The Ocean Podcast / science edu + ocean info
Discovery Channel is celebrating their 20th anniversary of Shark Week beginning July 29. Not everyone is enthusiastic.
How can we support Discovery Channel when we are fighting for shark conservation, and its biggest obstacle is the monster image given to sharks by the media, including Shark Week programs? Further, some of us who have been directly involved in the production of your documentaries feel disgusted at the way that our interviews were censored and our words twisted around.
![Flickr:kidcadaver, Kaiyukan - Manta Ray [240x160]](http://farm1.static.flickr.com/177/439458964_b61efe9e64_m_d.jpg "Flickr:kidcadaver, Kaiyukan - Manta Ray")
[via Tony Wu]
Watch the birth of a baby mantra ray literally unfold.
Video of the world’s first live birth of a manta in captivity. Healthy baby female, about 1.9 metres across, born at the Churaumi Aquarium in Okinawa, Japan. Video is from a TBS news broadcast.
I am curious to know if the animal mated and reproduced in captivity or if it was captured while pregnant.
UPDATE: The story at Japan Probe and Yahoo News suggests that the parents mated while in captivity.
UPDATE II: Sadly, the baby manta has died. 
Keepers believe the baby died of bruises and cuts, apparently caused by its abusive father that constantly chased after the baby, often slamming into it, the aquarium said.
The reason for the father’s violence was not immediately known, and the baby’s death was still under investigation, the aquarium said.
The American Fisheries Society is offering a free custom spellchecker/dictionary of the common and scientific names of North American fishes. Currently compatible only with Microsoft Word documents.
[via tastyblogsnack]
Sad news. The Georgia Aquarium has lost another whale shark. Norton is the second whale shark to die at the facility.
ATLANTA (AP) - Norton, 1 of the original whale sharks at the Georgia Aquarium, died early today, the aquarium’s second whale shark death in five months.
Aquarium officials said in a statement that in the last few months, Norton had stopped eating and showed erratic swimming behavior. The Georgia Aquarium hosts the only whale sharks on display outside of Asia.
Husbandry staff noticed a decline in Norton’s swimming behavior yesterday and blood work confirmed a decline in his health.
Norton had been placed on a 24-hour watch. Officials said early this morning, the whale shark stopped swimming and settled to the bottom of his tank.
Backside of a fossil sharks tooth, one of the largest ever excavated in Florida. On display at the Paleo Preserve (www.paleopreserve.org).
The Florida Museum of Natural History will soon open a new exhibit called Megalodon: Largest Shark that Ever Lived
At about 60 feet long, Megalodon was the largest shark that ever lived. The dominant marine predator vanished 2 million years ago, but its story inspires lessons for ocean conservation today.
Visitors enter a full-size sculpture of Megalodon through massive jaws. Once inside, they will discover this shark’s history and the world it inhabited.
The exhibit opens June 16 and runs through January 6, 2008.
[via FMSEA]
[via SHARK-L]
Here is some more video of a live goblin shark (Mitsukurina owstoni). It is a WMV file hosted at Tokai University’s School of Marine Science and Technology. Think this is the same specimen from a couple months ago? It’s in Japanese, so I can’t be sure. Here’s a nice, gnarly picture too.
Also, there’s a Flash movie featuring pics of a captured megamouth shark (Megachasma pelagios), which is another rarely seen species.
[via SAYOR]
Another captive whale shark has died suddenly, this one in Japan.
The cause of the death of the 5.4-meter-long female whale shark, named Yu-chan, is unknown, according to officials. The fish is believed to be 12 to 13 years old.
![Dr. Eugenie Clark, The Shark Lady, 1959 [200x150, 7.3K]](http://www.cephalopodcast.com/img/pic/pic_070504_MoteEugenie.jpg "Dr. Eugenie Clark, The Shark Lady, 1959")
Today is the 85th birthday of Dr. Eugenie Clark. Better know as the Shark Lady, Genie is also the founder of Mote Marine Laboratory. The local paper has a retrospective of her career.
The “Shark Lady” has been diving into waters around the world and making landmark contributions to marine science for some 50 years.
But whether she was discovering a hermaphrodite belted sandfish near New Pass, riding on the backs of whale sharks in Mexico or teaching the emperor of Japan to snorkel off the coast of Miami, Clark has always returned to a small waterfront laboratory in Sarasota.
It is where a young mother with a doctorate in zoology and no idea how to hunt a shark got her start. Clark is now permanently back at Mote Marine Laboratory, which will host an 85th birthday party for its director emerita and senior scientist this evening.
Continue reading ‘Happy 85th Birthday, Dr. Eugenie Clark, Shark Lady’
Another aquatic special from PBS, this one on sharks:
Sharkland
Airs Sunday, May 06, 2007In a stretch of the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Southern Africa, a unique pattern of warm and cold currents brings together an astounding variety of sharks. Nearly 150 species of all colors, shapes and sizes gather there - including pajama sharks, leopard cat sharks, seven-gill cow sharks and the great white.
In 1975, a gigantic great white shark began to terrorize the world. But Hollywood has nothing to compare with the waters off the tip of southern Africa, one of the sharkiest coasts on Earth. Roughly 140 different shark species of all shapes, sizes and dispositions hunt here, brought together by a pattern of warm and cold ocean currents unlike anywhere else on the planet. NATURE swims with leopard cats and coppers, the speedy mako, the great white and many others when Sharkland premieres Sunday, May 6 at 8 p.m. (ET) on PBS (check local listings). Academy Award-winning actor F. Murray Abraham narrates.
