This week DMAD staff and interns have been attending the European Cetacean Society Webinar which has been presented quite frankly by some of the legends of the marine mammal world
Wow, what a week! Usually the ECS is a meeting which brings together experts from all over the world to share knowledge and new discoveries, promote international collaboration and generally act as a reminder as to why the marine mammal community works so hard to try and achieve what they can with limited resources. Unfortunately, this could not happen this year because of the current global pandemic and so instead, refusing to be beaten by the current situation, the ECS organised an online webinar of presentations. The event has been incredibly well organised and allowed a much larger array of attendees to learn and contribute from the event. Talks have come in many forms ranging from an inspiring talk from Dr. Greg Donovan about the future of marine mammal conservation and our combined responsibilities as scientists to talks all about whale poo and the effects of whales as ocean engineers by Dr. Heidi Pearson.
Today, DMAD will be presenting the final session of the European Cetacean Society, “Fishing practices affect the behavioural budget of bottlenose dolphins off the coast of Montenegro, South Adriatic Sea”. The presentation gives some of the results from Laura Rudd et al.’s work on the differencesin behaviour exhibited by dolphins when in the presence of artisanal and industrial fisheries. Unfortunately Laura has recently undergone major surgery so Molly Crowe, one of DMAD’s interns from our new and highly successful remote internship who helped with the analysis will be presenting on her behalf. Make sure to catch the talk at 16:20 – 16:50 (Central European Time). That’s 15:20 UK time or 18:20 Turkish times. DMAD wishes Laura a speedy recovery.
