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In 2022, we published three resiliency fables written by students participating in a Duke Engage summer program at Duke University Marine Lab. The fables — Ollie the Orca. Gilbert the Grouper, Terry the Tree and The Live Oak and The Wind — were an experiment, developed as part of a resiliency curriculum being co-developed by the Community Science Initiative and Carteret County middle school teachers. Little did the students know, the fables would go on to become the centerpiece of the Ready, Set, Resilience curriculum, and participating middle school students would write their own fables. Under the guidance of middle school teachers Robert Condie and Kayla Ipock, 8th grade students at Broad Creek Middle School wrote a total of 60 fables! This episode features 6 of our favorites.

In this episode, Alyssa Klim discusses the role of knowledge in shark and ray conservation in small local coastal communities in Indonesia. She looks at examples of conservation efforts that have failed to consider local context, and discusses how local knowledge can be incorporated into conservation practices and what this means for local communities. The episode features insights from Rafid Shidqi, co-founder and managing director of Thresher Shark Indonesia, an NGO dedicated to conserving thresher sharks in Indonesia. 

This episode features a recording of a live story telling event, “Fish Tales.” Hosted by Ally Kristan, staff at the Duke University Marine Lab, the episode features 5 stories, by Barbara Garrity-Blake, Dana Grieco, Brandon Letchworth, Ally Kristan, and Alexis Longmire. The live event was scheduled on the eve of Halloween, so you might note a ‘spooky’ theme. Fish Tales is inspired by NPR’s The Moth Radio Hour podcast, and it began in Santa Cruz in 2018, thanks to the amazing Dr. Melissa Cronin. Thanks to Crystal Coast Brewing Company for providing a venue.

This episode explores the topic of food sovereignty using the case study of Palestine. Tasneem and Porter examine the different elements of food sovereignty that can be seen in the Palestinian Keffiyeh and how they manifest in Palestinian’s culture and their economy. Finally, they look at policies that currently restrict those elements of food sovereignty. Part of the Conservation and Development Series.

In this episode Juan Rebellon, Margaret Morrison, Jordan Scott, and Juliette Lee, students from Dr. Xavier Basurto’s Community-Based Marine Conservation travel course in April 2022, explore cultural changes in the Comcaác Indigenous community and Kino Bay fishing community through the lens of food systems. Listeners will hear community members talk about topics such as their favorite foods, how they fish, and their cultural relationships from interviews conducted during the course in Sonora, Mexico.

In this episode, Aileen Lavelle and Sara Norton of the Duke University Bass Connections team “Belugas; Sentinels of Climate Change in the Arctic” share their experiences traveling to Churchill, Manitoba, Canada, the Polar Bear Capital of the World, to see belugas in person and learn about the impacts of climate change on these charismatic species and the ecotourism industry in a small, isolated town that depends on them. They ask what the role of conservatives is in wildlife conservation and sustainability. Wally Daudrich, Owner and Founder of Lazy Bear Lodge shares his insights on beluga tourism and how he came to run a sustainable tourism lodge in Churchill, Canada.

The Duke University Marine Lab hosts a holiday party in early December, and students are encouraged to think about performing a skit, or song, or dance. Mostly, they don't. Classes are still in session, exams are coming up, they are contemplating moving back to main campus after a semester at the lab. It's a busy time. But in 2023 the undergraduates took up the challenge. Let by Sage Hirschfeld and Nicole Masarova, and assisted by Lara Breithaupt and Emme Ayers, the students wrote and performed "The 12 days of DUML." Check out the videos of the live performance (of the song and a line dance) below. We liked the song so much, we got Sage and Nicole to perform and record it separately as well. Enjoy!

