April 2014 - MARMAM - devlists.uvic.ca

Event Announcement: Orca Tour 2014 with Erich Hoyt
by Michelle 30 Apr '14

30 Apr '14

Event Announcement: Orca Tour 2014 with Erich Hoyt The Whale Trail (http://thewhaletrail.org) and partners present noted author and marine conservationist Erich Hoyt in a series of talks around The Whale Trail. Erich will present his talk “Adventures with Orcas in the North Pacific” at nine locations, from Saturna BC to Monterey CA, May 2 - 20, 2014. Join us! Check below for the location nearest you. Get your tickets early - before they sell out! You can also follow us at www.orcatour.org and on Facebook. Orca Tour Schedule (Dates, Locations, Tickets and Organizers): Saturday, May 3 Saturna Island, BC 1:00 – 2:00 PM Paul Spong 2:15 – 3:45 Erich Hoyt Tickets: $20 at door, 18 and under free (Concert by Dana Lyons, Friday May 2 7 PM) Organizer: Saturna Island Marine Education and Research Center (SIMRES) Wednesday May 7 Port Townsend WA Fort Worden, Building 204 5:00 - 6:30 PM (following annual meeting) PTMSC Members – free, Adults $7, Youth (under 18) $3 Pre-register: email to Brian Kay bkay(a)ptmsc.org Organizer: Port Townsend Marine Science Center Thursday May 8 Port Angeles WA Red Lion Hotel, 221 N. Lincoln St. 7 PM (doors open 6:30 PM) $5 (Kids Free!) Advance tickets @ brownpapertickets.com http://bpt.me/633364 Organizers: Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary, Feiro Marine Life Center and The Whale Trail Saturday May 10 Newport OR Oregon Coast Aquarium 6:30 PM (doors open 6 PM) $5 (Kids 12 & under free!) Advance tickets @ brownpapertickets.com http://bpt.me/610791 Organizer: American Cetacean Society, Oregon Chapter Tuesday May 13 San Francisco CA Bay Theater, Pier 39 Reception: 5:30 PM • Program 6:30 PM Admission: $10 (includes one drink) Advance tickets: eventbrite.com Organizer: Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary Wednesday May 14 Monterey CA Museum of Monterey 5 Custom House Plaza 6 PM Admission $5 Advance tickets @ brownpapertickets.com http://bpt.me/648204 Organizer: Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary Thursday May 15 Santa Cruz CA Sanctuary Exploration Center 35 Pacific Ave Admission $5 Advance tickets @ brownpapertickets.com http://bpt.me/64825 Organizer: Sanctuary Exploration Center Sunday May 18 Seattle WA Nesholm Family Lecture Hall at McCaw Hall 2 PM $10 ($5 Kids) Advance tickets: brownpapertickets.com http://bpt.me/632807 Organizer: The Whale Trail Tuesday May 20 Vancouver BC Vancouver Public Library, Central Library 350 West Georgia St., Alice MacKay Room, Lower Level 7 - 9 PM (doors open 6:30 PM) Free! Seating is limited. Organizer: Georgia Strait Alliance, Vancouver Public Library

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SURVEY: Prioritizing the Threat of Ocean Trash
by Nicholas Mallos 30 Apr '14

30 Apr '14

Dear Marine Mammal Scientists, Conservationists and Educators, Marine debris is a ubiquitous problem on our world's shorelines and in freshwater and marine environments. Having worked on the issue of marine debris for the past three decades through the International Coastal Cleanup, <http://www.oceanconservancy.org/our-work/international-coastal-cleanup/ top-10-items-found-1.html> Ocean Conservancy is now engaged in a research exercise to qualitatively and quantitatively evaluate the threat of specific marine debris items to ocean health. We have chosen expert elicitation as our survey method because it has been used for decades in the fields of social science and risk assessment. Expert elicitation synthesizes opinions of experts while assessing uncertainty around those views. Your professional judgment, along with your colleagues around the world, will be captured using the survey instrument and data will be analyzed to determine the relative threat posed by the most persistent forms of debris on beaches and in the marine environment. A manuscript will be composed from the findings of this research and submitted for publication. The questions in this SURVEY <https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/CY8CRC8> are designed to capture information on your expert judgment regarding the threat of specific ocean trash items across marine taxa. Based on your professional experience and judgment, the focus is on what threats and impacts you conclude are occurring, and the severity and specificity of those impacts. Please respond for all taxa for which you have a professional judgment, not just those for which you have professional research experience. The elicitation methodology rigorously captures professional judgment, rather than field data, observation or published literature with this questionnaire. This exercise does require thinking but it should not take more than 30 minutes to complete the 10 questions. As a token of our appreciation, we will send you a limited-edition Ocean Conservancy t-shirt for submitting your survey-details provided on the final page of the survey. Survey Link: Prioritizing Ocean Trash Threat Survey <https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/CY8CRC8> After completing the survey, your responses will be cataloged in a way to ensure complete anonymity; your identity will not be attached to your responses in any way. If you would like to be acknowledged for your participation in the final publication, email Nicholas Mallos at nmallos(a)oceanconservancy.org. Thank you in advance for your consideration and participation. Regards, Nicholas J. Mallos, MEM --- Nicholas Mallos Conservation Biologist, Marine Debris Specialist Ocean Conservancy Phone: 202.351.0478 Twitter: @NickMallos

