E. C. M. Parsons

The Sustainability of Whale-watching in Scotland

Scotlands tourism trade grosses £2.5 billion annually and supports 180,000 jobs; whale-watching is an important part of this activity. Whales and dolphins are the countrys number one wildlife attraction and with 11,770 km of coastline the potential for the Scottish industry is huge. In rural areas it can provide as much as 12% of local income. During the tourist season of 2000, questionnaires and telephone interviews were used to investigate the sustainability of Scottish whale-watching. 48 operators cooperated providing economic and environmental information. Most operators were found to be local people (72.4%), supporting five or less full-time equivalent jobs (86.4%). Over half of those questioned (63.2%) had alternative incomes and no formal training in wildlife tourism or business management (70.8%); 89.5% of respondents stated that they follow a code of conduct. The East Coast and Western Isles show the best-perceived trends in tourist numbers. Whale-watching in Scotland is shown to have potential for growth but a need to be regulated and managed from within the industry to ensure environmental and economic sustainability into the future.

Seventy‐One Important Questions for the Conservation of Marine Biodiversity

The ocean provides food, economic activity, and cultural value for a large proportion of humanity. Our knowledge of marine ecosystems lags behind that of terrestrial ecosystems, limiting effective protection of marine resources. We describe the outcome of 2 workshops in 2011 and 2012 to establish a list of important questions, which, if answered, would substantially improve our ability to conserve and manage the world’s marine resources. Participants included individuals from academia, government, and nongovernment organizations with broad experience across disciplines, marine ecosystems, and countries that vary in levels of development. Contributors from the fields of science, conservation, industry, and government submitted questions to our workshops, which we distilled into a list of priority research questions. Through this process, we identified 71 key questions. We grouped these into 8 subject categories, each pertaining to a broad component of marine conservation: fisheries, climate change, other anthropogenic threats, ecosystems, marine citizenship, policy, societal and cultural considerations, and scientific enterprise. Our questions address many issues that are specific to marine conservation, and will serve as a road map to funders and researchers to develop programs that can greatly benefit marine conservation. Setenta y Un Preguntas Importantes para la Conservación de la Biodiversidad Marina Resumen Los océanos proporcionan alimento, actividad económica y valor cultural para una gran porción de la humanidad. Nuestro conocimiento de los ecosistemas marinos está atrasado con respecto al que tenemos de los ecosistemas terrestres, lo que limita la protección efectiva de los recursos naturales. Describimos el resultado de dos talleres en 2011 y 2012 para establecer una lista de preguntas importantes, las cuales al ser respondidas, mejorarían sustancialmente nuestra habilidad de conservar y manejar los recursos marinos del mundo. Entre los participantes se incluyeron a individuos de la docencia, el gobierno y organizaciones no-gubernamentales, con una amplia experiencia que atraviesa disciplinas, ecosistemas marinos y países que varían en el nivel de desarrollo. Los contribuyentes de los campos de la ciencia, la conservación, la industria y el gobierno, presentaron preguntas a nuestros talleres, las cuales separamos en una lista de preguntas de investigación prioritarias. Por medio de este proceso, identificamos 71 preguntas clave. Las agrupamos en ocho categorías temáticas, cada una perteneciente a un componente amplio de la conservación marina: pesquerías, cambio climático, otras amenazas antropogénicas, ecosistemas, ciudadanía marina, política, consideraciones sociales y culturales, y la iniciativa científica. Nuestras preguntas se dirigen a muchas cuestiones que son específicas de la conservación marina, y servirán como una ruta a seguir para patrocinadores e investigadores que busquen desarrollar programas que puedan beneficiar ampliamente a la conservación marina.

