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July 14, 2015

Mediterranean compared to the Baltic

VIDEOGRAFO EXPLICANDO A COCINERA ASPECTOS DEL FUNCIONAMIENTO DEL DRON DE FILMACION

 

New sea, new species and new habitats, but threats are common and easily recognizable. My week joining the Life Bahar Malta Expedition onboard the Oceana Ranger is almost done. It has been very exciting being sailing and conducting surveys on this beautiful catamaran. The biodiversity in the Mediterranean is far different from the Baltic´s, the region I normally work with. The habitats and species are all new to me, so I have been trying to listen and learn from Ricardo Aguilar and Helena Alvarez who are experts on the area. Besides the wide biodiversity, I have also seen some of the threats that jeopardize the Mediterranean like plastics floating on the sea surface and lots of fishing nets entangled around coral reefs, which unfortunately are part of everyday´s sailing and surveys. On the other hand, deep areas in the Mediterranean are not suffering from eutrophication and oxygen depletion, like in the Baltic; the habitats and species present on the depths, would have been dead zones in the Baltic Sea. Today, for instance, we filmed a small-spotted catshark (Scyliorhinus canicula) with the ROV at 500 meters depth.