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A one year ATER (Researcher and Lecturer) position available in Brest (France). French required.
by Jean-Luc Jung 30 Apr '14

30 Apr '14

Dear MARMAMers, A one year position is available (starting date september 2014) in the Laboratory BioGeMME (university of Brest, France). This position includes both teaching and research tasks. Very good communication skills and proficiency in French are an absolute requirement as French will be the langage used for teaching. The following of this mail and the description of the position are therefore in French. —————————————————————————————— Le poste proposé correspond à un poste d'Attaché Temporaire d'Enseignement et de Recherche, potentiellement prélude à l'ouverture d'un poste de Maître de Conférences à l'Université de Bretagne Occidentale de Brest (France). Partie enseignement du poste (192H d'enseignement annuelles) : Le candidat assurera des enseignements de statistiques et d’informatique, appliquées aux Sciences Humaines, principalement en Psychologie, en Sociologie, et dans toutes les filières de l’UFR. Partie recherche : Le candidat s'impliquera dans l'un des projets de recherche du laboratoire BioGeMME, et mettra en oeuvre des outils de génétique moléculaire et des populations (quelques publications récentes du labo en fin de message). Profil requis - Thèse en génétique, génomique, bioinformatique (ou éventuellement informatique ou statistiques avec ouverture à la Biologie ) - Volonté et capacité à enseigner les statistiques à un public de non-spécialistes (niveau licence essentiellement) - Capacité à s'impliquer dans les thèmes de recherche du Laboratoire, portant sur la génétique des populations d'espèces ciblées de mammifères marins. Ce profil peut correspondre à un candidat ayant un profil "génétique des populations" (au sens large du terme) désireux d'adapter ses connaissances en statistiques à un public d'étudiants non spécialistes, ainsi qu'à un statisticien qui mettra en oeuvre ses connaissances et compétences en les appliquant à d'autre disciplines. Une expérience de l'étude des mammifères marins serait très appréciée. Plus de renseignements : jean-luc.jung(a)univ-brest.fr (partie recherche) francois.carpentier(a)univ-brest.fr (partie enseignement) Fiche descriptive du poste (N° 33) et Dépôt de candidature https://candidatures.univ-brest.fr/ Exemples de publications récentes du Laboratoire BioGeMME Zookeys, 365: 5–24. PLoS ONE, 7: e44425. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0044425.t001. Marine Mammal Science, 29 : 195-203.

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New publication on estimating exposure to boat traffic with spatially explicit capture–recapture models
by Enrico Pirotta 30 Apr '14