How Twitter Literacy Can Benefit Conservation Scientists

While some scientists may view Twitter as a social media fad, we argue that it can be a powerful tool to deliver conservation messages to a wide audience. In 2011 and 2013, the Society for Conservation Biology (SCB) Marine Section supported one of this editorial’s co-authors (D.S.) as a communications fellow to share research in conservation science and practice that was presented at SCB’s International Congress for Conservation Biology (ICCB) and to track the online conversations associated with each meeting. What he found was a worldwide audience thirsty for the knowledge presented and eager to participate in the proceedings. The use of Twitter at the 2011 and 2013 ICCB meetings highlights the important role that social media can play in sharing conservation messages far beyond the confines of the conference halls. There were 1731 conferencerelated posts (i.e., tweets) with the official hashtag #ICCB at the 2011 meeting in Auckland, New Zealand. These tweets were typically short summaries (limited by Twitter to 140 characters) of conference presentations or paraphrased statements of particular note from presenters who were acknowledged by name in the tweet. Tweets and retweets (sharing of a tweet written by another user) with the #ICCB hashtag were made by a minimum of 176 unique tweeters (i.e., Twitter users) from at least 40 countries on 6 continents (Shiffman 2012). While the 2011 conference was attended by more than 1000 scientists from 80 countries, fewer than 10% of the tweeters actually attended the meeting (Shiffman 2012), showing that Twitter facilitated a truly global conversation about the information presented at ICCB 2011. The rate of tweeting at ICCB 2011 was considered high compared with other academic meetings and it was estimated that between 110,000 and 150,000 Twitter users saw at least one conference-related tweet (Aaron Muszalski in Shiffman 2012). Twitter continued to be influential at the 2013 ICCB meeting in Baltimore, Maryland. Over 1500 scientists and conservation practitioners attended the 2013 meeting and the number of unique tweets nearly doubled to 3217, roughly an 85% increase over ICCB 2011. A minimum of 427 unique users tweeted or retweeted at least one #ICCB2013 tweet, again a significant increase from the previous meeting. As with the 2011 meeting, approximately 90% of these users were not present at the meeting, participating instead in online conversations about conservation. Offsite participants could even interact directly with speakers—questions asked on Twitter could be relayed to the presenter and the answers then tweeted back to the Twitter community. At the 2011 ICCB, more than 50 questions from Twitter users on five continents were asked at just one panel session (Shiffman 2012), and “several panelists confided that they got more challenging and more interesting questions from Twitter than from the ICCB attendees in the room” (Shiffman 2012: 260). To further encourage the use of Twitter, presenters at the 2013 ICCB were asked to provide a tweetable abstract of their presentation (i.e., a summary in 140 characters or less). For example, “U.S. wind turbines kill 45,000– 644,000 birds per year; taller turbines kill more birds, and diurnal raptors are disproportionately affected” (S. Loss, see Supporting Information for more examples). These abstract tweets provided the main conclusions or the key take-home message of a presentation in a way that could be easily understood and demonstrated that it is possible to communicate conservation science in a concise but also extremely effective way. However, many conference participants were unsure about what a Twitter abstract was meant to accomplish. The majority of submitted abstract tweets were shortened, slightly rewritten or repeated versions of the talk title. Others included overly technical scientific jargon, used superfluous hashtags, or exceeded the character limit. While any engagement is better than no engagement, these tweets were impractical, duplicative, or less accessible to the public. In contrast, well-crafted tweetable abstracts provided useful sound bites with which to communicate research. We hope future ICCB meetings will continue to encourage submission of tweetable abstracts and provide guidelines for presenters. For example, the most effective Twitter abstracts would start with the author’s surname, include one or two links to hashtag topics or websites, and finish with the conference hashtag. These abstracts can then be posted online in advance of the meeting and at the beginning or conclusion of each individual talk to disseminate the author’s perspective and encourage online discussions.

Public awareness, education, and marine mammals in captivity

Increasing popularity of marine parks as tourist attractions brought with it a number of concerns. Considerable attention has been paid to investigate issues, such as the ethics of keeping marine mammals in captivity, welfare of captive marine mammals, and the educational and conservational abilities of marine parks. Little research has been conducted to explore the public�s awareness and opinions of these issues. Public awareness is an important tool to understand the quality of a marine park�s products and services. This study was designed to investigate the public�s awareness of welfare of captive marine mammals, educational and conservational purposes of marine parks, and to examine public awareness and opinions of Dunlap and Van Liere�s New Environmental Paradigm. A total of 120 respondents from St. Catharines, Canada completed either a visitor or a nonvisitor questionnaire. Results indicated that most people were aware of the issues of welfare of captive marine mammals and educational opportunities offered by marine parks, but showed less awareness of the conservational issues. However, results also indicated that respondents were well aware of, and agree with, the concerns expressed in the New Environmental Paradigm.

Attitudes of College Undergraduates Towards Coyotes (Canis latrans) in an Urban Landscape: Management and Public Outreach Implications.

