The Fish Vet's Blog

Read more here –
http://vetgirlontherun.com/suicide-awareness-dr-sophia-yin/

—
Yours sincerely,

Dr Richmond Loh
DipProjMgt, BSc, BVMS, MPhil (Pathology) Murdoch, MANZCVS (Aquatics& Pathobiology), CertAqV, CMAVA, NATA Signatory.
THE FISH VET, Perth, Western Australia.
Veterinary Medicine for fish.
W: http://www.thefishvet.com.au
E: thefishvet
P: +61 (0)421 822 383

Good News from Aquavetmed:

Washington, DC (Whitehouse Press Release) — A designated area in the South-Central Pacific Ocean is now home to pristine and biodiverse marine ecosystems that are vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. As part of this Year of Action, President Obama signed a proclamation on September 25, 2014 to designate the largest marine reserve in the world that is completely off limits to commercial resource extraction including commercial fishing.

The proclamation expands the existing Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, one of the most pristine tropical marine environments in the world, to six times its current size, resulting in 370,000 square nautical miles (490,000 square miles) of protected area around these tropical islands and atolls in the south-central Pacific Ocean. Expanding the Monument will more fully protect the deep coral reefs, seamounts, and marine ecosystems unique to this part of the world, which are also among the most vulnerable areas to the impacts of climate change and ocean acidification.

The recently released National Climate Assessment confirms that climate change is causing sea levels and ocean temperatures to rise. Changing temperatures can harm coral reefs and force certain species to migrate. In addition, carbon pollution is being absorbed by the oceans, causing them to acidify, which can damage coastal shellfish beds and reefs, altering entire marine ecosystems. To date, the acidity of our ocean is changing 50 times faster than any known change in millions of years.

In response to this growing threat, the President announced in June his commitment to use his authority to protect some of our most precious marine landscape just like he has for our mountains, rivers, and forests. The Administration identified expanding the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument as an area of particular interest because science has shown that large marine protected areas can help rebuild biodiversity, support fish populations, and improve overall ecosystem resilience.

To meet the President’s commitment, the Administration examined how to expand protections near the Monument and considered the input of fishermen, scientists, conservation experts, elected officials, and other stakeholders, including through a town hall meeting and over 170,000 comments submitted electronically.

The expanded Monument will include over 130 newly protected sea mounts, which are hotspots of biodiversity that harbor uncounted numbers of new and unique marine species. The expansion will better protect the habitat of animals with large migration and foraging ranges that stretch throughout the area, including sea turtles, marine mammals, and manta rays. The Monument is also home to millions of seabirds that forage over hundreds of miles and bring food back to their rookeries on the islands and atolls. These birds serve as a conveyor belt of energy bringing nutrients caught at sea back into the near shore environment where they help sustain the ecosystems.

Commercial fishing and other resource extraction activities, such as deep sea mining, are banned in the Monument. In recognition of the importance of encouraging and supporting access to federally managed areas, recreational and traditional fishing that is consistent with the conservation goals of the Monument will continue to be allowed in the expanded Monument.

This proclamation builds on the Administration’s efforts to protect both our lands and our oceans. Early in his first term, President Obama launched the National Ocean Policy to harmonize the implementation of more than 100 laws that govern our oceans and create a coordinated, science-based approach to managing the many resources and uses of our coasts and oceans. In June, President Obama launched a series of executive actions to increase protections for the ocean, including combating black market fishing, establishing a pathway to new marine sanctuaries, and understanding the impacts of ocean acidification. The President has also designated eleven other national monuments across the United States to permanently protect sites that are significant to our nation’s rich history and natural heritage.

The expanded monument will continue to be managed by the Departments of the Interior and Commerce through the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration respectively. The Agencies will develop management plans pursuant to their respective authorities under the Antiquities Act, the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery and Conservation Management Act, and other relevant authorities to ensure proper care and management of the Monument.

First exercised by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1906 to designate Devils Tower National Monument in Wyoming, the authority of the Antiquities Act has been used by 16 presidents since 1906 to protect unique natural and historic features in America, such as the Grand Canyon, the Statue of Liberty, and Colorado’s Canyons of the Ancients.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/n9sot8y

___________________________

AquaVetMed e-News provides information to veterinary and veterinary-allied subscribers concerning aquatic animal medicine, health, welfare, public health and seafood safety, obtained from a variety of sources (largely AquaVetMed subscribers). While provided by the American Veterinary Medical Association’s, Aquatic Veterinary Medicine Committee and are for public distribution, they do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the AVMA or the veterinary profession. See the AVMA Terms of Use (http://tinyurl.com/29h2rf)for further information.

