Year: 2011
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More of the Chagos underwater world
[vimeo]http://www.vimeo.com/17274137[/vimeo] Here’s another movie clip from filmmaker Jon Slayer that catches a glimpse of the Chagos Islands’ beautiful coral reefs. There’s also some great top-side footage of hermit crabs, sea birds, and a moray eel in a shallow tidal pool catching, wrestling with, and swallowing a crab.
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The monthly climate report: April 2011
An excellent monthly summary of regional climate trends, news and science from Michael Searcy at Fresh Air. The Scent of Pine (here).
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Meet the elusive eels
Dan Laffoley from IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas tells a glorious story of the European eel and some of the crazy things it gets up to, in another installment of Naked Oceans‘ Critter of the Month feature.
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Plastic on the beach
I just returned from a trip to coastal Ecuador and guess what the beach was littered with? Plastic. All kinds of plastic. Plastic shoes, buckets and bottles. Especially plastic bottles. I see this everywhere I go and there seems to be more and more of it. In fact, the only beach I have ever visited…
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Solo kite boat
Crossing the eastern Pacific in a kite-powered boat! [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54eDe1px8_o[/youtube]
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What lives above, on, and in the oceans?
What lives above, on, and in the oceans? Pelicans of course… and what’s not to like about a pelican? Here’s our very own Seamonster John Bruno taking his turn picking the Critter of the Month on the Naked Oceans podcast.
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Beautiful jellyfish that lost their sting – or have they?
[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/23079092[/vimeo] Hello beautiful jellyfish. Check out this gorgeous movie shot at that famous lake in Palau where the stingers have lost their sting – or have they? Have a read of this National Wildlife magazine article and interview with jellyfish scientist, Laura Bell, who busts a popular misconception and reveals that they do have stings,…
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When Scientists were Poets. And artists.
Ah, those were the days. Back when scientists were not just technicians tickling keyboards and gingerly thumbing pipettes filled with tiny volumes of nucleic acids — but the Poets of Nature. Like the ancient druids, our forebears in the profession were often consummate Renaissance Men (indeed, they were mostly men in those benighted times, though…
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Quest for the curly-tailed horses
A little while ago, I made a rather wonderful discovery – I uncovered a forgotten pioneer of underwater filmmaking (and I found some seahorses). It was the title of Noel Monkman’s autobiography that caught my eye: Quest of the curly-tailed horses. And to…
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Tropical islands disappearing as a result of coral mining and sea level rise
Decades of indiscriminate collection of corals — including by researchers — from the Indian Ocean’s Gulf of Mannar Biosphere Reserve may have resulted in two low-lying islands slipping beneath the waves. The loss of islands and associated reefs has been exacerbated by rising sea levels and industrial pollution, and poses threats not only to the…