Simple Summary Understanding the public’s attitudes towards urban wildlife is an important step towards creating management plans, increasing knowledge and awareness about wildlife, and fostering coexistence between people and wildlife. Using undergraduate college students in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area (where coyotes are a recent arrival), this study examined attitudes towards coyotes and coyote management methods. Amongst other findings, we found differences in opinion between key demographic groups, and respondents grouped management methods into two categories: methods that modified human behavior, and methods that had a direct impact on coyotes. Our results have important implications for coyote management in urban areas. Abstract Understanding and assessing the public’s attitudes towards urban wildlife is an important step towards creating management plans, increasing knowledge and awareness, and fostering coexistence between people and wildlife. We conducted a survey of undergraduate college students in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area—where coyotes are recent arrivals—to determine existing attitudes towards coyotes and coyote management methods. Amongst other findings, we found that the more a person feared coyotes, the less likely they were to support their presence (p < 0.001), and the less likely they were to believe that pet owners should be directly responsible for protecting their pets (p < 0.001). Respondents demonstrated major gaps in their understanding of basic coyote biology and ecology. Respondents broke wildlife management practices into two categories: those that involved an action on coyotes (both lethal or non-lethal; referred to as “Coyote”), and those that restricted human behavior (referred to as “Human”); the “Human” methods were preferred. We found important differences between key demographic groups in terms of attitudes and management preferences. Our study suggests that wildlife professionals have unique opportunities in urban areas to prevent and reduce conflict before it escalates, in part by targeting tailored outreach messages to various demographic and social groups.

A reason not to support whaling – a tourism impact case study from the Dominican Republic

In 2007, 206 tourists in the Dominican Republic were surveyed to determine whether the stance of a country in support of whale conservation, or in support of whaling, would affect their decision about whether to visit that country on holiday. The majority (77.1%; n = 205) stated that if a Caribbean country supported the hunting or capture of whales or dolphins they would be less likely to visit it on holiday (more likely: 2.9%; no opinion 20.0%). Moreover, a larger majority (81.1%) stated that if a country has a strong commitment to whale and dolphin conservation they would be more likely to visit that country on vacation (less likely: 4.9%; no opinion: 14.1%). There was no significant relationship between respondent demographics and their response. During this study the Dominican Republic was not a member of the International Whaling Commission (the international competent authority for whale management) but government officials were debating membership of, and their policy in, this highly polarized treaty organization. This study suggests that a highly visible national policy towards cetacean conservation, and against the capture of cetaceans, would be beneficial in attracting the tourists, whereas a visible pro-whaling policy might repel them.

Recent advances in whale-watching research: 2006-2007.

Whalewatching research encompasses a wide variety of disciplines and fields of study including monitoring the biological impacts of whalewatching activities on cetaceans and assessments of the effectiveness of whalewatching management and regulations, to the sociological and economic aspects of whalewatching on communities hosting such activities. Many of these research activities are of interest to the Whalewatching Sub-Committee of the International Whaling Commission, in particular research on the impacts of whalewatching, and whalewatching as a source of scientific data that could be used in management decisions. This paper is the latest of a series of annual digests that describes the variety and findings of whalewatching studies published since the 58th Annual meeting of the IWC, in 2006.

The Impact of Information on Students' Beliefs and Attitudes Toward Coyotes

Providing information to the public about a species can impact the publics attitudes toward that species. Overall, providing information in any of four categories of information about coyotes positively influenced attitudes toward coyotes using six attitudinal measurements (p < .01). Behavior statements most positively influenced attitudes, followed by images of coyotes, statements about humans and coyotes, and statements about coyote ecology. How well specific pieces of information were received is also discussed.

Public awareness and attitudes towards naval sonar mitigation for cetacean conservation: a preliminary case study in Fairfax County, Virginia. (the DC Metro area).

The potential impacts of naval sonar on cetaceans has led to a series of court cases and statements of concern by international organizations. However, there has been no research conducted on attitudes of the general public with respect to this issue. To investigate this, a preliminary public survey was conducted in Fairfax, Virginia (the Washington, DC Metro region). The majority of the public sampled believed that naval sonar impacted marine mammals (51.3%), that the US Navy should not be exempt from environmental regulations in time of peace (75.2%), and that sonar use should be moderated if it impacts cetaceans (75.8%). Individuals who were conservative, Republican, and have served in the military were more likely to believe the Navy should be exempt from marine mammal protection regulations. In addition, expert interviews were conducted to gain opinions on the potential ramifications of the recent US Supreme Court case on naval sonar mitigation.

Navy sonar, cetaceans and the US Supreme Court: a review of cetacean mitigation and litigation in the US.

One source of anthropogenic noise in the oceans which has attracted much concern is naval sonar. As a result of possible impacts of such sonar, several environmental NGOs have pursued legal cases in the United States criticizing environmental assessments conducted prior to exercises and proposed mitigation measures. Cases have been brought using the US National Environmental Protection Act, Marine Mammal Protection Act, Endangered Species Act, Coastal Zone Management Act and other statutes. This paper reviews the chronology and results of these various cases. During the G.W. Bush presidential administration, the legal battle went to the US Supreme Court in the case Winter vs. Natural Resources Defense Council. This case however, did not address the potential impacts of sonar on cetaceans or the effectiveness of mitigation measures. During the Obama administration, mitigation measures for naval exercises have been revised, and working groups planned, in an attempt to resolve conflict between parties.