Colin Speedie's new book takes us from swashbuckling hunts of giant sharks by reckless individuals with makeshift harpoons, through an age of mass slaughter, to the author's personal shark-tracking adventures in the name of conservation.There are few marine creatures as spectacular as the Basking Shark. At up to 11 metres in length and seven tonnes in weight, this colossal, plankton-feeding fish is one of the largest in the world, second only to the whale shark. Historically, Basking Sharks were a familiar sight in the northern hemisphere - off the coasts of Norway, Scotland, Ireland, Canada and the USA, for example. In an 18th Century world without electricity, they became the focus of active hunting for their huge livers containing large amounts of valuable oil, primarily used in lamps.Catch numbers were small enough to leave populations largely intact, but during the 20th Century a new breed of hunter joined the fray, some driven as much by a need for adventure as for financial gain. With improved equipment and experience, they exploited the shark on an industrial scale that drastically reduced numbers, leading to localised near-extinction in some areas.From the 1970's onward a new generation took to the seas, this time with conservation in mind to identify where the shark might still be found in the waters around the British Isles, employing new technologies to solve long-standing mysteries about the behaviour of this elusive creature. Using the best of both old and new research techniques, the case was built to justify the species becoming one of the most protected sharks in the oceans.Today, the Basking Shark is a much-loved cornerstone of our natural heritage. There are positive signs that the population has stabilised and may even be slowly recovering from the damage of the past, proving that timely conservation measures can be effective.Join us on a journey amidst wild seas, places, people and conservation history in the battle to protect this iconic creature - a true sea monster's tale.

Der vorliegende Band der Reihe a žSA1/4Awasserfauna von Mitteleuropa" umfasst in seinem Inhalt erstmals die gesamte WestpalAarktis (Europa, Nordafrika, Vorderasien). Er enthAlt zusammenfassende Angaben A1/4ber die Morphologie, Biologie, A-kologie und Verbreitung der Scirtidae (SumpfkAfer). ZusAtzlich zur Charakterisierung der Familie werden die einzelnen Gattungen, Artengruppen (nicht bei allen Gattungen vorhanden) und Arten ausfA1/4hrlich dargestellt.

Reich illustrierte Bestimmungstabellen fA1/4hren zu den einzelnen Taxa. Viele Merkmale sind abgebildet und gemessen (A1/4ber 1000 Einzelabbildungen, meist Fotos von MikroprAparaten, einige REM-Bilder, 8 Farbtafeln). Das fA1/4hrt dann zu einer sicheren Determination, wodurch Akologische und tiergeografische Aussagen ermAglicht werden.

FA1/4r Limnologen, aber auch Entomologen, Biogeografen und Zoologen, die sich mit der SA1/4Awasserfauna befassen, ist dieses Werk unverzichtbar.

From swimming alongside our kayaks, canoes, coracles and boats to lurking alone in the shadowy waters of remote seas, seals have long interacted with humans and played a part in our history. Seal by Victoria Dickenson explores the natural and cultural history of an animal that has piqued and delighted human interest since ancient times, from their role in Roman spectacles to their frequent inhabitation of animal rescue centers today.Seals, sea lions, fur seals and walruses are so distinctive that biologists have classified them as members of a single order, the Pinnipedia, yet our relationship with each distinctive seal species varies. We have for centuries hunted some seals for their skin, oil and meat. In the twentieth- and twenty-first century the hunt has become a focus for global protest, and the white-furred baby seal has evolved into one of the most powerful symbols for animal welfare. Some species, like the Mediterranean monk seal, are among the most endangered mammals in the world. Others, who live far from human habitation, number in the millions.The seals living closer to our societies have become wrapped in our myths and legends: there are tales of seals who have sought out human society, following the sound of children's voices, or the music of the pipe and flute; and there are darker stories of selkies and other seal-like creatures that take on human shape for purposes of both good and ill. Richly illustrated and accessibly written, Seal offers an immersive view of a much-loved, storied creature.

This book explores the lives of the world's largest living mammals. Drawing on the latest scientific research, Whales describes these incredible animals' evolution from terrestrial to marine mammals, their life cycle, diversity and distribution, and the ecosystems of which they are a part. Whales highlights the many extraordinary aspects of these intelligent and social creatures, including the complex vocalizations they use to communicate over vast distances. Philip Hammond, Sonja Heinrich, Sascha Hooker, and Peter Tyack investigate the role of whales in human culture, from whaling to whale watching, and emphasize how scientists monitor the current threats to whales and the methods they use to conserve their future. Spectacular photographs of whales in the wild reveal the private lives of these fascinating and majestic ocean giants.

Humans aside, dolphins, whales, and porpoises are often considered to be the smartest creatures on Earth. Science and nature buffs are drawn to stories of their use of tools, their self-recognition, their beautiful and complex songs, and their intricate societies. But how do we know what we know, and what does it mean? In Deep Thinkers, renowned cetacean biologist Janet Mann gathers a gam of the world's leading whale and dolphin researchers--including Luke Rendell, Hal Whitehead, and many more--to illuminate these vital questions, exploring the astounding capacities of cetacean brains. Diving into our current understanding of and dynamic research on dolphin and whale cognition, communication, and culture, Deep Thinkers reveals how incredibly sophisticated these mammals are--and how much we can learn about other animal minds by studying cetacean behavior. Through a combination of fascinating text and more than 150 beautiful and informative illustrations, chapters compare the intelligence markers of cetaceans with those of birds, bats, and primates, asking how we might properly define intelligence in nonhumans. As all-encompassing and profound as the seas in which these deep cetacean cultures have evolved, Deep Thinkers is an awesome and inspiring journey into the fathoms--a reminder of what we gain through their close study, and of what we lose when the great minds of the sea disappear.

This title trails the seahorse through secluded waters across the globe in a kaleidoscopic history that mirrors man's centuries-old fascination with the animal, sweeping from the reefs of Indonesia, through the back streets of Hong Kong and back in time to ancient Greece and Rome.

Dieses Lehrbuch gibt dem Studenten einen UEberblick uber alle wichtigen Lebensraume des Meeres: von den Kustengebieten bis hin zur Tiefsee und dem Meeresboden, von den Packeiszonen bis zu den Korallenriffen. Es setzt den Schwerpunkt auf diejenigen Lebensraume im Meer, die die grossen Flachen der Erdoberflache ausmachen und eine entsprechend grosse Bedeutung fur die Biosphare der Erde haben - z.B. bei der aktuellen Diskussion daruber, wieviel Kohlendioxid die Weltmeere aufnehmen koennen. Fur Studenten im 2. Studienabschnitt, Hochschullehrer, Lehrer der gymnasialen Oberstufe

From vividly colored underwater photographs of Australia's Great Barrier Reef to life-size dioramas re-creating coral reefs and the bounty of life they sustained, the work of early twentieth-century explorers and photographers fed the public's fascination with reefs. In the 1920s John Ernest Williamson in the Bahamas and Frank Hurley in Australia produced mass-circulated and often highly staged photographs and films that cast corals as industrious, colonizing creatures, and the undersea as a virgin, unexplored, and fantastical territory. In Coral Empire Ann Elias traces the visual and social history of Williamson and Hurley and how their modern media spectacles yoked the tropics and coral reefs to colonialism, racism, and the human domination of nature. Using the labor and knowledge of indigenous peoples while exoticizing and racializing them as inferior Others, Williamson and Hurley sustained colonial fantasies about people of color and the environment as endless resources to be plundered. As Elias demonstrates, their reckless treatment of the sea prefigured attitudes that caused the environmental crises that the oceans and reefs now face.