National Marine Week 2014

29 September 2014 - 8:40am — Mari-Lise

It's National Marine Week from the 6th to the 12th of October this year!
SANBI marine programme and the SeaKeys project will be running several events in celebration of this and we encourage everyone to get involved and spread the word.

1) A countrywide bioblitz for the week of the 6-12 October. During this time we are encouraging people to get into the ocean (or out onto the rocky shores) and photograph as many species of fishes and crustaceans . All images must be taken during marine week and uploaded to iSpot before midnight on the 17th October and tagged with “MW14”. The individual who uploads the most species gets a Gold SeaKeys badge.

2) We will also be running a month long competition for a second Gold badge as well as a prize in the form of a beautiful book on marine diversity. The winner will be the person with the most uploads to iSpot for the month of October . These photographs can be of any marine species and from anytime and anywhere in South Africa as long as they are uploaded onto iSpot during the month of October and tagged with “COS” which stands for Celebrating our Seas. Please note that images from the bioblitz above can be used to contribute to your month uploads, just tag them with both “COS” tag and “MW14”

3) If you are in Cape Town, Georgina Jones will be giving a talk on the many discoveries of marine life and previously unknown behaviours and interactions made by South African scuba divers. These include several species of fish (including, most famously, the coelacanths of Sodwana Bay), and many invertebrates: anemones, shrimps, worms and nudibranchs. Scuba divers have also discovered the builders of mysterious submarine mounds and unearthed clues hinting at the secret life of tiny crustaceans. She will also talk about SeaKeys, a three year project which aims to digitise marine information held in museums around the country, as well as map marine animals' distributions around our coast. She will explain the two bioblitzes planned for the period, how these initiatives will work and what prizes you can win. The talk will be held twice: first at Pisces Divers in Simonstown starting at 18h30 on the 7th of October and then again at OMSAC also starting at 19h00 on the 9th of October. Please RSVP directly to Georgina [email protected] . Please specify which venue you're planning on so we can get an idea of numbers.

If you have any queries please feel free to contact Mari-Lise [email protected] or Rose [email protected] .
Thank you all for your support and have a fantastic Marine Week.

Attachment	Size
Picture1.png	9.81 KB