The World Society for Protection of Animals (WSPA) has published a report which studies the profound impact that “ghost fishing gear” is having on marine animals. The report, titled Ghosts beneath the waves states: As fishing intensifies, more fishing gear is being lost or abandoned and this is contributing to our ocean’s plastic problem. It’s […]
» Marine Wildlife
- “Ghost” fishing gear is having a profound marine impact, says new report
- Exterminating rats on the islands of Chagos could conserve its coral reefs
- Commonwealth Nations agree to a Blue Charter to tackle global ocean issues
- UK Seas in Crisis : Will Brexit change things?
- Coral reefs – can the Honduran reefs survive over-fishing, climate change and pollution?
- Coral reefs – can they be protected by insurance?
- Scientists are trying to lab-breed corals that are resistant to global warming
- Seas-At-Risk organisation evaluates new fishing proposals, including electric pulse fishing
- Great Barrier coral reef : Is it capable of regenerating itself?
- Wildlife Trusts call for new UK Marine Strategy following Brexit
- Albatross have experienced a major decline over last three decades
- Kelp farming being explored in research project off Cape Cod, USA
- UN lays groundwork for an Ocean Treaty
- The survival of the Wadden Sea, Netherlands, is in question
- Humpback whales return to Hudson River estuary, New York
- World’s largest colony of Humboldt penguins threatened
- Convention on Ballast Water Management secures legal force
- Sea otter is a “keystone species” says new ecological study
- Denmark is an obstacle to the protection of 69 threatened Baltic species, says Oceana
- Arrests over illegal fishing of Patagonian toothfish
BBC News reports 12th July 2018: A team working on the Chagos Islands in the Indian Ocean found that invasive rats on the islands are a “big problem” for coral reefs. Rats decimate seabird populations, in turn decimating the volume of bird droppings — a natural reef fertiliser. Scientists now advocate eradicating rats from all […]
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The Commonwealth Secretariat News Release, 20th April 2018, reports: Commonwealth leaders today agreed on a bold, co-ordinated push to protect the ocean from the effects of climate change, pollution and over-fishing. Their landmark decision to adopt a Commonwealth Blue Charter will affect one third of the world’s national coastal waters, helping to sustain livelihoods and […]
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Note: This article was commissioned by The Marine Quarterly which has agreed to the publishing of an abridged version in its Summer edition. The decline in both the health and diversity of life of British seas is a subject much reported upon. Yet in addressing the meaning of Brexit in this context it is first […]
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The Guardian reports, 27th December 2017: “I’m like one of those old-school gangsters,” says Ralston Brooks, a park ranger on the island of Roatán off the coast of Honduras. “If you’re going to do it, do it. Pop a cap.” The 37-year-old boat captain says he faces regular death threats from local fishermen because of […]
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The Guardian reports, 20th July 2017: A stretch of coral reef off Mexico is the testing ground for a new idea that could protect fragile environments around the world: insurance. The reef, off the coast of Cancún, is the first to be protected under an insurance scheme by which the premiums will be paid by […]
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The Guardian reports, 23rd December 2017: New super corals bred by scientists to resist global warming could be tested on the Great Barrier Reef within a year as part of a global research effort to accelerate evolution and save the “rainforests of the seas” from extinction. Researchers are getting promising early results from cross-breeding different […]
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Seas-At-Risk press release, 21st November 2017: The European Parliament Fisheries Committee [has taken a decision which] seriously weakens marine environmental legislation. The European Parliament Fisheries Committee today [21st November] voted on a proposal that will revise legislation on the protection of fisheries resources and marine ecosystems. The proposal merges more than 30 existing regulations and […]
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The Guardian reports, 29th November 2017: A group of “source” reefs have been identified that could form the basis of a life support system for the Great Barrier Reef, helping repair damage by bleaching, starfish and other disturbances. Researchers from the University of Queensland, CSIRO, Australian Institute of Marine Science and the University of Sheffield […]
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The Wildlife Trusts, October 2017: A unique chance for the UK to become a world leader in marine management. Seize the moment! In 2019 the UK plans to leave the European Union. While it is important that we retain existing EU law through the Withdrawal Bill and anticipated Fisheries and Agriculture Bills, this departure is […]
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BBC News reports, 20th November 2017: The spectacular wandering albatrosses in the Blue Planet programme on the BBC have suffered a major decline in numbers over the past three decades. New research suggests breeding pairs of this species are now little more than half what they were in the 1980s. Scientists say the losses are […]
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The Cape Cod Times reports, 9th October 2017: The marine farm of the future could look like this: offshore fields of kelp growing on a latticework of line 8 feet below the waves, each section tethered by a single line to an anchor hundreds of feet below. The farmer only has to go out to […]
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The High Seas Alliance, an alliance of 32 NGOs and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), reports 21st July 2017: “States meeting at the United Nations in New York today took an important step towards launching negotiations for a new treaty to protect the biodiversitybiodiversity Biological diversity in an environment as indicated […]
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The Guardian reports, 16th June 2017: The world’s largest unbroken intertidal system of sand and mud flats could sink beneath the waves by the end of the century due to sea level rise and subsidence caused by gas drills. The Unesco world heritage site at the Wadden Sea on the Dutch coast stretches over 10,000 […]
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SFGATE.com reports, 9th June 2017: Large numbers of humpback whales have returned to New York City for the first time in a century. For the first time in 100 years, sizeable numbers of humpback whales are being spotted in the waters off NYC, and it’s thanks to years of environmental clean-up efforts, Popular Science reports. […]
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Oceana reports, 12th January 2017: Six hundred kilometres (360 miles) north of Santiago, Chile, the National Humboldt Penguin Reserve reverberates with the braying of 26,000 Humboldt penguins — around 80 percent of the species’ entire population. Sea otters and migrating blue whales glide through the waves close to colonies of nesting seabirds. This global biodiversitybiodiversity […]
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The UK Wildlife and Countryside Link reports, October 2016: This month Finland ratified the International Maritime Organisation’s (IMO) Ballast Water Management Convention. Being the 52nd contracting party, Finland tipped the target of 35% world shipping tonnage and triggered entry into force by September 2017. We’ve been waiting a long time for this, as the convention […]
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The Observer reports, 10th July 2016: Charles Darwin once mused on the impacts that predators could have on the landscapes around them. In particular, he wondered – in On the Origin of Species — how neighbourhood cats might affect the abundance of flowers in the fields near his house at Downe in Kent. He concluded […]
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Oceana reports, 14th March 2016: Three years of work by 88 leading experts were effectively scrapped during the 37th Annual Meeting of the Helsinki Commission (HELCOM), held March 2016, when countries approved a heavily weakened version of a plan to protect and rebuild the most threatened Baltic Sea and Kattegat species. Oceana denounces Denmark as […]
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The Guardian reports, 9th March 2016: Six people have been arrested on charges of illegal fishing of protected species in raids carried out jointly by Interpol and Spanish police in Galicia in northwest Spain. The six include five members of the Vidal family who run Ribeiro Vidal Armadores, among them Antonio Vidal, the owner, and […]
