A Cape Cod company is now launching a timer that might help save dwindling populations of sea turtles from being decimated by fishing nets.

The new device is a 7-inch (18 cm) long silver cylinder capable of keeping track of how long a net has been submerged. Federal research indicates that a vast majority of entangled sea turtles will survive if they are rescued and given a chance to breath within 50 minutes.

According to predictions made by a team of NOAA-supported scientists from the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, Louisiana State University, and the University of Michigan, the Gulf of Mexico “dead zone” is likely to become record big this summer. If there predictions are true, we will see a dead zone the size of New Jersey (7,450 to 8,456 square miles). Additional flooding of the Mississippi River since May can however increase these numbers even further.

1.2 million tonnes of coral may have been illegally extracted from reefs located near Malaysia’s protected Semporna Islands Park.

State Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Datuk Masidi Manjum has formed a committee that will investigate the allegations made by former state Social Services Minister Datuk Kong Hong Ming.

A study proposing a ban on spear guns and gill nets in the Great Barrier Reef is now being criticised by Australian scientists saying its results – which were obtained from Kenya and Papua New Guinea – aren’t relevant to the Great Barrier Reef.

Australia and New Zealand announced Thursday that they will carry out a six-week long non-lethal whale research expedition in the Antarctic early next year. Dubbing the expedition non-lethal is a direct challenge to Japan’s research program that kills up to 1,000 whales a year.

“Small fish may have small brains but they still have some surprising cognitive abilities”, says Dr Jeremy Kendal* from Durham University’s Anthropology Department.

300,000 pounds of rock has been stolen from the bottom of the ocean near Alligator Light and Islamorada off the coast of Florida.

Florida will soon have the strictest conservation law for the harvest of imperilled freshwater turtles in the U.S. The new legislation pertains to all freshwater turtles on Florida’s imperilled species list plus species that look similar to the imperilled species, which include common snapping turtles and cooters.

In an effort to end the country’s reliance on imported uranium, Dr Masao Tanada of the Japan Atomic Energy Agency has developed a fabric capable of absorbing uranium directly from seawater.

According to the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (WDCS), Greenland intends to ask permission to hunt a quota of 50 humpbacks over five years. The request will be put forward at an international key meeting on Tuesday where the 40 year long moratorium on whaling will be discussed.

Since the early days of the 20th century, marine biologists have pondered one of the world’s most puzzling questions – if a tree falls in the ocean, can the cephalopods hear it?

During recent years, massive jellyfish congregations have appeared along the Northeast U.S. coast, in the Gulf of Mexico, in the Mediterranean, in the Black and Caspian Seas, and in South-East Asian coastal waters.

“Dense jellyfish aggregations can be a natural feature of healthy ocean ecosystems, says Dr Anthony Richardson of the University of Queensland, but a clear picture is now emerging of more severe and frequent jellyfish outbreaks worldwide.”

A moray eel species native to warm tropical waters have been caught in the considerably colder waters found off the coast of Cornwall, UK.

The work towards replenishing depleted stocks of wild sea cucumber with captive hatched ones is moving forward at a steady pace; two Philippine hatcheries has now successfully managed to hatch sea cucumbers outside their natural habitat and one batch, comprised of roughly 2,000 juveniles, has been released inside sea pens in the Philippines.

Indonesia is getting ready to sink foreign boats carrying out illegal fishing in Indonesian waters.

“We are glad the House`s Commission IV supports us in this,” Marine Resources and Fisheries Minister Freddy Numbery said at a meeting with the House commission this week.