Welcome to the Fry Off!
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Is North Atlantic Right Whale conservation a worthwhile cause, or is the population already too far gone? Join the debate.
Is the Gulf of Maine lobster fishery having an adverse effect on whale prey abundance? bluegrass blue crab weighs in here.
The Southern Fried Scientist is searching for the best marine invertebrate blog posts on the web. Send in your favorites.
Jellies at the Monterrey Bay Aquarium
Once again, the time has come to compile the best marine invertebrate blog posts from around the interwebs. Have you written something awesome about inverts? Have you read something awesome you wish everyone would read? Are you still wondering just what the hell a cheatognath is?
The North Atlantic Right Whale (Eubalaena glacialis) is a cool animal. Although they can be 50 feet long, they eat only microscopic plankton. They have an enormous head (up to 1/4 of the size of the body) with bowed lower lips. The head also has bizarre patches of rough skin called “callosities”.
Image from animalinfo.org
They are also one of the world’s most endangered animals- by most estimates, there are less than 300 remaining. The original reason for their decline was the whaling industry- Right Whales are slow, dumb, and float when dead, making them easy targets for whalers.
If any of our readers live near Yale, come on down to the KBT lecture hall next Friday at 4:00 p.m. Yale’s student chapter of Scientists for America will be hosting me. A question and answer session will follow my 45 minute talk.
I hope to see you there! It’s always nice to meet our readers in person.
~WhySharksMatter
A flier for my event
Check out this Oceana/WILDAID ad:
The scenario is familiar to us all – Some sort of disease begins in a small town or large city, it spreads rapidly, infecting everyone in its wake, the infected become mindless, murderous creatures, hellbent on consuming or converting everyone they encounter, the walking dead. Finally, through some heroic effort, the survivors either turn back the tide or find a stronghold from which the human race can be rebuilt. It is the Zombie Apocalypse. read more…
A few days ago, I had the good fortune of talking with famed ecologist Robert Paine about the policy implications of species interactions. Some of these interactions are fairly common sense, such as preservation of a predator causing depletion of prey stock. Others, however, I had never previously thought of as predator-prey. For instance, the quantity of bait fish consumed by the lobster industry: 4 lbs of bait for each pound of lobster caught. Furthermore, he pointed out, these bait, if not caught and placed in pots, would provide a substantial food stock for whales in the area. Right whales, to be exact. So does that mean we are lobstering out the whales?
Open thread on South Park Whale Wars episode, available here (probably NSFGW*).
Thoughts?
~Southern Fried Scientist
*NSFGW – not suitable for government work (probably safe for most workplaces, but not if you’re in a NOAA lab)
Well, we might as well get all our Sea Shepherd hatin’ out at once. This is the epitome of Nautical Incompetence.
~Southern Fried Scientist
You know, we have a history on this blog of criticizing Sea Shepherd. We frequently criticize their methods, motivations, and effectiveness (we also went out of our way to add opposing views when we raised such a contentious issue). For a select group of readers, criticizing one conservation organization is tantamount to criticizing them all. If we say Sea Shepherd has been ineffective in protecting sharks, inevitably someone will assume that we’re in favor of shark finning. I don’t understand that leap of logic, but I’ve seen it come up so often that I know to expect it, probably even on this post. I can also expect someone to say “At least they’re doing something!” That is, of course, completely missing the point, since our argument is that the ’something’ they’re doing is making it harder to affect real, lasting, change.
So let me begin by saying this – assume Sea Shepherd’s motives are absolutely pure, assume they really are try to protect the oceans, assume their commitment is absolute, then our main argument is still sound – they aren’t doing a very good job and they are generating a lot of ill will in the process. 
“Oh sure,” you say, “you can rag on Sea Shepherd ’til your face turns blue. Why don’t you show us someone who’s doing it right?”
Enter STRP.
I’m going to give a hat tip to the MarineBioBlog now, instead of at the end, since you really should go read their post before you continue. It’s very good and I’d hate to steal another blog’s thunder.
First, kudos to Deep Sea News for reaching their goal of $2000 for the Oceans in the Classroom Initiative. A little salt in the classroom goes a long way.
On the theme of outreach and education, a student in a recent field trip of mine was incredibly inspiring in terms of optimism on one of those field days full of weather that never seem to show up on the Discovery Channel shows… he kept encouraging classmates to “embrace your biophilia”. On this particular day, the biophilia included cold rain coming down sideways and a barrier island ecosystem that provided little shelter.
The term was coined by E.O. Wilson in his book entitled “Biophilia” and refers to the subconscious need all humans feel for contact with nature. He doesn’t explicitly point it out as well as my student, but nature comes in all forms, for better or worse depending on the day. In fact, all forms are needed to keep the proper ecological balance of the earth and ecosystem you live in. I’d even argue that days like our little adventure provide a much more memorable experience and definitely a good story for your next party.
David is a graduate student in South Carolina studying shark conservation. He is the author of the upcoming book “Why Sharks Matter: Using New Environmentalism to Show The Economic And Ecological Importance of Sharks, The Threats They Face, and How You Can Help”. His time is divided between educating the public about sharks, spending days at a time at sea playing with sharks, and eating horribly unhealthy foods. Follow him on Twitter @WhySharksMatter.
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