Subscription and Contributions: Interested veterinarians and veterinary-allied professionals can subscribe, unsubscribe, or contribute pertinent news or information, by sending a message with “For AquaVetMed -” and the topic in the subject line, todscarfe@avma.org. If e-News information is used elsewhere please acknowledge AquaVetMed as the source. Encourage individuals to subscribe rather than distribute through list serves.

Note: Undelivered e-mails will not be resent; Subscribers will be deleted from the list after repeated undelivered or bounced messages and will have to re-subscribe. Messages may contain attachments that will have been scanned for known viruses.

Visit our website:www.avma.org

________________________________

Q: What do our fishy friends say when they’re having an exciting and fun time?

A: We’re having a whale of a time!

I received this from the aquavetmed mailing list:

The American Fisheries Society’s Fish Health Section Executive Committee recently approved an online / open access format of the Blue Book, with intent to provide others access to information on the detection and diagnosis of aquatic animal diseases.

The primary purpose of the Blue Book is to provide standardized diagnostic laboratory assay protocols for aquatic animal diseases. Standardized procedures and protocols will allow more informed decisions when evaluating weather animals are free of important disease causing agents, that is important in intrastate, interstate or international movement of aquatic animals, certifying disease freedom in an aquaculture operation, and other important regulatory issues.

New or updated in the 2014 edition are parts of the diagnostic section (motile aeromonas septicemia, weissellosis, general procedures for electron microscopy, viral erythrocytic necrosis and Infection with hematodinium) and inspection section (myxobolus cerebralis, a virology position statement and a parasitology position statement).

To access the online version of the Blue Book, go to http://afs-fhs.org/bluebook/bluebook-index.php.

For questions or queries please contact one of the following member of the Blue Book technical standards committee:
Keven Snekvik, Chair (ksnek@vetmed.wsu.edu)
Nick Phelps (phelp083@umn.edu)
Maureen Purcell, (mpurcell@usgs.gov)

___________________________
AquaVetMed e-News provides information to veterinary and veterinary-allied subscribers concerning aquatic animal medicine, health, welfare, public health and seafood safety, obtained from a variety of sources (largely AquaVetMed subscribers). While provided by the American Veterinary Medical Association’s, Aquatic Veterinary Medicine Committee and are for public distribution, they do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the AVMA or the veterinary profession. See the AVMA Terms of Use (http://tinyurl.com/29h2rf) for further information.

Subscription and Contributions: Interested veterinarians and veterinary-allied professionals can subscribe, unsubscribe, or contribute pertinent news or information, by sending a message with “For AquaVetMed -” and the topic in the subject line, to dscarfe@avma.org. If e-News information is used elsewhere please acknowledge AquaVetMed as the source. Encourage individuals to subscribe rather than distribute through list serves.

Note: Undelivered e-mails will not be resent; Subscribers will be deleted from the list after repeated undelivered or bounced messages and will have to re-subscribe. Messages may contain attachments that will have been scanned for known viruses.

Visit our website: http://www.avma.org
________________________________

Following on from last week’s post, and just to recap, I was lucky enough to be invited to attend a seminar on ground breaking research into shark sensory perception and how they were developing and testing shark repellants. You’ll need to read the previous post to get a bit of background so we can understand how and why the following devices show promise.

 

Chemical repellants against sharks

Nathan spoke on the use of chemical repellants that would be detected by the olfactory system (sense of smell) of sharks. What they found was that sharks were repelled by the essense of dead shark, special slime produced by the sole fish and sea cucumber and also, some common household detergents. Good news? Yes, in a way. But testing showed that these were impractical because diffusion of the chemical stimuli is too slow, and in the field where there is water current, these smells would not stay put.

 

Accoustic shark deterrents

It is known that sharks can hear low frequency sounds and are attracted to them. Research showed that they do not like loud sounds. But with time, they become habituated to it (used to it) and so they will return. So, loud sounds don’t really work in the long term. They were planning on trialling whale sounds. Not the relaxation ones people use for meditation, but ones from the predatory killer whales (OK, before you kick me, I know they are not considered true whales). They did talk about the theory of neophobia (fear of new things). Here they tried electronic sounds like from the Star Wars’ R2D2 which seemed to repel sharks. What also seemed to work was songs from ACDC! Sharks are no fans of the heavy metal music (frankly, I don’t blame them).

