Category Archives: methods

Winter of the Shark: It Pays to Know People

Posted on February 19, 2013 by Chuck

This past weekend marked a new venture into shark-related field work.  For the better part of two months I’ve been fighting the good fight to keep ECU’s acoustic array up off of Cape Hatteras, and last Friday and Saturday finally … Continue reading →

Posted in fishing, gill nets, grad school, methods, North Carolina, research, sharks, Winter of the Shark | Leave a comment

AES 2012: Day 1 Highlights

Posted on August 9, 2012 by Chuck

AES has officially begun!  The first day of the World Congress of Herpetology (referred to as “AES” from here on out, because that’s the part I care about, no disrespect to the scalies) kicked off with free breakfast, which was … Continue reading →

Posted in AES, conference, dorkiness, ecology, methods, sharks | 2 Comments

Summer of the Shark: Stingray City

Posted on August 5, 2012 by Chuck

My summer-long (likely into a little bit of autumn) quest to find sharks in the Pamlico Sound took me to the waters of the Neuse River this past Thursday.  I’ve been out on the Neuse looking for sharks on a … Continue reading →

Posted in cownose rays, fishing, gill nets, grad school, methods, North Carolina, research, Summer of the Shark | Leave a comment

Summer of the Shark: Warts And All, Mostly Warts

Posted on July 22, 2012 by Chuck

Some field days just don’t go well.  This past Thursday I went out with Evan and Jeff to do a little opportunistic shark sampling in the Pamlico River while they were out collecting water samples for a striped bass project.  … Continue reading →

Posted in fishing, gill nets, grad school, gross, methods, North Carolina, research, Summer of the Shark, wtf | 1 Comment

Declining Predators eat Mediterranean Jellies

Posted on June 13, 2012 by Chuck

It wasn’t my intention to keep picking on the Mediterranean, but this paper was just too damn interesting.  In the Mediterranean, like many other marine environments worldwide, numbers of jellyfish and ctenophores (those really colorful comb jellies, actually not related … Continue reading →

Posted in conservation, ecology, gut contents, methods, research blogging | Leave a comment

Blacktip or Spinner?

Posted on March 3, 2012 by Chuck

During my last trip out to the field, I documented a small shark that came up in the gillnet, and identified it as a juvenile blacktip shark.  Now, after looking over the picture in better detail and consulting the literature, … Continue reading →

Posted in methods, mystery fish, North Carolina, sharks | 9 Comments

New Dogfish Species Found in Taiwanese Fish Market

Posted on August 30, 2011 by Chuck

The Order Squaliformes, home to the dogfish sharks, is one of the most diverse groups of sharks currently swimming the oceans, second only to the Carcharhiniformes in sheer number of species.  Within that order is the Family Squalidae, made up … Continue reading →

Posted in methods, mystery fish, research blogging, science, spiny dogfish | 2 Comments

Hunting Bull Sharks in the Neuse

Posted on August 11, 2011 by Chuck

Yesterday I got the chance to wake up before dawn and head down to Morehead City to help out Duke PhD student Meagan Dunphy-Daly in her research on bull sharks and their habits in the Neuse River.  She has a … Continue reading →

Posted in fishing, grad school, methods, North Carolina, photography, research, sharks, tagging | 4 Comments

Harpoon Fishing is Totally Badass

Posted on August 9, 2011 by Chuck

Bycatch is a huge problem in commercial fishing operations.  The need to make trips out on the water worth the expenses of gas, gear, and work-hours means that often commercial gear is designed to capture as many fish as possible … Continue reading →

Posted in conservation, fisheries, fishing, methods, MSC | 8 Comments

101 Uses for Shark Puke Part 2: How Much Do Sharks Eat?

Posted on July 30, 2011 by Chuck

The last time I wrote about the usefulness of shark puke, I discussed a few of the less obvious uses of diet studies on sharks.  As apex predators, sharks can sample a wide variety of potential prey species, and diet … Continue reading →

Posted in ecology, fisheries management, gut contents, methods, research blogging, sharks, spiny dogfish | Leave a comment