Exclusive: Fish farms in Macquarie Harbour are the greatest threat to survival of ancient ray-like species, scientists advising Australian government find
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Scientists advising the Australian government on how to save the threatened Maugean skate from extinction have recommended the salmon industry be either scaled back dramatically or removed from Tasmania’s Macquarie Harbour after finding fish farms are the greatest threat to its survival.
The advice is included in a report by the government’s threatened species scientific committee that says the skate – an ancient ray-like species found only in the harbour in the state’s west – should be considered critically endangered.
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08/15/2024 - 00:49
08/15/2024 - 00:00
Rentokil to use the wasps as a sustainable alternative to sprays in museums and homes
The newest recruits for the battle against moths will be the smallest pest control team in town.
Rentokil plans to release entosite parasitoid wasps into the nooks and crannies of museums, heritage sites and homes to stop moth infestations.
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08/14/2024 - 23:00
Butterfly numbers in the UK appear to be at the lowest on record after a wet spring and summer dampened their chances of mating. This comes on top of a long and worrying trend of decline. To find out what’s going on and what we can all do to help butterflies cope with extreme weather patterns, Phoebe Weston speaks to Dr Richard Fox, the head of science for the charity Butterfly Conservation, and to Matthew Hayes, who is part of the Banking on Butterflies project, a collaboration between the Insect Ecology Group at the zoology department in Cambridge University and the Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire
‘Warning sign to us all’ as UK butterfly numbers hit record low
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08/14/2024 - 23:00
Surveys suggest that wet weather and habitat deterioration are among the causes of devastating population declines, but there are ways to help
When Christina Letanka moved to Chiddingly village in East Sussex 28 years ago, insects were everywhere. “Everything was prolific when we first arrived,” she says. The kitchen used to be full of flies during the day and moths at night, swarming under the light. “Now they’ve all gone.”
Fewer butterflies, wasps and hornets dance around in the garden. “Normally everything comes out with the buddleia, but this year has been surprisingly bad – it’s dead,” Letanka says. “Is it the wet? I don’t know what’s happened. It’s been truly shocking.”
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08/14/2024 - 23:00
After a series of mass mortality events, it is more common to find these huge Mediterranean clams dead. Which is why the species’ ‘biggest fangirl of all’, Susan Smillie, is thrilled to see a thriving population in Greece
I swim and I stare as my shadow causes panic on the seabed below. Shells snap shut, one, two, three. Alive, alive, alive. I am so happy to see them: noble pen shells, all improbably but indisputably alive. These giant Mediterranean clams are a species on the verge of extinction, with so few left that it is rare to find one living anywhere in Europe.
Often known as fan mussels, the moniker is a suitable one for this beautiful bivalve, its pearlescent point dug into the sand, fanning up to a rounded posterior. I’m in the Amvrakikos Gulf on the west coast of Greece, where I have the privilege of watching these creatures grow. Their presence is such good news that Spanish scientists have flown in to see the clams for themselves as part of an EU project focused on trying to rescue, and hopefully expand, what is left of the pen shell population.
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08/09/2024 - 23:00
npj Ocean Sustainability, Published online: 10 August 2024; doi:10.1038/s44183-024-00073-7
Ecosystem services “on the move” as a nature-based solution for financing the Global Biodiversity Framework
World Ocean Explorer Wins Gold Medal Serious Simulation Award from Serious Play Annual International Competition
10/26/2023 - 14:35
For Immediate Release October 19, 2023
Sedgwick, Maine USA World Ocean Explorer, a 3D virtual aquarium and educational simulation, was recently cited for excellence, winning a Gold Medal Award in the 2023 International Serious Play Awards Program.
World Ocean Explorer is an innovative 3D virtual aquarium designed for educational exploration of the world’s oceans. With interactive exhibits and a lobby space, visitors can immerse themselves in realistic marine environments, including a DEEP SEA exhibit funded by Schmidt Ocean Institute, showcasing unprecedented deep-sea discoveries off Australia. Targeted at 3rd graders and beyond, this immersive experience offers a range of perspectives on the ocean environment and can be explored through guided tours or user-controlled interfaces. Visit DEEP SEA at worldoceanexplorer.org/deep-sea-aquarium.html.
Serious Play Conference brings together professionals who are exploring the use of game-based learning, sharing their experience, and working together to shape the future of training and education. For more information on Serious Play Award Program visit seriousplayconf.com/international-serious-play-award-programs.
World Ocean Explorer is a transformative virtual aquarium designed to deepen understanding of the world ocean and amplify connection for young people worldwide. Organized around the principles of Ocean Literacy and the Next Gen Science Standards, World Ocean Explorer brings the wonder and knowledge of ocean species and systems to students in formal and informal classrooms, absolutely free to anyone with a good Internet connection. As an advocate for the ocean through communications, World Ocean Observatory believes there is no better investment in the future of the sustainable ocean than through a new approach to educational engagement that excites, informs, and motivates students to explore the wonders of our marine world and to understand the pervasive connection and implication for our future, inherent in the protection and conservation of all aspects of our ocean world.
World Ocean Explorer presents an astonishing 3-dimensional simulated aquarium visit, organized to reveal the wonders of undersea life, with layers of detailed data and information to augment the emotional connection made to the astonishing beauty and complexity of the dynamic ocean. Within each of the virtual exhibits, students visit exemplary theme-based sites with myriad opportunities to understand the larger perspectives of scientific knowledge as organized and visualized to dramatize the impact and change on ocean life as a result of natural and human-generated events. Through immersion among displays, mixed media and 3D models, the experience of an aquarium visit will be brought into classrooms or home school environments as a free, accessible, always available opportunity for teaching and learning. All of this will be available to a world audience without physical limitation or cost. World Ocean Explorer, a project of the World Ocean Observatory, receives support from the Seth Sprague Educational and Charitable Foundation, Visual Solutions Lab, the Climate Change Institute, the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation, and The Fram Museum Oslo. To learn more about the current and future exhibits of World Ocean Explorer, visit worldoceanexplorer.org.
media contact
Trisha Badger, Managing Director, World Ocean Observatory | [email protected] +12077011069
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