Ocean Stories

What does water look like when you’re immersed in it? Can you see wind? Artist Shayna Leib began exploring these questions about a decade ago when she embarked on “Wind and Water” – her series of intricately hand-crafted glass sculptures that appear to flow like anemone tentacles moving with an incoming tide. She says:
“Wind and water possess no intrinsic color, are clear to the point of invisibility, and yet move through space. We see not their form itself, but can detect their patterns and shapes only vicariously though the objects they affect. The trace of water’s touch over moss and sea life, the wind’s passage over marshlands… – these two forces make their presence known. Their character is contradictory and fickle, encompassing fragility and violence, placidity and turbulence.”…

During an organized shark dive, photographer Justin Lewis dressed in chainmail to get in the middle of a group of feeding sharks in the Bahamas. The Bahamian Reefs Hope Spot is located East and South of Florida and host forest, wetlands, swamps, and the Andros Barrier Reef, the second largest barrier reef in the western hemisphere. The Bahamas Island eco-region consists of over 3,000 low-lying islands and covers over 14,000 square kilometers.
Photograph: Justin Lewis Photography…

Dr. Sylvia Earle, Oceanographer, National Geographic Explorer-In-Residence and Mission Blue Founder
&
Phil Radford, Executive Director, Greenpeace
Invite you to join them for an Evening of Hope for our Ocean
Tuesday, May 21, 2013 6:30pm to 8:30pm Seattle Aquarium 1483 Alaskan Way Seattle, WA 98101
  Hope Spots are special places that are critical to the health of the ocean — Earth’s blue heart. Greenpeace and Mission Blue invite you to an evening celebrating the Bering Sea, one such place where hope for our planet’s future thrives. Join Dr. Sylvia Earle and Greenpeace Executive Director Phil Radford at the Seattle Aquarium to discover, explore and take action to protect the Bering Sea Canyons. Please note that space for this event is limited.
 
TO RSVP
e-mail: …

Mission Blue founder, Dr. Sylvia Earle is one of the world’s most influential ambassadors for the ocean. Her Horace Albright Lecture in Conservation this Spring was focussed on Sustainable Seas.  The University of California at Berkeley has shared the lecture below, in its entirety, where Dr. Earle talks about how the actions we take in the next 10 years to support the ocean will matter more than what we do in the next 10,000 years.…

These strange-looking creatures may look like ear-less teddy bears with tails – but this micrograph is actually two-day-old zebrafish larvae, as seen through a scanning electron microscope. The image was captured by Jurgen Berger and Mahendra Sonawane, both employees at the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology.
The zebrafish, or Danio rerio, is a common tropical fresh-water fish. Within three months, the larva turns into an adult (the two holes above the mouth in the picture above show not its eyes but a developing olfactory system.) During the larval stage, the zebrafish has the ability to regenerate fins, skin, heart and brain. Learn more about this fascinating critter here: zebrafish.org…

New Mission Blue partner, Dolphin SMART began when a number of conservation agencies, including NOAA’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries and National Marine Fisheries Service, the Dolphin Ecology Project, and Whale and Dolphin Conservation, as well as local businesses and members of the public, teamed up and developed a unique, multifaceted program encouraging responsible viewing of wild dolphins and recognizing businesses that participated. By joining this exciting conservation program, Dolphin SMART recognized businesses to encourage responsible wildlife viewing and to help aid in dolphin conservation. ~ Ed.
Here is their story, straight from the team at Dolphin SMART!
Dolphins, like many other marine mammals, are beloved by humans around the world. These popular mammals, whose energetic behaviors tend to fascinate us all, conjure lasting positive images of themselves for people.…

Hope Spots are scientifically-identified marine areas of critical importance to our ocean’s health. Working together, we can protect and conserve these areas as Marine Protected Areas to preserve the seeds of tomorrow’s healthy ocean. Today, let’s take a look at the dazzling Mesoamerican Reef, one of the 18 official Mission Blue Hope Spots.
The Mesoamerican Reef region lies within the Caribbean, extending from Isla Contoy on the north of the Yucatan Peninsula to the Bay Islands of Honduras. It is the second longest barrier reef and is home to over 350 species of mollusk and 500 species of fish, including the whale shark — the largest fish in the world.

The reef system is packed with protected areas and parks such as the Belize Barrier Reef, Arrecifes de Cozumel National Park, Hol Chan Marine Reserve(Belize), Sian Ka’an biosphere reserve, and the Cayos Cochinos Marine Park.…

Emperor penguins mill in the depths as they prepare for their swift ascent to the sea ice. “Once they start to launch,” says Nicklen, “within 30 seconds they’re all standing on the ice.”
Why is today the most important Penguin Day ever? In less than three months, two dozen countries and the EU (the Commission for Conservation of Antarctic Living Marine Resources meets in Germany July 15) will decide whether to create the world’s largest marine reserves. CCAMLR will vote on one proposal from New Zealand and the United States, and another sponsored by Australia, France and the EU.
A consensus vote would create reserves in marine areas that are teeming with life, and arguably the best penguin habitat on Earth.…

Today’s Feature Story for World Penguin Day is from respected Antarctic penguin expert David Ainley ~ Ed.
Penguins have been around on Earth for a long time. The first ones appeared in the geologic record 65 million years ago just after the mass extinction of animals (including dinosaurs) that ended the Cretaceous Period. Many reptilian species that had been their competitors had disappeared. Quickly, geologically speaking, penguins radiated into more than 50 different species, ranging in size from ones similar in size to the smallest one present now (Little Penguin, 1/3 m tall, 1200 g) to ones much larger than the largest now (Emperor Penguin, 1 m tall, 35 kg), that is, an ancient penguin that was 1.8 m tall and 80 kg.…

Da Vinci’s 500-year-old Vitruvian Man was reinvented on the Arctic Sea Ice in 2011 with the help of Mission Blue Partner Greenpeace and Los Angeles artist John Quigley in an effort to “draw attention to how climate change is causing the rapid melting of sea ice beyond most predictions.”
Constructed with copper banding, which was later removed and recycled, a team of Greenpeace activists laid out “Melting Vitruvian Man” on an ice sheet which was the size of four olympic-size swimming pools, following artist Quigley’s specifications.

Using Greenpeace’s ice-breaker, the Arctic Sunrise, they travelled to a remote area 500 miles from the North Pole, after scouting for the perfect ice canvas from the air. The installation was created in the Fram Strait between Greenland and Norway’s Svalbard Islands.…