolizing the latest development in the growing movement to safeguard the ocean’s top predator. Members of the coalition committed to a declaration supporting the development of sanctuaries that end commercial shark fishing in their national waters.

This announcement comes just one year after President Johnson Toribiong of Palau and President Porfirio Lobo Sosa of Honduras issued a global challenge to protect dwindling shark species. Several countries, states and territories have answered that call by committing to a range of conservation policies. This year, Honduras, the Bahamas, the Maldives and Tokelau have created sanctuaries for sharks off their shores, and the countries of Micronesia committed to establishing them in their waters.

Commercial fishing of these animals is now prohibited in more than 2.7 million square kilometers (1 million square miles), an area larger than Mexico and Texas combined. Domestically, trade bans on sharks and shark products recently passed in California, Washington and Oregon, and internationally in Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands.

“With each new sanctuary, sharks gain another ally in their fight for survival,” said Matt Rand, director of Global Shark Conservation for the Pew Environment Group, the organization which is spearheading efforts to establish shark sanctuaries where targeted fishing for the species is prohibited.

Sharks are especially vulnerable to overfishing because they mature and reproduce slowly. As top predators, their depletion also has risks for the health of entire ocean ecosystems. Up to 73 million of these animals are killed each year to support the global fin trade, while 30 percent of all sharks are threatened or near threatened with extinction. Some populations, such as the scalloped hammerhead, have declined by up to 98 percent. But many governments are recognizing that sharks are more valuable alive and can be a key economic driver as a tourist attraction.

“The shark sanctuary here supports the health of our ocean environment and economy,” said Honduran President Lobo Sosa. “However, these species migrate beyond our waters, so it is necessary for us to work together to ensure that their populations and marine ecosystems are healthy.”

Sharks are the intended catch of some fisheries. They are also frequently caught unintentionally as bycatch. In certain fishing operations, including open sea longliners that target tuna and swordfish, as much as 25 percent of the take can be shark bycatch.

“When I created Palau’s sanctuary in 2009, I knew our country’s action could not accomplish the task of conserving the ocean’s vast biodiversity alone,” said Palauan President Toribiong. “Our ocean’s health depends on sharks. I am delighted that more countries are pledging to play an active role in ensuring these creatures’ survival, not just in our lifetime but for future generations as well.”

Under the declaration supported by The Bahamas, Colombia, Honduras, the Maldives, the Marshall Islands, Mexico, Micronesia and Palau, up to 6 million additional square kilometers (2.3 million square miles)–greater than three times the land mass of Mexico–could be off-limits to commercial shark fishing and designated as shark sanctuaries. By signing the pledge, signatories commit to:

maintain or develop shark sanctuaries;

work together internationally to ensure healthy shark populations; and

advocate for better science-based precautionary protection for sharks in all international fora.

“We applaud these countries for their leadership in protecting these amazing animals, and Pew will continue to work with governments and key stakeholders to support shark conservation efforts as they implement these new commitments,” said Rand.

The Pew Environment Group is the conservation arm of The Pew Charitable Trusts, a nongovernmental organization that works globally to establish pragmatic, science-based policies that protect our oceans, preserve our wildlands and promote clean energy. Click here to view an interactive map of Pew’s global shark conservation work.

Notes

On July 28, 2011, the following Micronesian countries, states and territories committed to creating a regional sanctuary: Palau, the Marshall Islands, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands and the Federated States of Micronesia, which is composed of Yap, Chuuk, Pohnpei and Kosrae.

Contact: Kymberly Escobar, 202.441.9995, kescobar@pewtrusts.org

SOURCE The Pew Environment Group

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