Coastal & Marine Conservation

This reference resource, in atlas format, is an online-only compendium of maps and data sets accompanied by multimedia elements designed to illustrate key concepts in green issues and environmentalism graphically and interactively. Topics for the maps presented in this work were selected from articles in the 12-volume SAGE Reference Series on Green Society: Toward a Sustainable Future. Each map includes links to one or more of the series articles. Maps include interactive components, with clickable icons to deliver the data and statistics that make up each map.

“This is the first time we’ve been able to sneak a peek at a coral pathogen’s behavior in real time, as it responds to the chemical cues leaking into the seawater from its host,” says postdoc Melissa Garren of MIT’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE), first author on a paper about this work that appears Dec. 12 in the International Society for Microbial Ecology Journal. Professor Roman Stocker of CEE is lead researcher on the project.

It has been more than two years since the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster hammered the Gulf of Mexico with an unprecedented 200 million gallons of crude oil, but we are still seeing the effects today. Coast Guard officials have confirmed that an oil slick found in the Gulf last week matched oil from the spill two years ago.

A group of students from the University of Maine-Machias made a bittersweet discovery this week. They found an Asian shore crab on Great Wass Island in Beals, the northernmost point where the crab has been sighted. The excitement of their discovery was tinged with disappointment, however, because the Asian shore crab is an invasive species that threatens Maine’s coastal ecosystem.

New NOAA-led research on tagged humpback whales in Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary reveals a variety of previously unknown feeding techniques along the seafloor. Rather than a single bottom feeding behavior, the whales show three distinct feeding approaches: simple side-rolls, side-roll inversions, and repetitive scooping.

Ayana Johnson was interviewed live on Antigua's Observer Radio morning show. Hosted by Daren Matthew-Ward, and with questions from listeners, the discussion focused on the Barbuda Blue Halo Initiative, sustainable fishing, and climate change. Listen to the interview

For the tourist city of Acapulco, the statistics about Tropical Storm Manuel are staggering, especially given its seemingly unassuming status as a storm and not a cyclone. 60,000 stranded tourists. 23,000 homes without electricity and water. At least 11 deaths. 15 to 25 inches of rain. The only two roads connecting Acapulco to México City ruined by landslides. The international airport flooded. The rains began on Saturday, 14 September 2013, and continued nonstop through Monday, México’s Independence Day.

With its ocean views, walking path, and ice plant-covered cliffs, many in Santa Cruz consider West Cliff Drive to be a jewel of the community. Now a couple of scientists want the community to help them restore native habitat to the coastal bluffs. They’ve started the non-profit West Cliff Ecosystem Restoration project to help organize the restoration. Last winter, volunteers with the group ripped out ice plant in a small bed near the entrance to Natural Bridges State Park.

All it takes is a license and a cutting rake to harvest rockweed anytime and anywhere along most of Maine's long coast. Other than in a large bay in far eastern Maine, there's no fisheries management plan for the common seaweed that grows along the shore. But work is now underway to develop a statewide plan to manage rockweed, which is processed in Maine into fertilizer, animal feed supplements, food and other products with an estimated value of $20 million a year.