California

Newborn White Shark Pup
Newborn white shark pup (Photo by Carlos Gauna)

Drone discovery: A newborn great white shark

(TOP BANNER IMAGE: Carlos Gauna/The Malibu Artist) 

The remarkable sighting occurred on 9 July 2023, approximately 400m (1,300ft) off the shores of Carpinteria, California. Wildlife filmmaker Carlos Gauna and Phillip Sternes, a doctoral student in the Department of Biology at the University of California Riverside, stumbled upon the extraordinary sight while filming aerial footage.

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Announcing the 24th Annual SDUFEX Undersea Film Festival

The 2023 San Diego UnderSea Film Festival will be held Friday, October 6 and Saturday, October 7 at the Irwin M Jacobs Qualcomm Hall. Join us for a wonderful evening featuring some of the best underwater short films from around the world.

There will be a unique program each evening and tickets are available now at SDUFEX.com.

If you are unable to join us in person, tickets will be available to watch our virtual film festival October 9-31.

San Diego Undersea Film Exhibition is back in person October 1, 2022

Please join us for a wonderful evening featuring some of the best short underwater films from around the world. 

The in person event is for one evening only on Saturday, October 1, 2022 from 7:00-9:30pm PDT at the Irwin M. Jacobs Qualcomm Hall in San Diego, CA.

A Virtual Film Festival will follow from October 8 - 16, 2022. Tickets for the virtual festival will be available following the live event.

Sea otters bounce back but fall prey to great whites
Sea otters bounce back but fall prey to great whites

White sharks complicate population recovery for sea otters

Complex interactions and conflicts between protected populations may challenge the recovery of whole ecosystems. Several factors indicate that white sharks may be currently limiting the recovery of California sea otters.

Protected white sharks (Carcharodon carcharias) and pinnipeds have an established predator–prey relationship along the California coast.

White sharks are considered threatened by the IUCN Red List, and though they are protected at state, federal, and global scales, their current status in the northeastern Pacific is debated.

Striking Hydrothermal vents, chimneys, and mirror pools, with large population of tubeworms in the JaichaMaa' ja' ag vent field.
Striking Hydrothermal vents, chimneys, and mirror pools, with large population of tubeworms in the JaichaMaa' ja' ag vent field.

Hydrothermal vents and possible new species discovered in Gulf of California

The hydrothermal vents are located in the Pescadero basin and are unique both in their chemistry and appearance to other known hydrothermal vents, as they are the only ones currently observed to emit clear fluids as opposed to dark, smokey fluids associated with iconic “black smoker” vents.

Indigenous names

The largest of the new vent mounds, named Maija awi, sits midway between the JaichaMaa ‘ja’ag vent field, discovered by the same team during Schmidt Ocean Institute’s 2018 R/V Falkor expedition, and the Auka vent field, discovered during an expedition by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) in 2015.

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Photo by incidencematrix / Flickr Commons / CC BY 2.0
Whales at Dana Point, California, USA. Photo by incidencematrix / Flickr Commons / CC BY 2.0

Business rivals worked together to make Dana Point a Whale Heritage Site

In late January 2021, the World Cetacean Alliance (WCA) named Dana Point, California as a Whale Heritage Site, the first such site in the Americas.

The reasons were obvious: As one of the world's top whale-watching destinations, it hosts a variety of whales all year round, including the blue whale. It has more dolphins per square mile than anywhere in the world. Dana Point also has a small non-commercial harbor, community support, and undertaken public outreach and education, advocacy and research efforts. 

Long Beach Scuba Show 2021 Cancelled

Last year, we told you that there was "no way to responsibly hold an event of this size with people from around the world for the foreseeable future." When we wrote that, we never would have guessed the "foreseeable future" would extend well over a year.

To bridge the gap, we are working on a resource for divers - for you. Information from our exhibitors with videos, specials, new products, travel and more.

The harbour porpoise is one of eight extant species of porpoise. It is one of the smallest species of cetacean.
The harbour porpoise is one of eight extant species of porpoise. It is one of the smallest species of cetacean.

Increases in California harbor porpoise population due to gillnet ban

Before they were closed down, these fisheries would cause the deaths of many harbor porpoises, as they ended up as bycatch in the fisheries' gillnets. And based on the numbers, it is apparent that such coastal set gillnets had taken a greater toll on the harbor porpoises than we realized.

This is the finding of a paper published in the Marine Mammal Science journal.

Giant kelp (Macrocystis pyrifera) is a species of kelp (large brown algae)

Kelp forests help the climate

Kelp is an ecologically and economically important foundation species in California, where forests line nutrient-rich, rocky bottom coasts. It also might alleviate acidification caused by too much atmospheric carbon being absorbed by the seas.

A new interdisciplinary analysis of giant kelp in Monterey Bay off the coast of California shows that near the ocean’s surface, the water was less acidic, suggesting the kelp canopy does reduce acidity.

California's Channel Islands: Kelp Diving on the US West Coast

A bright orange Garibaldi fish and crimson-colored California sheephead with red gorgonian at Santa Barbara Island. Photo by Frankie Grant

Due to their unique position relative to the eastern Pacific current, or the California Current, the Channel Islands off California’s coast receive an ideal amount of nutrients and water circulation for optimum growth of California giant kelp. This colonial algae forms forests over the rocky reefs and walls surrounding the islands, and act as one of the world’s most productive marine ecosystems.