In this episode, we’re talking with Dr Bryce Stewart about the power of community-driven marine conservation. Bryce is a Senior Research Fellow at the MBA and Associate Professor at the University of Plymouth. His work on marine protected areas (MPAs) has contributed to world-renowned examples of participatory marine conservation and management, notably around the Isle of Man and the Isle Arran.

A productive ocean benefits everyone. Listen in to find out how we can not only have our marine biodiversity but eat it too.

For more information about Bryce’s research, visit the MBA website. 

Become a member of the Marine Biological Association and be part of a global community advocating for the ocean. You'll receive four copies a year of our beautifully produced magazine, The Marine Biologist, and a host of other benefits.

For a limited period, you can save 25% on MBA membership. To join, visit www.mba.ac.uk/our-membership/ 

This offer is valid until the 31st of May, 2025 and applies to the monthly payment option only. 

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In this episode we are glad to bring you the warmth of West Africa!

For his achievements in turtle conservation and with the coastal communities of Sierra Leone, Edward Aruna has won the 2024 Tusk Award for Conservation in Africa. This is a stunning achievement and we are delighted to bring this conversation to you.

Edward outlines the many environmental challenges facing Sierra Leone but this small, West African country inhabited by "lovely, welcoming, and peaceful people" is full of promise.

By listening to the needs of local people and encouraging them to listen to conservation law, Edward has achieved turtle conservation wins and brought real benefits to numerous coastal communities.

His message is: "The environment doesn't need us, but we need the environment", and Edward invites NGOs and volunteers to help in his beautiful country.

Listen in: there is much to learn from Edward's patient and sincere approach to his work.

Edward Aruna was the 2024 recipient of the The Tusk Award for Conservation in Africa, sponsored by Defender. Established in 2013 in partnership with Ninety One and in conjunction with H.R.H The Prince of Wales, the awards recognise cutting-edge conservation leaders and their positive impacts on wildlife conservation and local communities across Africa. For over a decade, The Tusk Conservation Awards have served as a springboard for these guardians of biodiversity, who have risen to the top of their fields, scaling their work and amplifying conservation impact across the continent.

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www.tuskawards.com
@Tusk_org

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We are delighted to welcome Raghda Ezzeldin, record breaking freediver, maths teacher, and ocean activist with OceanLove, a global non-profit ocean conservation initiative.

Raghda tells us about her intimate connection with the ocean and putting her passion into action for change.

We also cover philosophy, marine life encounters in remote parts of the Red Sea and the OceanLove Innovation awards.

We interviewed Raghda and OceanLove founder, Ilco van der Linde, in the April 2024 edition of The Marine Biologist magazine.
 
You can find out more about @Ocean Love @oceanlovenews or on www.oceanlove.news 

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We are joined in this episode by Noelle Helder, marine ecologist, and member of the four-woman Salty Science rowing team that crossed the Atlantic to make a positive contribution to inclusivity in marine science. 
 
Representing three generations of marine scientists, Isabelle Côté, Chantale Begin, Lauren Shea, and Noelle rowed 3,000 miles across the Atlantic in an 8.5 m boat. Noelle describes how she and the team prepared for this epic of endurance, kept their morale high, and worked as a team under the most extreme conditions. They not only won the women's division and came 7th out of 37 boats that finished the race. 
 
On the way they endured days of 20-foot waves, encountered sharks, tuna, and flying fish, and tried not to think about the consequences of a marlin strike. 

Noelle’s description of the sometimes hair-raising journey is refreshingly deadpan – perhaps unsurprising for a self-confessed lover of ‘type II fun’. But beyond testing themselves in the open ocean, the reason the team took on the challenge was to raise support for marine conservation education, and support access for less privileged people to enter careers in marine science. 

We hope you enjoy this episode as much as Lize and I did.

https://saltyscience.org/
https://www.worldstoughestrow.com/the-atlantic/

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What is so special about the deep sea? What are the impacts of human activities there and which areas are particularly important?

In this episode, we are joined by deep-sea ecologist Dr Amelia Bridges. Following on from an article that Amelia wrote for the October edition of The Marine Biologist magazine, we will be discussing the pros and cons of exploration and exploitation in the deep sea. 