30 Apr '14

Dear MARMAM colleagues, We are pleased to announce that the following paper has been made available online: Enrico Pirotta, Paul M. Thompson, Barbara Cheney, Carl Donovan, David Lusseau (In press). Estimating spatial, temporal and individual variability in dolphin cumulative exposure to boat traffic using spatially explicit capture–recapture methods. Animal Conservation. DOI: 10.1111/acv.12132 ABSTRACT: Appropriate management of the effects of human activities on animal populations requires quantification of the rate at which animals encounter stressors. Such activities are heterogeneously distributed in space, as are the individual animals in a population. This will result in a heterogeneous exposure rate, which is also likely to vary over time. A spatially explicit analysis of individual exposure is therefore required. We applied Bayesian spatially explicit capture–recapture models to photo-identification data to estimate the home range of well-marked individuals in a protected coastal population of bottlenose dolphins. Model results were combined with the estimated distribution of boat traffic to quantify how exposure to this disturbance varied in time and space. Variability in exposure between individuals was also investigated using a mixed-effects model. The cumulative individual exposure to boat traffic varied between summers, depending both on the overall area usage and the degree of individual movement around the activity centres. Despite this variability, regions of higher risk could be identified. There were marked inter-individual differences in the predicted amount of time dolphins spent in the presence of boats, and individuals tended to be consistently over- or underexposed across summers. Our study offers a framework to describe the temporal, spatial and individual variation in exposure to anthropogenic stressors when individuals can be repeatedly identified over time. It provides opportunities to map exposure risk and understand how this evolves in time at both individual and population levels. The outcome of such modelling can be used as a robust evidence base to support management decisions. KEY WORDS: Bayesian modelling; capture–recapture; disturbance; dolphin; exposure rate; home range; marine traffic; Tursiops truncatus. A PDF copy of the work can be downloaded from: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/acv.12132/abstract Please do not hesitate to contact me for any question regarding our work. All the best, Enrico Pirotta

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new papers on beaked whales strandings (Sowerby's, Gervais' and Cuvier's)
by Wojtek.Bachara 30 Apr '14

30 Apr '14

Dear Readers, We are pleased to announce that our papers: Bachara W. and S.A. Norman. 2014. Mesoplodon europaeus strandings- a short review. Reports of the International Whaling Commission. SC65b/SM01 Bachara W. , P. Cermeño and S.A. Norman. 2014. Mesoplodon bidens strandings- a short review. Reports of the International Whaling Commission. SC65b/SM02 Bachara W. and S.A. Norman. 2013. Ziphius cavirostris strandings-a short review. Reports of the International Whaling Commission. SC65a/SM1 can be downloaded from: http://iwc.int/sc65bdocs and go to SM section. and: http://iwc.int/sc65adocs and go to Small Cetaceans. Please do not hesitate to contact me for any question regarding my work. Best regards, Wojtek

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New Ecology paper: Ontogeny of long distance migration
by Rebecca Scott 30 Apr '14

30 Apr '14

Dear all, Please see abstract (below) of new our paper now "in press" with Ecology: Rebecca Scott, Robert Marsh, and Graeme Hays In press. Ontogeny of long distance migration. Ecology.http://dx.doi.org/10.1890/13-2164.1 Abstract: The movements of some long-distance migrants are driven by innate compass headings that they follow on their first migrations (e.g., some birds and insects), whilst the movements of other first time migrants are learnt by following more experienced conspecifics (e.g., baleen whales). However, the overall roles of innate, learnt and social behaviors in driving migration goals in many taxa are poorly understood. To look for evidence of whether migration routes are innate or learnt for sea turtles, here for 42 sites around the World we compare the migration routes of > 400 satellite adults of multiple species of sea turtle with c.45,000 Lagrangian hatchling turtle drift scenarios. In so doing, we show that the migration routes of adult turtles are strongly related to hatchling drift patterns, implying that adult migration goals are learnt through their past experiences dispersing with ocean currents. The diverse migration destinations of adults consistently reflected the diversity in sites they would have encountered as drifting hatchlings. Our findings reveal how a simple mechanism, juvenile passive drift, can explain the ontogeny of some of the longest migrations in the animal kingdom and ensure that adults find suitable foraging sites. Please note: supplementary material will not be available until the article has gone through the copy-editing process and appears "in print", Kind regards and please let me know if you would like a copy of the "pre-print", Rebecca Scott ------------------------- Dr Rebecca Scott GEOMAR|Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research Kiel Düsternbrooker Weg 20 24105 Kiel, Germany +49 (0)431 600 4569 http://www.geomar.de/en/mitarbeiter/fb3/ev/rscott/

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8th marine mammals necropsy workshop Liege 2014
by Thierry Jauniaux 30 Apr '14

