Trouble for Turtles:
Trawl Fishing in the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico

Griffin, E., Miller, K.L., Harris, S. and Allison, D. July 2008

Bycatch – the unintentional catch of sea turtles in fishing gear – poses a serious threat to sea turtle survival. More than fifteen years ago, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) began to address this problem by requiring the use of Turtle Excluder Devices (TEDs) in Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico shrimp trawl nets…Although all six sea turtle species inhabiting U.S. waters are currently listed as threatened or endangered under the ESA, the government has yet to require TEDs and other bycatch mitigation methods in trawl fisheries that are known to take and even kill sea turtles.

To download the full report, go to: http://www.oceana.org/fileadmin/oceana/uploads/turtles/Trouble4Turtles_WebFinal.pdf

To learn more about Oceana, go to: http://oceana.org/north-america

Conservation at Barnegat Bay (video)

‘We All Need to Do Something’ ‘Voluntourists’ are helping animals around the globe

Click on the video link above to learn from our own Dr. Hal Avery on research being conducted at Barnegat Bay with the assistance of Earthwatch volunteers.  Abigail Dominy is one of the student leaders/facilitators working with the voluteers and the graduate students.

The Paleobiology Database is an international scientific organization run by paleontological researchers from many institutions.

Taxonomic and distributional information about the entire fossil record of plants and animals is brought together in one place.

The goal is to educate the public, summarize the literature for professionals, and foster statistical analyses of mass extinctions and other aspects of biodiversity.

Bioko–An Island Ark  

Bioko Island is just off the west coast of Equitorial Guinea, Africa.  In January 2008, our own Dr. Gail Hearn and, undergraduate student, Abigail Dominy of Drexel’s Bioscience department and others went to Bioko Island to document primates and turtles.  Tagging along were several photographers and writer, Virginia Morell, from the National Geographic.                                                                            

Dr. Gail Hearn

The story and images of the expedition are now published in the August issue of the National Geographic Magazine (finally!)

 Abby and the hyrax

Orphaned baby western tree hyrax

To check out the video, photo gallery, and article text a little early go to: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/08/bioko-primates/morell-text

It’s Gregor Mendel’s Birthday!

Help the Academy of Natural Sciences celebrate the father of modern genetics’ birthday with a weekend full of discovery. Interactive presentations highlight genetic research conducted at the Academy of Natural Sciences, and the key role that the humble gene plays in our everyday lives. Add live animal presentations, arts and crafts and you’ve got a weekend that would make Gregor smile.

Saturday, July 19 through Sunday, July 20
Academy of Natural Sciences
$8-$10
Call 215-299-1000 to order

This event is a part of the Year of Evolution, a celebration of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin.

IN THEATERS AUGUST AND SEPTEMBER 2008

FLOW: For Love Of Water, a new film by Irena Salina, highlights the local intimacies of an emerging global catastrophe: African plumbers reconnect shantytown water pipes under cover of darkness to ensure a community’s survival; a Californian scientist forces awareness of shockingly toxic public water sources; a ‘Big Water’ CEO argues privatization is the wave of the future; a “Water Guru” in India sparks new community water initiatives in hundreds of villages; a Canadian author uncovers the corporate profiteering that drives global water business.

Click to play clip:

Part directory, part blog, Evolvist helps find eco-friendly and socially responsible businesses around you. Just plug in a product or service and location and voila a list, a map, and reviews. Evolvist is new and growing. Suggestions and reviews can be submitted, so stay tuned.

Ten major natural history museum libraries, botanical libraries, and research institutions have joined to form the Biodiversity Heritage Library Project. The group is developing a strategy and operational plan to digitize the published literature of biodiversity held in their respective collections. This literature will be available through a global “biodiversity commons.”

The participating libraries have over two million volumes of biodiversity literature collected over 200 years to support the work of scientists, researchers, and students in their home institutions and throughout the world. The 10 member libraries of the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) members now have over 1.124 million pages of key taxonomic literature available on the web. Over 6000 titles are currently available online.

Participating institutions:

American Museum of Natural History (New York, NY)
The Field Museum (Chicago, IL)
Harvard University Botany Libraries (Cambridge, MA)
Harvard University, Ernst Mayr Library of the Museum of Comparative Zoology (Cambridge, MA)
Marine Biological Laboratory / Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (Woods Hole, MA)
Missouri Botanical Garden (St. Louis, MO)
Natural History Museum (London, UK)
The New York Botanical Garden (New York, NY)
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (Richmond, UK)
Smithsonian Institution Libraries (Washington, DC)

The BHL will provide basic, important content for immediate research and for multiple bioinformatics initiatives. For the first time in history, the core of our natural history and herbaria library collections will be available to a truly global audience. Web-based access to these collections will provide a substantial benefit to people living and working in the developing world — whether scientists or policymakers.