How To Protect The Ocean

The Alaskan crab fishery was made popular by the TV show, the deadliest catch and it's worth $200 million dollars annually. But the fishery is closed this year because 90% of the population (one billion crabs) disappeared over the past two years. I will be discussing the possible culprit in this episode.   Join the audio program - Build Your Marine Science and Conservation Career: https://glow.fm/...

There are more people who are trying to change the way people, companies, and governments change the way they do business to reduce climate change. But the methods of some climate activists are giving the rest of the climate activists and advocates a bad name. These methods need to stop and the people doing this need to focus on more appropriate demonstrations and lobbying. I provide examples of s...

I grew up reading books on the ocean and I would soak up all of the textbooks that I could find, but we need more books that target the specific segments of the people to help them change their habits for a better ocean. There is a tiny trend happening where books are being targeted toward the general public, but that needs to scale and quickly. I am going to talk about the marine conservation boo...

The best thing that we can do to help the ocean is to choose products and services that are good for the environment and companies are making it known that they are doing something to protect the environment. But how can you tell if companies are truly in for the environment? There are companies that are greenwashing, Starbucks for example, for profit. I am going to cover an example of a scientifi...

There is a race of innovative projects from organizations and companies to try to clean up the ocean from plastic pollution and some projects are doing a great job, Mr. Trashwheel is a great example. But the organization called the Ocean Clean Up continues to overpromise and underdeliver at the expense of the natural environment and yet the messaging continues to be pushed as the narrative that th...

Marine protected areas work well to protect fisheries and biodiversity if the areas are not fished during protection. But what happens to the fishers during those closures? Fishers could have a tough time finding alternative income during closures in areas where they used to fish to make a living and feed their families. Indonesia may have an interesting way to combat this and might help the ocean...

Watching climate change impacts such as major hurricanes, floods, droughts, wildfires, and ice sheets melting can be overwhelming for anyone, but it's time to act to fight climate change on every level ranging from individual actions to voting at the highest level. In this episode, I am going to talk about how to do more in your local area that needs to be done.   Join the audio program - Build Yo...

The fall in Ontario is one of my favorite times of the year. It's a time when leaves change into beautiful colors, and the humid air of the summer is replaced with a crisp that is perfect under the sun making the season as close to perfect as possible. But the weather in other places could mean a visit from hurricanes, one after another. We have seen two large hurricanes hit various parts of the e...

A heat wave causing an increase in sea surface temperatures in the Mediterranean Sea causes a rapid deterioration in corals that once housed vibrant red and purple coral forests that provided a ton of biodiversity along the southern French, and Spanish coasts, and along the island of Sardinia. The only thing that saves them is the depth in which they reside. We need to talk about it in this episod...

After looking at the news this week and seeing two hurricanes rip through various countries causing trillions in damages, it's hard not to think about climate change and how everything is getting worse. I find it difficult to know how we are doing. We hear about international agreements such as the Paris Agreement and the Convention of Biological Diversity and we expect things to get better, but e...

My University was and still is known as an Agricultural School. One program that was being heavily promoted at our school and in my program was that of aquaculture. I didn't know much about aquaculture before I took a class on it but it sounded like a great thing that solved food problems. Grow fish to serve as food with a growing global population that was slowly running out of resources. Aquacul...

There are times that we, as humans, think that we can't affect the ocean because it is so big and so deep. In fact, there used to be a saying: "The solution to pollution is dilution." But scientists and engineers realized that there is a tipping point where there is so much pollution that dilution is impossible. The same truth works for noise pollution. Noise can reach many places including the de...

The world is changing at a rapid rate and governments are scattering to catch up with a policy to try and stop the changes. But the changes are starting to get companies to rethink their priorities from only making a profit to adding benefits to their employees and their environment. Some companies, like Patagonia, are taking their values full throttle by making the Earth its only shareholder. In...

There are two major issues that have to do with fisheries that could affect the way you choose your sustainable seafood, but each issue can be confusing to find the information that would make it easy for you to make the best decision for you. These issues lead to confusion because you never know which information is correct. The results can affect people's lives in a negative way. In this episode...

The US government has declared tribal salmon fisheries along the west coast failures for a number of years due to a number of factors that include everything from river pollution to climate change, but will the payments offered by the government as compensation for the failures help bring back the salmon stocks? In this episode, I will discuss how the salmon population is negatively affected and w...

I was scrolling through Twitter the other day and I came across a post that was retweeted by a friend of mine. The post was a graph that looked at how long it would take to break down various bags (plastic bags vs re-useable bags). It showed that plastic bags did not take the longest time to break down in a landfill. But they were more questions to be asked that talked about sustainability. Theref...

There are often times that I look at the news and hear the disasters that are happening all over the world and in my own backyard, I get overwhelmed and doubt whether we are going to be able to protect the oceans and ourselves from Climate Change. But I take comfort in the fact that there are people all over the world who are working together to protect their piece of ocean/planet. Therefore, in t...

For 45 years, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has been know for its Direct Action Campaigns that led to controversial means to stop illegal activity in the open sea. The organization was led by Captain Paul Watson, who was the face and the pride of Sea Shepherd. Paul Watson was the youngest co-founder of Greenpeace and left the organization because he wanted to do more than protest illegal w...

My Master's advisor used to tell me that I would be great in a technical job within the marine science and conservation field and he was right as at the time I worked in a very technical part of the field as a marine technician and a newly graduated GIS Analyst. But I always pictured myself as someone who was in charge of either a research program or a non-profit organization that helped forward m...

I've known that I wanted to be a marine biologist ever since I was 14 years old and dreamed of being on ships to work to protect the ocean. But I struggled to find information on the ocean as I did have access to the web at the time. There are still struggles in finding the proper information on the ocean in today's society. Access to journal articles is behind paywalls for the most part and infor...

Mangroves provide protection along the coastline from erosion due to wave action and are a biodiversity haven that produces ample fisheries for local villages. But with bounty often comes increased popularity and in the case of Malampaya Sound in the Philippines, the increased popularity led to destruction and decreased fisheries. Therefore a combination of legislation and community action was nec...

Last week, I discussed how to get experience to help you get your first job in marine science and conservation; however, COVID put a wrench in many college-level students that impaired their ability to get experience. So now what do you do? In today's episode, I am going to discuss how you can move forward to start your career.   Sign up to find out about the audio Ocean Conservation Careers membe...

A recent meeting in New York at the UN headquarters was not very productive for the High Seas. An agreement could not be met to protect the high seas in four key areas. The lack of an agreement leaves many ocean species vulnerable to overfishing, climate change, and disturbance from increased shipping traffic. An agreement will take a global effort to ensure governments respect the oceans for all...

The UK is facing a number of beach closures due to sewage run-off as water companies are bypassing treatment and dumping raw sewage. Sewage run-off is supposed to happen on rare occasions; however, water companies are allowing run-off more than on rare occasions. Critics have suggested that the companies are choosing profits over reinvestment in the treatment plants. Could the problems faced with...

POV - You just graduated with your BSc in Biology with a concentration in Marine Science and you are super excited to start a new career in the field of Marine Science and Conservation, but you noticed that every job requires 3-5 years of experience, a Masters and/or a Ph. D. degree. Now you are a little deflated and you want to find out where you can find a job that you don't require a crazy amou...