Mote Marine Laboratories gathered a panel of marine environmental scientists at the Immersion Theater on May 8th to acknowledge the growing concept of Sato-Umi, the integration of science and the community to promote the sustainable use of the marine environment. One of the speakers was Dr Tetsuo Yanagi, a professor at Kyushu University in Japan, who coined the phrase Sato Umi describing the partnership of both scientists and local citizens in the process of restoring, monitoring and sustaining marine ecosystems. Dr. Yanagi and the other speakers cited examples around the world where community members worked with scientists to restore or sustain coastal waters.

Ed Chiles, one of the early founders of START, talked about the work in nearby Cortez Village to develop mullet and mullet row as sustainable sources of seafood for both the environment and the economy.

Michael Crosby of Mote noted the valuable work by the citizen volunteers of the Sarasota Bay Watch in helping scientists seed scallops into Sarasota Bay to try and restart a viable population that thrived there years ago.

The scientists remarked how refreshing it was to visit an area where citizens through a variety of local organizations had such a long history of working to sustain their marine environment.

START has been practicing the concept of Sato-Umi since its inception back in 1995 through its partnership with Mote, the Florida Fish & Wildlife Research Institute and the Florida Department of Health in the ongoing activities of the Red Tide Alliance. In recent years, START has expanded its Sato-Umi activity through our partnership with the Sarasota Bay Watch in the effort to restore a sustainable scallop population in Sarasota Bay.

You can help this important effort by renewing your START membership on our website at www.start1.org or by sending a check to START, Bay Preserve, PO Box 784, Osprey, Fl 34229-0784.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission is asking Florida beachgoers and residents, who live along the beach, to be careful and watch out for sea turtles coming ashore to lay their eggs. The nesting season usually begins in May and goes thru October.

There are five different types of turtles who nest on Florida shores, all of which are threatened or endangered. They are the green, leatherback, hawksbill, Kemp’s Ridley and the most common, the loggerhead.

The sea turtle lays 75 to 150 eggs, buries them and then returns to the sea. About 50 to 60 days later hatchlings scramble from the nest and instinctively head toward the water.

Please do not approach, touch or pick up nesting turtles or hatchlings. Don’t use flashlights or fishing lamps on the beach as the hatchlings rely on the bright light of the moon to guide them to the sea. Artificial lights lure them in the wrong direction often resulting in their deaths. Condo’s located on the beach, or in close proximity, should keep drapes closed at night. Beachgoers should not tamper with stakes marking turtle nests.

In the past Mote Laboratories would mark turtle nests on private property for free but because of budget constraints will no longer be able to perform this service.

A sensor, known as an Environmental Sample Processor (ESP), described as a garbage can size canister, was launched in late April in the ocean waters off southern Maine to collect and transmit data about toxin-producing algae blooms, known as red tides. The sensor will also detect one of the potentially fatal toxins that the algal species produce. It will be taken out in mid June and replaced by another that will continue taking samples through the rest of the red tide season. A second sensor will be deployed in May.

The sensors contain a pint size robotic biology lab that extracts organisms from water samples, tests them for DNA and toxins, and instantly sends the information to shore by cellphone. The ESP’s are mounted to ocean buoys in the Gulf of Maine.

The new processors are intended to complement, not replace, existing red tide monitoring programs. State agencies now test for red tide in coastal shellfish areas, but there’s never been ongoing testing in waters miles offshore.

The first laboratory in a can was deployed off Maine in 2000. The idea was to find a way to retrieve test data from the ocean in a timely manner without actually going to sea.