When Brenda Konar launched the first scientific diving course at the University of Alaska Fairbanks in 2000, there was some speculation that it could be a short-lived experiment. After all, how much demand could there really be for a class that combines cold-water diving and research skills? That gamble has paid off nicely: The scientific […]
A 45-year-old Naukati man, in a plea agreement, pleaded guilty to two commercial fishing misdemeanors last Thursday in a two-year-old case of harvesting sea cucumbers in a closed area. Jonathan W. McGraw and two others, it was determined in the investigation that spanned four months, had illegally harvested sea cucumbers from closed waters that included […]
Reductions in sea ice in the Arctic have a clear impact on animals such as polar bears that rely on frozen surfaces for feeding, mating and migrating. But sea ice loss is changing Arctic habitat and affecting other species in more indirect ways, new research finds. Beluga whales that spend summers feeding in the Arctic […]
Children’s singer and songwriter Raffi may have brought beluga whales into popular culture with his 1980 song “Baby Beluga,” but surprisingly little is actually known about the life and ecology of these elusive marine mammals that live in some of the world’s most remote, frigid waters. Two distinct populations spend winters in the Bering Sea, […]