Aquatic Mammals - A Historical Perspective

Dr. Würsig shares experiences about his work, mentors and general topics from his tenure as a scientist and professor.

Have you ever wondered what goes into publishing a scientific journal? In this episode we delve into that topic with Dr. Kathleen Dudzinski and Dr. Heather Maritzas Hill as they explain the ins and outs of science publishing.

Dr. Gisiner is now semi-retired but stays active in the field by conducting research that interests him, as well as writing and presenting on these interests. His most recent research looks at the Precautionary Principle and its problems for complex multivariate models of environmental risk. It’s a complicated issue.  In a nutshell, this means that protecting and recovering marine mammals isn’t as simple as it was 50 years ago. 

Today, I am going to revisit a conversation that I had in 2008, with a senior member of the marine mammal science community, Dr. Dan Odell.  Dr. Odell’ s Expertise is natural history and biology of cetaceans and manatees in the southeastern United States and cetacean mass stranding phenomena. Dr. Odell’s species of special interest include the Florida manatee, bottlenose dolphin, dwarf and pygmy sperm whales, and killer whales. Reproduction and growth of captive cetaceans is another focus of his study as well as the biology of the bottlenose dolphin in the Indian River Lagoon, Florida.

Today, I’m going a bit off course and revisiting a conversation that I had in 2008, with someone who had very little to do with the marine mammal community other than being married to one of its early members, Margaret Tavolga.  

William Tavolga ,or Bill as he liked to be called, was a teacher.  He was a professor of biology at City College in New York and also on the research staff in the Department of Animal Behavior at the American Museum of Natural History.  

He was one of the world’s leading authorities on fish sounds and is said to be one of the founding individuals of the marine bioacoustics field.  He did important studies of the mechanisms of fish sound production and acoustic communication. He did actually co-author one paper on dolphins.  

Dr. Robert Hoffman, Bob as he likes to be called is one of the world’s leading authorities on Antarctic Pinnipeds. In the early 1970s he became scientific program director for the U.S. Marine Mammal Commission where he played a major role in assessing threats and implementing the recovery and conservation efforts for Florida manatees, California sea otters, Hawaiian monk seals, and other endangered and threatened marine mammal species.

Dr. Bruce Mate is one of the world’s leading authorities on whales, and best known for pioneering the tracking of whales using satellite-monitored radio tags. 

Karen Pryor was a marine mammal trainer in the 1960s. She pioneered the use of behavioral science to develop the dolphin shows at Sea Life Park. Her work with dolphins, as head trainer and curator at Sea Life Park led to the first scientific paper on training creativity in animals. While at Sealife park, she did ground-breaking work on animal behavior and cognition, which eventually segued into what is now called clicker training, which is used by some trainers as a positive and humane way to work with animals.

More than 50 years have passed since Randy Wells began his career as a volunteer with Mote Marine Laboratory.  Currently, Randy is director of the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program, the longest, continuously running wild dolphin study in the world. This study keeps track of thousands of dolphins on Florida's west coast. If you would like to see the video interview then visit aquaticmammalsjournal.org

Dr. Jerry Kooyman a long-time member and mentor of the marine mammal community and American scientist discusses his numerous research projects and contributions that took him to Antarctica where he studied Leopard seals, Weddell seals, and Emperor Penguins.  His research topics included the comparative anatomy and physiology of respiration in air-breathing marine vertebrates, diving behavior, and exercise physiology of marine mammals and other aquatic vertebrates including marine birds, particularly the emperor penguin.