Dr Amelia Bridges is a Research Fellow at the School of Biological and Marine Sciences (Faculty of Science and Engineering), University of Plymouth. She specializes in spatial ecology in the deep sea and how science can help policy-makers make informed decisions. 
@Amelia_Bridges
https://www.plymouth.ac.uk/staff/amelia-bridges

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A shoal of sardines comes under attack from all sides as some of the ocean's most spectacular predators converge to take their fill.
But which species do best and how do they interact with their competitors? How can scientists even study such a dynamic and ephemeral event? Alicia Burns joins us to talk about the challenges and rewards of getting up close and personal with feeding aggregations in the clear waters off Baja California, Mexico.
The purpose of this exciting research is to understand the hunting success of individuals, specifically, of blue marlin and sea lions and other predators in open ocean multi-predator aggregations. Learning how resources are shared helps understand this extremely productive ecosystem and the threats it faces through exploitation and climate change.
Alicia is a behavioural biologist whose research interests include the mechanisms driving animals' social organization. She is part of an international and multi-disciplinary collaboration with scientsist from Departamento de Pesquerías y Biología Marina, Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Centro Interdisciplinario de Ciencias Marinas (CICIMAR-IPN), La Paz, Baja California Sur, 23096, Mexico led by Jens Krause, Head of the department of Fish Biology, Fisheries and Aquaculture at Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and
Inland Fisheries (IGB).

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Ever since humans began making things, we have been looking to nature for inspiration: Leonardo Da Vinci designed flying machines inspired by birds, and burs (seeds covered in hooks) inspired the invention of velcro. 

• Marine natural compounds are three to four times more likely to yield successful drugs compared with terrestrial ones.
• In 2022, there were over 17,000 new marine natural products discovered.

Leading marine biologist Robert Blasiak joins us to discuss the magical ingredients of marine biomimetics. With an emphasis firmly on learning from nature and extracting only ideas, Robert and colleagues from the Stockholm Resilience Centre take us on a fascinating exploration of the deep sea, how we must value it, and why the benefits of exploration may outweigh those of extraction. 

With thanks to Robert, Tilde Krusberg (MSc student and Research Assistant), and Lova Schildt (MSc student).

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What drives animals to go where they go?

We are proud to welcome shark expert Professor David Sims for a conversation about basking shark speed dating and much more.

David is a behavioural ecologist specialising in tracking the movements and behaviour of ocean predators to understand how they will respond to natural and human-induced change. In this podcast he talks about the detailed study of basking shark circling behaviour that he led off the West coast of Ireland.

This podcast builds on David's article, 'Basking shark circles' that appeared in the January edition of The Marine Biologist, the magazine for members of the Marine Biological Association.

It's always a pleasure to listen to David share his decades of knowledge about how and why sharks do what they do. So tune in, sit back and come away knowing a lot more about the lives of these magnificent predators.

Professor David Sims is a Senior Research Fellow at the MBA where he leads the Movement Ecology and Conservation of Ocean Predators research group.

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Trawling in marine protected areas? What's that all about? Join us as we learn from experts why protecting areas of the sea is an essential tool for marine conservation, what some of the pitfalls are, and how MPAs help tackle the climate and biodiversity crisis.
 
This is a huge topic to tackle but we are in safe hands. We are joined in this episode by Dan Laffoley who held the global honorary role as Marine Vice Chair for the World Commission on Protected Areas for 17 years and by Daniela Sturm, who wrote the article on large-scale marine protected areas which featured in the October edition of The Marine Biologist magazine. 

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You have probably heard of Charles Darwin (he got there first with his theory of evolution by natural selection) and DNA. But few of us can explain what a genome is and why genomes are so important.

In this podcast we ask Kes Scott-Somme, a Marine Biological Association scientist who works on the marine part of  the Darwin Tree of Life project (DToL), why so many people are interested in the genomes of marine organisms, and what is a genome, anyway?

As part of a global drive to describe the genetic make-up of life on Earth, DToL is cataloguing the genomes of 70,000 species in Britain and Ireland.

Kes also gets around to talking about careers in marine biology, taxonomy, and the importance of natural history.

Join this engaging discussion and find out how building a vast catalogue of genomes is relevant to human health, and dealing with the climate and biodiversity crisis.

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