Author: Emmett Duffy
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Cuba journal: Top predators on the reef
Happy World Oceans Day everyone! Wow, it’s hard to compete with Helen’s whale shark story for a close encounter with an awesome sea creature! Since it’s still fresh in my mind, I’ll go with an experience from our recent trip to Cuba. At the risk of giving you a case of elasmobranch overload, this features…
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Communing with ocean life makes you kinder
We’ve all heard about the dark side of violent video games. But is there a bright side to virtual reality? Personally I’m not a big fan of video games (I appear to be in the minority among modern Americans) but I was intrigued by a recent study that addressed this question using the Wii game…
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Cuba journal: Goliath
I’ve been around the block a few times, and dove on quite a few reefs over the years. On most reefs in the Caribbean — make that the West Atlantic generally — you’d be hard pressed to see a fish big enough to feed 2 or 3 people. But our last week spent in the…
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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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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…
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The real rapture
6:00 PM Eastern daylight time, 21st day of May, year 2011 of what is now generically referred to as the “Common Era” (C.E.). Breaking news: We’re still here. And it’s still beautiful. But it won’t last if we don’t take care of it. Wake up people. Read the real good news all around you.
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Shrimp farming: a green (blue) future?
I love shrimp. Not just as sources of surprising insights into the evolution of social life. They’re tasty too. Too much so in fact. Despite my attempts to fit into a dainty little ecological footprint, I’ve always found it difficult to pass up shrimp on the menu despite the fact that they’re generally considered by…
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Those who can — teach!
Are you a scientist? Have you ever wondered what you personally can do to make a difference? To combat the dark age that seems to be upon us in nearly every aspect of public life, from evolution to climate change? To fire kids up about how cool marine organisms are? Of course — we all…
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Forum on fish, food, and people
Editor’s note: The following discussion, which more than one participant called “extraordinary”, began after Ray Hilborn of the University of Washington published an op-ed “Let us eat fish” in the New York Times on 14 April 2011, and John Bruno of the University of North Carolina (and my Co-Editor at SeaMonster) replied here at SeaMonster.…
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Teach your children well
Many of us of a certain age credit Jacques Cousteau with the inspiration that got us excited about marine life and started, or at least helped, us down the path to a life dedicated to the oceans. It’s not an exaggeration to say that Cousteau almost single-handedly created a human constituency for the oceans. Last…