The Duke University Marine Lab is home to second year students in the coastal and marine systems (CAMS) concentration of a Masters of Environmental Management (MEM) degree. During the fall of their first year when they are based on main campus in Durham, CAMS students visit the marine lab for a weekend to meet faculty, staff, and students and to see a bit of Beaufort. The Seas the Day team took the opportunity in fall of 2022 to ask students about their motivations and interests in a career as an environmental professional. In this episode, Jake Whisler weaves together their stories of inspiration, motivation, hope, and community.  Featuring: Maeve Arthur, Allison Barbaro, Isaac Benaka, Katrina Bernaus, Taylor Coleman, Laura Exar, Aileen Lavelle, Hugh Cipparone, Hayden Dubniczki, Jasmine Papas, Stephanie Pipas, and Amanda Sajewski.

In this episode, the students in the Biology and Conservation of Sea Turtles travel class document their trip to Culerbra, Puerto Rico, and St. Croix, in the US Virgin Islands in a kind of 'travel diary'. Reflecting on what they did, who they met, and how they felt, the students effectively capture the very essence of travel courses and the heady combination of experiential learning and personal development

Masters students Mariana Kendall and Nicholas Fairbairn sit down with Dr. Carter Smith to learn about her circuitous career path to research ecology. Carter explains how her non-traditional and non-linear path to the sciences has made her a better researcher and educator. We center our conversation on the topic of ecological restoration, a field that inspired EO Wilson to deem the coming era the “Age of Restoration” and the UN to declare a “Decade of Ecological Restoration.” What is the next frontier for this field and how has Dr. Smith seen the field evolve throughout her career? What techniques are most salient and what considerations should practitioners and managers keep in mind when restoring an ecosystem? Dr. Smith shares insights into these questions and, along the way, touches on imposter syndrome in the sciences, ecological grief, and the merits of failure. This episode was recorded in Fall 2022 as part of our Lab Notes series.

How can we bridge extremely localized, traditional knowledge with the “best available science” of Western knowledge? Students of Dr. Xavier Basurto’s Community-Based Marine Conservation travelled to the Gulf of California in Sonora State, Mexico in April 2022, to find out. Brittany Tholan, Claire Huang, Grace Jennings, Jieyi Wang, and Zoe Wong explore how knowledge is passed down among the indigenous Comcaac people and local fishers, and how bridging knowledge types can help address local issues from sea turtle conservation to fisheries management.

What role do sea turtle hatcheries play in conservation? In this episode, Sarah Sevilla and Jessica Stevens dive into the background and various uses of hatcheries, compare the pros and cons, discuss their use in the US versus other nations, and explore improvements in and new technologies for sea turtle management. This episode features Airton Jesus, a field manager at the Turtle Foundation in Cape Verde, and Kartik Shanker, an ecologist with an interest in sea turtles, based in India. Part of our Sea Turtles series.

Restoration is a relatively new tool used for the conservation of marine and terrestrial ecosystems. As such, a certain level of uncertainty surrounds what restoration actually is. Our podcast seeks to understand how restoration is defined, specifically as it pertains to Target 2 of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework adopted by the the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in 2022. We are particular interested in artificial reefs and what role they might play in meeting Target 2, which aims to Ensure that by 2030 at least 30 per cent of areas of degraded terrestrial, inland water, and coastal and marine ecosystems are under effective restoration, in order to enhance biodiversity and ecosystem functions and services, ecological integrity and connectivity.

In this episode, Duke Marine Lab students Claire Helgerson, Kendra Rentz, and Anna de Hostos explore the processes by which researchers tag sea turtles to track migratory patterns and learn more about their somewhat mysterious life histories. Through interviews with various researchers, they discuss the methods of managing, processing and sharing tagging data in several sea turtle databases.

In December 2022, world leaders at the Convention on Biological Diversity adopted a proposal to conserve 30% of the Earth by 2030. This proposal was highly controversial and has met with varied reactions from Indigenous Peoples. In this episode, hosts Claudia Deeg and Devin Domeyer discuss the history of conservation’s violence towards Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Peoples' perspectives on the 30 by 30 proposal, and what happened during the negotiations. This episode features an interview with Jennifer (Jing) Corpuz, lead negotiator on conservation targets for the International Indigenous Forum on Biodiversity.