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  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by aj0690
    +41 +1

    Whales Mourn Their Dead, Just Like Us

    Smart and often sociable, whales forge tight bonds with one another. Now it’s clear that those bonds can be stronger than death itself. More than six species of the marine mammals have been seen clinging to the body of a dead compatriot, probably a podmate or relative, scientists say in a new study. The most likely explanation for the animals’ refusal to let go of the corpses: grief. “They are mourning,” says study co-author Melissa Reggente, a biologist at the University of Milano-Bicocca in Italy. “They are in pain and stressed. They know something is wrong.”

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by grandtheftsoul
    +27 +1

    SeaWorld shares sink to record low as attendance keeps falling

    SeaWorld shares sank to a record low on Thursday after the controversial aquatic theme park company reported further falls in attendance and profits. The company, which induces killer whales, dolphins and sea lions to perform tricks to entertain the public, said 494,000 fewer people visited its parks in the three months to the end of June compared with the same period a year earlier. The 7.7% drop in attendance, from 6.5 to six million, knocked more than $16m off SeaWorld’s quarterly earnings and spooked analysts...

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by TNY
    +34 +2

    Talk About An Ancient Mariner! Greenland Shark Is At Least 272 Years Old

    Sharks can live to be at least 272 years old in the Arctic seas, and scientists say one recently caught shark may have lived as long as 512 years. That's according to a study published Thursday in the journal Science that says Greenland sharks can live longer than any other known animal advanced enough to have a backbone. Until now, the record-holder for the oldest vertebrate was the bowhead whale, known to have lived up to 211 years.

  • Video/Audio
    7 years ago
    by geoleo
    +23 +2

    Dolphin Steals Woman's iPad

    A playful dolphin at SeaWorld in Orlando grabbed a woman's iPad right out of her hands while she was taking a picture. The visitor got her iPad back -- but not before getting splashed!

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by jcscher
    +8 +1

    Obama Creates the Largest Protected Place on the Planet, Off Hawaii

    Expansion of 2006 monument will protect rare corals, fish, birds and marine mammals

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by jedlicka
    +58 +2

    Dolphins recorded having a conversation 'just like two people' for first time

    Two dolphins have been recorded having a conversation for the first time after scientists developed an underwater microphone which could distinguish the animals' different "voices". Researchers have known for decades that the mammals had an advanced form of communication, using distinctive clicks and whistles to show they are excited, happy, stressed or separated from the group.

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by jedlicka
    0 +1

    Scientists discover dolphins 'can speak almost like humans'

    Dolphins are capable of “highly developed spoken language” which closely resembles human communication, scientists have suggested. While it has long been acknowledged dolphins are of high intelligence and can communicate within a larger pack, their ability to converse with each other individually has been less understood. But researchers at the Karadag Nature Reserve, Feodosia, Crimea, believe the pulses, clicks and whistles – of up to five “words” – made by dolphins are listened to fully by another before a response is made.

  • Analysis
    7 years ago
    by rexall
    +22 +1

    Stingrays Chew? Who Knew?

    Plenty of animals bite, but mammals were once thought to be the only ones to chew, at least as it’s usually defined: moving our toothy jaws up, down, and side to side to tear through tough food. But chew on this: the ocellate river stingray, a beautiful spotted fish from the Amazon River, also chews its food. The discovery not only demonstrates that chewing isn’t special to mammals, but explains how rays, whose skeletons are made of soft cartilage rather than bone, can eat tough prey like shellfish.

  • Video/Audio
    7 years ago
    by geoleo
    +28 +2

    GoPro Awards: Soaring with Orcas

    Captured and submitted by GoPro Awards recipient Andreas Heide, who was joined by a pod of Orcas while riding his Subwing off the coast of Norway.

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by socialiguana
    +24 +1

    Protect dolphins, UK government urged

    Campaigners are demanding better safeguards for the UK's marine mammals after the EU said it would take Britain to court over harbour porpoises. The European Commission announced the action because it says the UK is failing to protect the endangered animals properly. The government is yet to comment on the court action. But the Wildlife Trusts are urging ministers to declare many more Marine Conservation Zones (MCZs).

