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Can California save the ocean?

By David Helvarg
California, its economy recovering from the Great Recession, is far from the demise conservative doomsayers predicted just a few years ago, a demise brought on by environmental regulation, graduated income taxes and its sybaritic ways.
In fact when it comes to environmental policy, particularly ocean and coastal protection, California is a national trendsetter and a role model for what kind of blue planet we leave the next generation. “This is the only state where you can get elected or lose your job based on your positions on coastal protection and offshore oil,” Monterey Rep. Sam Farr likes to point out.
One reason is Californians’ sense of entitlement to their 1,100 miles of oceanfront. This grows out of the state’s history as a maritime frontier dependent on access to the Pacific for its economic and social development.…

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Hope Spot Update: Protecting Bahamian Reefs

By Courtney Mattison
With Shark Week in full swing and beach vacation season beginning to wind down in the U.S., it’s time for an update on one of our favorite shark-loving tropical Hope Spots – the Bahamian reefs. Many NGOs, governments and other stakeholders are doing exciting work there and throughout the Caribbean Community that is good for the ocean and good for us.
With over 3,000 low-lying islands covering 1,400 square kilometers off the southeastern tip of Florida, the Bahamas are home to a wealth of marine life and host millions of visitors each year. More visitors mean more people hungry for seafood and eager to explore the reefs. It’s great that tourists want to get wet and explore the ocean both for their own enjoyment and to support the regional economy (tourism accounts for 60% of the Bahamian GDP), but as with any good thing, responsibility and moderation are key.…

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Ahoy Shark Week!

It’s Shark Week! How jawsome is that? We get a full week to celebrate and learn the full 360 on these toothy fellows. Get involved in the conversation! Check out the cheat sheet below, provided by our friends at Upwell.

On the menu for the week is a close look at the gargantuan megalodon, which had 7 inch teeth and the most powerful bite of any creature ever. Its chomp packed between 10 – 18 tons of pressure, compared to today’s lion which does about 600 pounds. What a wimpy cat! Check the graphic…these guys were huge!

Viewers can also look forward to 11 hours of new material, a profile of freshwater bull sharks near New Orleans, a peek at extremely rare deep sea sharks and the top ten sharkdown of the world’s most deadly species.…

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Big Things Come from Small Beginnings: The Mystery of the Sick Sea Lions

By Shari Sant Plummer, Mission Blue Board Director, President, Code Blue Foundation
On a cold, foggy morning along the Malibu coast, a small brown lump emerges from the sea and waddles ashore. I spot it from 100 yards away, but already my dog, Cooper, is at a full run toward the baby sea lion. I scream at him to stop, but it’s too late: The thin, frightened sea lion pup is heading back into the ocean. I finally catch up to Coop and pull him back, and we watch as the pup swims out through the waves. Though Cooper hadn’t touched him, the timid pup was easily threatened; animal lovers with cameras approaching other pups have been met with the same result.…

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Marie Tharp’s Big Map for a Big Ocean

What’s the tallest mountain in the world? Without the seminal work of Marie Tharp, this question may have remained unanswered. In the first half of the 20th century, Tharp worked together with Bruce Heezen to bring definition to the world of the deep blue, a topographic map of the world ocean. At a time when acoustical mapping techniques were extremely basic, Tharp brought the seafloor to life by illustrating the dramatic geographic features of the ocean for all to see.
The tallest mountain in the world is, of course, Mauna Kea in Hawaii, which beats Everest’s height when you consider that the mountain extends from the ocean floor. And speaking of revelations about ocean topography — known as bathymetry — we can’t discount the amazing work of Google in creating Google Ocean.…

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Exploring the Gulf of Mexico Deep Reefs with Megan Cook

By Megan Cook, Mission Blue Young Explorer
Megan will rejoin the E/V Nautilus in the Gulf of Mexico in late July further exploring hydrocarbon influx sites.  Participate as the team explores the Gulf of Mexico Deep Reefs Hope Spot by sending in questions to www.NautilusLive.org or by following on Twitter or Facebook. ~ Ed.
Where is your favorite coral reef? I’m willing to bet you answered somewhere tropical and warm, where the sunshine glitters into clear, shallow water bathing polyps and divers alike.  Nearby there might be a beach scene where drink umbrellas wouldn’t be out of place. That would have been my answer too, until last month… 
Descending to the seafloor took the ROV Hercules over an hour. From the control van of the E/V Nautilus, I sat with my watch team from the Corps of Exploration as HD video poured in from the ROV Hercules.…

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Plastic Soup Nursery for Hawaiian Monk Seals

By Daniel Fox, Wild Image Project
I am here, not far from the Kamilo Beach located on the South Point of the Big Island of Hawaii with Justin from NOAA & the Hawaiian Monk Seal Research Program to monitor a female Monk seal and her pup. Compared to other seals and sea lions, Monk Seals greatly differ in the way they raise their young. Instead of gathering in great numbers and benefiting from the protection of the group, female Monks give birth alone, nurturing the pup for about 5 or 6 weeks before weaning it for good, leaving behind a fat young seal and hoping for the best. The duo here has been together for close to 6 weeks now. The female is starting to look skinny while the little one is adding pounds.…

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Carl Safina Reports from the Gyre

No Refuge: Tons of Trash Covers The Remote Shores of Alaska
A marine biologist traveled to southwestern Alaska in search of ocean trash that had washed up along a magnificent coast rich in fish, birds, and other wildlife. He and his colleagues found plenty of trash – as much as a ton of garbage per mile on some beaches.
by Carl Safina
I am back ashore after an unusual expedition that brought scientists and artists to witness and respond to beach trash on the shores of southern Alaska. I have good and bad news.
The expedition was called GYRE, partly because much of the trash spins out of the North Pacific Ocean gyre, and partly because of the trip’s message: what goes around comes around.…

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Sharon Kwok is FIN-ished with Shark Finning

By Sharon Kwok, Mission Blue Board Director
I’m a Eurasian American raised in Hong Kong. Until recent years, every banquet I attended seemed to include shark fin soup. Although the exact origin of this ostentatious dish is shrouded in mystery, we do know it had to come from China’s southern coastal regions, and it was never a favorite of the Northern Chinese. Therefore l doubt the truthfulness of claims that it was a fancy dish created for the Emperor. Perhaps it was a fancy marketing ploy but we’ll never know for sure. I’ve even heard a version that shark fin soup’s origin was simply the fishermen’s frugal use of their catch. In bygone days, any obviously useful parts would either be sold fresh or salted to survive a trip to inland China.…

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Lost Antarctica & Ghost Rookeries ~ Climate Change & the Adelie Penguin

Dr. Sylvia Earle calls Dr. James McClintock’s recent book, Lost Antarctica: Climate Change on the Antarctic Peninsula (Palgrave/MacMillan, 2012), a wonderfully written wake up call concerning Antarctica and global climate change. The book should be required reading for everyone who can read. No exceptions. Those who can’t read should watch the film.” 

Ghost Rookeries: Climate Change and the Adelie Penguin from EOWilson Biodiversity Foundation on Vimeo.
“The consequences of a loss of biodiversity could encompass everything from altering key Antarctic marine food chains to the loss of species that may hold cures to cancer,” writes Dr. McClintock, whose recent book forms the basis of Ghost Rookeries.
The E.O. Wilson Biodiversity Foundation (EOWBF) and the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) will be embarking on an exciting new initiative this summer.…

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