Conservation and Learning about Sharks with Dr. Demian Chapman
Dr. Demian Chapman is an International Shark Expert, Director of Sharks and Rays Conservation at Mote Marine Laboratory and Professor at Florida International University. Dr. Chapman leads the FinPrint team to work to come up with better ways to protect sharks and rays. In many countries the fins from sharks are used to make soup which is causing large numbers of sharks to be killed. China is a country that kills large numbers of sharks for this purpose. Dr. Chapman received funding from Ellen for shark conservation and leads Ellen's social media for shark week.
Dr. Chapman has worked with locations all over the world to pair up scientists, fishermen/ locals, and government to work together to save sharks and the environment they live in. In Belize they put incentives in place for fisherman to tag sharks instead of catching them. They receive some income from this work and are working to save the environment. When everyone works together on the environment everyone wins.
Coexistence of Polar Bears and Humans
Churchill is home to humans and polar bears. They need to coexist safely. Polar bears are the "kings of the Arctic." Knowing this, polar bears and humans basically have to make a treaty of an agreement on how they use their land. As we sat in a bus, a polar bear walked down the street. The people of Churchill consist of about 800 people in this very small town. However, this town is right in the center of a dream life for a polar bear. Polar bears come to this town to wait for the Hudson Bay to freeze and go catch seals on the Hudson Bay sea ice. Polar bears have to wait for the sea ice to freeze to get food. This means that if the water does not freeze the polar bears will likely starve. If the polar bears are hungry, they will come to the town in search of food. This is very dangerous for the bears and humans. The bears will try to eat garbage and could possibly hurt humans in finding their next meal. The Churchilians know this danger so they are prepared for the bears to come into town.
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The Polar Bean Alert Groups gets alerted by the hotline ((204)675-BEAR) when a person sees a bear. The group makes a decision based on the zone to send a conservation officer out. When the find a polar bear is directly in town they immediately find and go to the bear. Once they see the bear depending on how far it is in town they decide how to handle it. If it is threatening a human, they will tranquilize the bear or chase the bear out of town using a truck with a sound board with 180 sounds to scare it to move. If they tranquilize the bear they will put the bear in a place called the Polar Bear Holding Facility or Polar Bear Jail. Polar Bear Jail is the storage place to hold misbehaved polar bears. It can hold about 30 polar bears. The bears stay there up to 30 days maximum. When they are in jail, they will not be fed. They won't be fed so the polar bears learn a lesson and don't become dependent on people to feed them. we wouldn't want the polar bears to want to go to jail or come into town to get there.
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Churchill provides a lot of education on bear safety to the community its and visitors. People learn to stay their distance and avoid areas during specific seasons. The people share their town with the bears. This helps people understand to appreciate wildlife and the polar bears and give them the room to live together with humans.