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by hxxp
    +23 +1

    China's 'extinct' dolphin may have returned to Yangtze river, say conservationists

    Chinese conservationists believe they may have caught a rare glimpse of a freshwater dolphin that was declared functionally extinct a decade ago having graced the Yangtze river for 20 million years. Scientists and environmentalists had appeared to abandon hope that China’s baiji, or white dolphin, could survive as a species after they failed to find a single animal during a fruitless six-week hunt along the 6,300-km (3,915-mile) waterway in 2006.

  • Expression
    7 years ago
    by lostwonder
    +6 +1

    Obituary: Great Barrier Reef (25 Million BC-2016)

    Climate change and ocean acidification have killed off one of the most spectacular features on the planet.

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by canuck
    +23 +1

    Ocean algae blooms earlier, with potential ripple effects to come

    Warmer oceans are acting like a catalyst for one of the world's most abundant species of plankton, triggering earlier blooms of blue-green algae in the waters of the North Atlantic. Because of plankton's fundamental role in the marine ecosystem, researchers expect this shift to have far-reaching impacts throughout the world's oceans. The study, published in the journal Science, focused on Synechococcus, a type of blue-green algae that is one of the most abundant phytoplankton in the ocean. The authors drew on 13 years worth of data to measure the spring blooms that cover the North Atlantic in a carpet of green each year.

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by funhonestdude
    +38 +1

    Starfish are dying out in the Pacific – and no-one is quite sure why

    Starfish are dying out on the Pacific Coast from Mexico to Alaska – and no-one is quite sure why. The problem has been documented among starfish, or sea stars as they are also known, that live along the Pacific shore before. But a new study has found species which live below the low tide mark are also being severely affected.

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by lexi6
    +8 +1

    Sperm Whales Found Dead In Germany, Stomachs FULL Of Plastic And Car Parts

    In January, 29 sperm whales were found stranded on shores around the North Sea, an area that is too shallow for the marine wildlife. Only recently were details of the animals’ necropsy released. However, scientists were deeply disturbed by what they found in the animals’ stomachs. According to a press release from Wadden Sea National Park in Schleswig-Holstein, many of the whales had stomachs FULL of plastic debris, including a 13-meter-long fishing net, a 70 cm piece of plastic from a car and other pieces of plastic litter.

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by messi
    +31 +1

    Mercury levels drop in Atlantic bluefin tuna

    Pollution can seem like a vague, general problem, but sometimes it is specific and personal. People with asthma living in some major cities know to keep tabs on the ozone report in the weather forecast, for example. And frequent anglers should be keenly aware of how much of their catch they put on the dinner table because of mercury contamination in fish. Mercury is a problem for marine fish, as well—particularly the ever-popular tuna.

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by hedman
    +12 +1

    Stop eating sushi. Immediately

    Healthy, convenient and increasingly popular over the past few years, sushi has become as common a cuisine in the UK as Indian or Chinese. It’s a staple lunch-choice for city-workers all over the country and you’re never far from a restaurant or supermarket selling the traditional Japanese delicacy. But it turns out sushi may not be as wholesome a choice as we previously thought – leading biologists have warned that it is in fact harming both the environment and our health.

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by TNY
    +23 +1

    650 whales stranded on New Zealand coast

    A new pod of 240 whales swam aground at a remote New Zealand beach on Saturday just hours after weary volunteers managed to refloat a different group of whales following an earlier mass stranding. In total, more than 650 pilot whales have beached themselves along a 5 kilometer (3 mile) stretch of coastline over two days on Farewell Spit at the tip of the South Island. About 335 of the whales are dead, 220 remain stranded, and 100 are back at sea.

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by messi
    +28 +1

    Oil disaster will halve dolphin population say St Andrews researchers

    An international study involving researchers at St Andrews has revealed dolphins are struggling to survive seven years after the Deepwater Horizon disaster. In April 2010 a blowout on the drilling rig resulted in 134 million gallons of oil being released into the Gulf of Mexico over an 87-day period, killing thousands of marine mammals including bottlenose dolphins.

  • Current Event
    7 years ago
    by TNY
    +27 +1

    The Winning Photos of Underwater Photographer of the Year 2017

    The international Underwater Photographer of the Year photo contest has announced its winners for the 2017 edition. The winning photo (shown above) was by French photographer Gabriel Barathieu, who captured a “Dancing Octopus” in a lagoon on the island of Mayotte in the Indian Ocean. Barathieu’s photo was selected from over 4,500 underwater photos entered by photographers based in 67 different countries around the world.