The Radula blog reports that students at John Adams Middle School vandalized some of the fish tanks during a recent fieldtrip to the Albuquerque Aquarium.
There is damage to two separate tanks, which had been gouged and “tagged”. The massive shark tank may be repairable but the tank holding the moon jellies will have to be replaced at a cost of over $30,000. The biopark has banned the school (an APS school) from all future biopark venues.
If you would like to donate to help repair the aquariums, contact the office of the BioPark Director at 505-764-6211 for details.
![Claire Nouvian, The Deep, University of Chicago Press [200x150, 4.4K]](http://www.cephalopodcast.com/img/pic/pic_070415_UCdeepsea.jpg "Claire Nouvian, The Deep, University of Chicago Press")
[via TONMO]
The companion website to Claire Nouvian’s book has a gallery of deep sea critters that you can glance through. Note especially the Dumbo octopus (Grimpoteuthis sp.), Glowing sucker octopus (Stauroteuthis syrtensis), Telescope octopus (Amphitretus pelagicus) and an egg-bearing Black-eyed squid (Gonatus onyx). All very well photographed and tentacley. Splash page includes ethereal, mysterious music too so you know you are underwater.
The Deep
The Extraordinary Creatures of the Abyss
By Claire NouvianFeaturing 220 color photographs of deep ocean species, some photographed for the first time.
![Credit: NOAA, Alaska Fisheries Science Center, Marine Observer Program [200x150, 9.6K]](http://www.cephalopodcast.com/img/pic/pic_070414_NOAA.jpg "A ghastly view of fish squeezed through the net by the tons of fish trapped within the main body of the net.")
The World Wildlife Fund has launched its third annual Smart Gear Competition. They are offering cash prizes for innovative ideas for reducing bycatch. Many non-target species are caught up in the gear, nets and hooks of modern commercial fishing fleets. This effort tries to bring together industry, environmentalist, scientists and educators to find practical solutions.
WWF and our partners created the International Smart Gear Competition to inspire innovative, practical, cost-effective ideas that allow fishermen to “fish smarter” - to better target their intended catch while reducing bycatch. The Competition awards a cash prizes for the best entry to reduce fisheries bycatch, which is the leading threat to many endangered marine mammals, cetaceans, sea turtles, seabirds and certain fish species.
The 2007 International Smart Gear Competition will award a $30,000 Grand Prize and two 10,000 Runner-Up Prizes.
Entry Deadline: July 31, 2007
The competition is open to all - fishermen, professional gear manufacturers, teachers, students, engineers, scientists and backyard inventors.
Please visit www.smartgear.org for entry materials and to learn about the winning ideas from the first two competitions.
![Humpback whale's tail [200x150, 6.8K]](http://www.cephalopodcast.com/img/pic/pic_070413_NOAA.jpg "Humpback whale's tail; Captain Budd Christman, NOAA Corps;")
Hey, NOAA has updated their online photo library. Because most of these images are taken as part of the normal operations of this federal agency, they are copyright free and in the public domain. All they ask is that proper photo credit is given.
Bizarrely, the search function is currently not working, making perusal of the collection a somewhat arduous expedition.
- More than 10,000 new images.
New search capability.- Many new albums that better reflect NOAA’s stewardship role and range of operations.
- Hundreds of Hurricane Katrina images that help record the extent of damage of this American tragedy.
- Thousands of stunning ocean exploration photographs, coral reef photographs, and polar regions photographs.
- New additions to albums including remarkable lightning photography, coastal photographs detailing the nooks and crannies of our American coastline including a medley of American lighthouses, and new images detailing the Treasures of the NOAA Library.
- And in this, the 200th Anniversary of the Coast Survey, NOAA’s oldest ancestor agency and America’s first science agency, thousands of newly digitized historical photographs detailing the work of the Coast Survey, Fisheries Commission and Weather Bureau.
In addition to still images, NOAA also makes available a number of copyright free video clips. The quality is a bit mixed, but it’s a nice way to build a royalty-free library.
NOAA maintains a library of video footage, which is compiled and categorized by subject. It’s available for the cost of reproduction on a public domain basis—no license or clearance required. It’s requested that you credit “NOAA” or “National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration,” when using the footage.
[via Make]
![aquahobby.com, Lightbulb Fish Tank [80x80, 1.5K]](http://www.cephalopodcast.com/img/pic/pic_070330_AHlightbulbtank.jpg "aquahobby.com, Lightbulb Fish Tank")
Back in my LFS days, we gave new customers this rule of thumb: one gallon of water for each inch of fish. So these little lighbulb aquariums wouldn’t make good starter tanks. But they are tiny and cute. And now you can learn how to make your own.
[via Consumerist]
Continuing our series on weird aquariums, here is a video showing a combo deep fryer and goldfish tank.
Because oil floats on water, despite the massive heat (163 degrees Celsius) the goldfish simply stay away from the surface and all is well. They eat the crumbs of croquettes and other fried foods that fall to the bottom, and can live in there for 5-10 years as they happily clean away, ignorant to the fact that certain death awaits any potential escapees.
Continue reading ‘Weird Aquaria: Fast Food Fryer + Live Goldfish Tank’
Trolling the Google for sharky news so you don’t have to:
Swim At Your Own Risk is your daily dose of all things sharky… oh, and we’ll also try to fill you in on any other aquatic antics we stumble upon.
Jason Robertshaw
Cephaloblog Comments
PharaohFracking AntsPharaohFracking AntsPharaohFracking Ants