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The Birds and the Buoys: Using Googly Eyes to Avert Extinction
A pair of looming eyes could scare away seabirds from fishing nets in which they are often entangled.
A prototype looming-eyes buoy in waters off Estonia.Credit.Andres Kalamees
By Annie Roth
May 10, 2021
Every day, thousands of hooks and nets meant for fish end up catching seabirds a global problem that is pushing many seabird species to the brink of extinction. But no fishing gear may do more damage than the gillnet, which entangles and kills at least 400,000 seabirds each year.
What if all it took to save them was a pair of googly eyes?
In the Cayman Islands, sea turtles are more than just a majestic creature. The animal appears on the islands’ flag, is the mascot of the British territory’s flagship airline and is printed on the $5 bill (along with the Queen). It’s also the main ingredient in the Cayman Islands’ national dish: sea turtle stew.
Eating sea turtles, which have been classified as an endangered animal since 1973, is controversial. But the culinary tradition is important to the Cayman Islands, which has its own farm to breed and raise sea turtles for local consumption. And according to a new study published in
Credit: Cayman Islands Department of Environment
Sea turtles in the Cayman Islands are recovering from the brink of local extinction, new research shows.
Monitoring from 1998-2019 shows loggerhead and green turtle nest numbers increased dramatically, though hawksbill turtle nest numbers remain low.
In the first counts in 1998-99, just 39 sea turtle nests were found in total on the three islands. By 2019, the figure was 675.
Captive breeding of green turtles and inactivity of a traditional turtle fishery due to tightening of restrictions in 2008 contributed to this - but populations remain far below historical levels and still face threats including illegal hunting.
E-Mail
Ship movements on the world s oceans dropped in the first half of 2020 as Covid-19 restrictions came into force, a new study shows.
Researchers used a satellite vessel-tracking system to compare ship and boat traffic in January to June 2020 with the same period in 2019.
The study, led by the University of Exeter (UK) and involving the Balearic Islands Coastal Observing and Forecasting System and the Mediterranean Institute for Advanced Studies (both in Spain), found decreased movements in the waters off more than 70 per cent of countries.
Global declines peaked in April 2020, but by June - as Covid restrictions were eased in many countries - ship movements began to increase.