 

Visual protection against sharks

Sharks are attracted to yellow and silver, and they tend to investigate objects sporting these colours. They have found that low contrast material work as camouflage. For divers, they trialled 3 different shades of blue with patterns to break up the silhouette and they found it worked. They also trialed novel, unpleasant visual stimuli like very bright flashing lights which seemed to work. There is also the theory of biomimicry, having contrasting black and white stripes to imitate venemous sea snakes.

 

Electric deterrent system

Some products are being marketed as “shark shields”. These are electric deterrent systems and they do appear to be effective. There is promise for it to be used to protect swimming areas, and as a personal-based device. But more research needs to be done to know what are their limitations. Does it matter what species of shark, shark size, will it work with multiple sharks and will sharks become habituated?

 

But the most simple, and most promising thing researchers have found is….

…. in my blog post next week 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

Check out the review here:
http://vetpracticemag.com.au/tools-trade-premiere-portable-rechargeable-monocular-microscope/

Q: what do you call a loud, coarse-mannered woman?

A: fishwife.

Then I wonder what you’d call a fish vet’s wife…

Last Thursday, I attended a very good lecture on this topic at the University of Western Australia. Each of 3 lecturers took it in turns to present their unique findings: Prof. Shaun Collin, Assoc. Prof. Nathan Hart and Dr Ryan Kempster, all from the School of Animal Biology.

So what have we learnt?

 

The presentation started with describing their findings of the shark senses. Being living animals, it is not surprising that they have the 5 senses: sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch. These will be explained below.

 

Sight

They have found that sharks are monochromats, having peaks in receptors for the green-yellow wavelengths (with a secondary low peak at purple). Practically, this means they are somewhat “colour-blind”. Characteristics of colour-blind animals is that they are very good at detecting contrasts. They’ve found the greatest density of receptors in their eyes lie in the posterior-ventral part of the retina and this means that their line of best site is diagonally above, and in front of them. However, their visual acuity is only moderate which means they have to get close to see more clearly.

 

Hearing

On sound, sharks do have ears. The opening to the ear is in the dorsal surface (top) of the head, a slight distance behind the eye. It detects vibrations and hydrodynamic sounds (e.g. waves, splashing, eating, bubbles). They have good directional hearing, meaning they can tell where sound is coming from. Of the 10 shark species studied, they’ve found they can hear low frequency sounds, in the range of 10-800 Hz (cf humans 20-20,000 Hz).

 

Smell

Sharks have nostrils and they point downwards. They have folded skin to increase the surface area, making them able to detect as little as 1 drop of blood in a olympic-size swimming pool. This said, the olfactory bulbs in the brain of different elasmobranchs differ in size, so we can’t quite make sweeping generalisations.

 

Taste

Sharks have no external taste buds. Their taste buds are located in the oropharynx, basihyal (tongue) and gill arches. The highest concentration of taste buds are behind their teeth. This explains why they need to bite, or to mouth at things, in order to taste it.

 

Touch

I think I was late in to the lecture, and might have missed this section, or maybe they didn’t cover it. But if you’re reading this, and you were there, please do elaborate in the comments section. Thank you.

 

So, sharks have all the 5 senses that we have. But they have a couple more! Firstly, like all fishes, they have a “lateral line system“. These are little pits along the length of the body, each pit contains hairy cells and the pits are connected to adjacent pits by a channel. The lateral line system detects water motion and low frequency sounds (20-200 Hz). It is used for detecting obstacles.

 

The second special sense they have is called the “ampullae of Lorenzini“. These a small pits around the area of their snout and within the pits is a gel-like substance that helps conduct electrical currents from the environment to the electroreceptors within. These are so sensitive that they can detect electrical currents as low as 1 billionth of a volt! They use this to detect prey since all fishes produce small electric fields. Thus, electrical stimuli actually attract sharks to check things out. The abundance of these ampullae vary between species. A Port Jackson shark has only 200 pits, making them less adept at locating electrical stimuli, whereas the hammerhead shark as as many as 3000 pits, making them finely tuned. The great white shark has 800 and the shovelnose ray has 1200.

 

So now we know about their 7 special senses, how do we use this knowledge to our advantage? How do we create safer beaches for swimming? How do we create personal protective devices for divers?

 

Stay tuned to find out in my post next week.

This is a common guilt-trip question every non-enthusiasts puts to us. My argument is that it’s one of the healthiest “static” hobbies around.

Anyway, I came across a FB post by Boronia Aquarium that led me to find this humorous article on how you can decrease your power consumption.

http://www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk/mobile/content.php?sid=6508