30 Apr '14

Apologies for cross-posting A marine mammal necropsy workshop is organized by the Department of Veterinary Pathology (University of Liege, Belgium), UMS Pelagis (University of La Rochelle, France) and the Laboratory of Applied Bioacoustics LAB (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Spain). The session will be held at the Veterinary College on the Sart Tilman campus (Liège, Belgium) on June 30 and July 1, 2014. During the workshop, 20 marine mammals, mostly harbor porpoises and harbor seals will be extensively necropsied and sampled. A morning session will be devoted to main lesions, and dissection and sampling procedures (Jauniaux T.), another one will be reserved for acoustics and inner ear extraction and fixation (André M.); afternoons will be dedicated to necropsies. The number of attendees is limited to 20, in order to pair off participants under the supervision of a veterinary pathologist and specialists of the inner ear dissection. See details in the attachment Contact only using email: "necropsyworkshop(a)ulg.ac.be" Regards T. Jauniaux Thierry Jauniaux, DMV, PhD,

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Alaska Whale Foundation's new website
by Andy Szabo 29 Apr '14

29 Apr '14

Dear Marmam folks, Alaska Whale Foundation has recently launched its new website ( www.alaskawhalefoundation.org) and Facebook page. For those of you interested in checking out what we're up to, reconnecting, and/or looking for opportunities to get involved, come by and have a look. Cheers, Dr. Andy Szabo Director, Alaska Whale Foundation

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Right Whale Publication
by Ashley Barratclough 29 Apr '14

29 Apr '14

Dear colleagues, We are pleased to announce the publication of the following article: Barratclough, Ashley, Paul D. Jepson, Philip K. Hamilton, Carolyn A. Miller, Kenady Wilson, and Michael J. Moore. "How much does a swimming, underweight, entangled right whale (Eubalaena glacialis) weigh? Calculating the weight at sea, to facilitate accurate dosing of sedatives to enable disentanglement." Marine Mammal Science (2014). http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/mms.12132/full Summary Fishing gear entanglement represents a significant source of anthropogenic mortality in North Atlantic right whales (Eubalaena glacialis). The current methods of photo identification and post-mortem examination of stranded carcasses, give a good indication of the prevalence of entanglements. Consistent monitoring of the trends in entanglements has demonstrated a rise in the number of North Atlantic right whales affected. The implications of this trend are of serious concern in an already endangered species. Disentanglement of whales from fishing gear is one potential mitigation option, however approaching a distressed whale is challenging. Sedation has facilitated the approach, however accurate sedative dosing is essential to prevent fatalities. Accurate body weight estimation is therefore required to calculate the correct dose. By examining the post-mortem data of whale morphometrics and performing a step wise linear regression analysis relating length and girth measurements, we established a formula to estimate the weight of North Atlantic right whales at sea. If you are interested but cannot access this article online lease email me at ashley_2486_b(a)yahoo.com for a pdf reprint. Best Wishes Ashley Barratclough

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Research Internship
by Victoria Howard 29 Apr '14

29 Apr '14

*The Institute for Marine Mammal Studies is now accepting applications for the Fall 2014 Internship- deadline June 1, 2014* The IMMS Research Internship Program is designed as a way for students interested in a career in marine science to gain valuable research experience in a real-world setting. Interns will participate with multiple projects involving bottlenose dolphins, sea turtles and diamondback terrapins. As an intern, you will be trained in all aspects of dolphin photo-id research, sea turtle satellite tracking, and other current research projects at IMMS. Interns will also participate in other operations at IMMS including stranding response, education, and animal care. Our goal is to give Interns a well-rounded experience in a variety of areas while providing expert training and experience in marine science research. Interns must: - Commit to a minimum of at least 12 weeks. The internship can be extended depending on work performance. - Be available to work Mon-Fri and must be available for all boat trips. Some field days may fall on the weekends. - Have strong sense of responsibility, work ethic, attention to detail, and ability to admit mistakes. - Produce high quality research efforts and exhibit strong interpersonal skills. *Principle Duties include*: data entry, searching and cataloging journal articles, learning all research protocols, cropping and sorting photo-id fin images, learning to use photo-id programs such as Darwin (fin matching software), and FinBase (Microsoft Access), boat based field research (21’ and 31’ boats), and learn how to use ArcGIS Applicants must be 18 or older and must have a genuine interest in marine research. Applicants should be actively pursuing a college degree or be a recent graduate in oceanography, marine science/biology, biology, or a related field. Previous research experience in any capacity is a plus. Applicants must be able and willing to fulfill all duties outlined for this Internship Program. This is an unpaid position and Interns are responsible for their own housing and transportation. Once accepted, IMMS staff will be able to assist Interns in suggesting suitable housing options and locations *Please visit http://imms.org/internship.php <http://imms.org/internship.php> for full Internship information and details on how to apply*

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