Read, Halpin and Crowder lead a $1.8 million project called "Spatial Ecological Analysis of Megavertebrate Animal Populations," or SEAMAP, to create a digital archive of sea turtles, marine mammals and seabirds from throughout the world. The project is funded by the Sloan Foundation and the National Oceanographic Partnership Program.
SEAMAP is one component of an Internet data sharing network called the Ocean Biogeographic Information System, or OBIS. OBIS, in turn, is part of an even larger international Census of Marine Life project to track, collect and analyze information about all living sea animals.
"Bluefin tuna are now known to move from North Carolina to the Mediterranean," said Read. "How are we going to manage that? Wandering albatrosses might circumnavigate the Southern Ocean. How do we deal with the conservation of those animals and the various threats they face?
In an effort to find out, the researchers are using computerized technology available in Halpin's laboratory to plot returns from satellite tracking tags that scientists have attached to various species that swim or fly long distances. To see how many tagged sea turtles might cross the paths of commercial fishermen, for example, that information is being overlaid onto fishing patterns available from state agencies.
They are also overlaying sea surface temperature readings available by satellite. "That's because when water temperatures drop below a certain critical threshold the turtles leave the coastal sounds," Read said. "And when they do that they have to run this gauntlet of fishing nets." Air breathing turtles and marine mammals inadvertently caught by fishing nets may die after they are trapped.
Halpin said that one of the technical challenges is developing the computer tools to track tagged sea animals at the same fr
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Contact: Monte Basgall
monte.basgall@duke.edu
919-681-8057
Duke University
12-Feb-2004