Guy Harvey Magazine — Fall 2021

The Art of Ocean Conservation VOLUME 11, ISSUE 38 FALL 2021 $6.95

M A G A Z I N E

Shellfish Desire The Fight to Save Oysters

The Balance Social Responsibility Issue

This Is Your Ocean 10 Years of Celebrating Sharks

Help Save Our Oceans!

A portion of the proceeds from the sale of all official Guy Harvey merchandise benefits the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation, which conducts ocean conservation research and hosts educational programs.

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32 Sawgrass to Seagrass

Maintaining the delicate balance inside Florida’s Everglades is critically important to the state in a variety of ways.

BY AMANDA MARTIN

38 Blue Economy

Finding the funding to build financially sustainable conservation areas.

BY JOSEPH IERNA JR.

42 Fishing Apps

Stock assessments now have a surprising ally: crowd-sourced fishing apps.

BY SID DOBRIN

46 The Solar State

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY THE

ISSUE

FPL is committed to making clean energy the future in the Sunshine State with its solar power initiatives.

BY GHM STAFF

50 Brightmark Plastics

Making it economically viable to fight the plastic plague in our oceans.

BY GHM STAFF

54 Sustainable Development

The St. Joe Company seeks to safeguard the environment as it creates a community.

BY STEVE BORNHOFT

58 Saving & Serving Oysters

The fight is on to save oysters and the habitat that they help maintain.

BY DR. SANDRA BROOKE

62 Private Reef Building Tragedy led Scott Harris down an unexpected road — artificial reef building.

BY DANNY THORNTON

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FALL 2021

CONTENTS

70 20 Expeditions Go fishing, diving and snorkeling with Dr. Guy Harvey.

BY GHM STAFF

22 Education Launch The pandemic had an adverse affect on one of education’s best tools: field study.

BY VALERIE GAYNOR

28 MarineLab

The Guy Harvey Ocean Foundations is teaming up with MarineLab to help educate teachers on marine conservation.

BY GHM STAFF

PHOTO BY BILL BOYCE (SEAL)

70 Photo Portfolio — Bill Boyce

Photographer Bill Boyce takes us on a picturesque journey through three distinct and beautiful locales: Baja, the Caribbean and Alaska

BY BILL BOYCE

DEPARTMENTS

80 A Future

for Sharks

Protecting sharks and their environment has a payoff for humans — in quite literal ways.

Meet two of the talented writers and educators who contribute to this publication.

BY STEFANIE BRENDL

84 This is Your Ocean The author takes a look back at one of the foundation’s seminal documentaries.

BY GEORGE SCHELLENGER

88 Shark Teeth

Hunting for fossilized shark teeth can teach everyone a lesson that is millions of years in the making.

BY NICK HONACHEFSKY

94 Shark Tracks

7 Contributors

8 Guy’s Editorial Conservation is a necessity, but it’s not cheap.

BY GUY HARVEY

10 The Bite

One young girl’s hobby evolves into a way to teach kids about fishing and conservation.

ON THE COVER:

“Great Egret”

by Dr. Guy Harvey

BY FRED GARTH

96 Last Cast

Over four years and 17,000 miles, one big lady reveals the mysteries of her underwater journey.

Ocean education and conservation is important no matter where you fall on the map.

BY GEORGE SCHELLENGER

BY FRED GARTH GHOF.org | 5

GUY HARVEY MAGAZINE OFFICES PENSACOLA, FLORIDA Fred Garth, Editor-in-Chief

DAVIE, FLORIDA Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation

GRAND CAYMAN Dr. Guy Harvey

TALLAHASSEE, FLORIDA Brian Rowland, Publishing Director

CREDITS TO Publisher

Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation

ATTENTION

TEACHERS! Get more copies of Guy Harvey Magazine.

Editor-in-Chief Fred D. Garth Publishing Director Brian Rowland Associate Publisher McKenzie Burleigh Director of New Business Development, Western Division Dan Parker Director of New Business Development, Eastern Division Dan Parisi Vice President of Production and Technology Daniel Vitter Creative Director Jennifer Ekrut Senior Publication Designer Sarah Burger Graphic Designer Sierra Thomas Custom Publishing Manager Sara Goldfarb Managing Editor Jeff Price Director of Marketing & Fulfillment Zandra Wolfgram Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation President Patxi Pastor Executive Director Greg Jacoski Education Director Valerie Gaynor Webmaster Russ Kyff Director of Development Amanda Martin Social Media Director Alex Harvey Social Media Developers Matt Raine and Brent Shavnore Editorial Steering Committee Fred Gar th, Valerie Gaynor, Guy Harvey, Jessica Harvey, Greg Jacoski, Patxi Pastor, Steve Roden Contributors Steve Bornhoft, Bill Boyce, Stefanie Brendl, Dr. Sandra Brooke, Sid Dobrin, Valerie Gaynor, Nick Honachefsky, Joseph Ierna Jr., Amanda Mar tin, George C. Schellenger, Danny Thornton

Publishing Services Provided by:

WE’RE GREEN: Finding an environmentally friendly printer is important to

us. That’s why we choose LSC Communications in Lebanon Junction, Kentucky. LSC recycles more than 50 million pounds of paper products per year, which saves 10 million gallons of oil, 14 gallons of water and 35,000 trees. LSC also recycles more than 300,000 pounds of aluminum printing plates annually, and no hazardous wastes are ever sent to a landfill — instead they are recycled and reused. Additionally, they recycle 217 tons of plastic each year and have set aside 550 of the 700 acres they own to be used for conservation and recreation.

It’s easy...

Visit GHOF.org to subscribe today.

Interested in having a mag for the entire classroom? Call for special pricing...800.288.1227.

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GUY HARVEY MAGAZINE (ISSN 2162111X) is published four times per year (quarterly)

by Rowland Publishing, Inc., 1932 Miccosukee Rd, Tallahassee, FL 32308. Periodicals postage paid at Pensacola, Florida, and additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to: Guy Harvey Magazine, 10408 W State Rd 84 # 104, Davie, FL 33324. No part of this magazine can be reproduced without express written permission from Rowland Publishing, Inc. Occasionally, we may make all or part of our subscriber list available to carefully screened companies that offer products and/or services that may interest you.

To subscribe to Guy Harvey Magazine, call our toll-free subscription number, 800-288-1227.

CONTRIBUTORS

Dr. Sandra Brooke A native of the United Kingdom, Dr. Sandra Brooke grew up with an interest in veterinary medicine, but her first job in the Cayman Islands set her life on a different track: oceanography. After falling in love with diving in the Caymans, Sandra returned to school and earned her master’s degree in marine biology from the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, plus a Ph.D. from the Southampton Oceanography Center (UK). Now in a career that has spanned a couple continents and both U.S. coasts, Sandra is a research faculty member at Florida State University’s Coastal and Marine Laboratory.

Sandra’s primary research is on coral reefs from shallow waters to the deep sea. Her focus is on understanding their distribution, abundance, physiology and life histories, as well as how they are affected by anthropogenic impacts. “Corals are important components of deep-sea hard-bottom habitats, and like

their shallow counterparts, they are being impacted by various human activities.”

“Deep sea research is logistically difficult and expensive, but through a combination of in situ observations, laboratory experiments and environmental monitoring, we can begin to define the factors that drive the distribution of deep sea corals and predict how that might change in the future.”

She has worked on deep-water coral ecosystems in the Aleutian Islands of Alaska, Norwegian fjords, South Atlantic Bight and Gulf of Mexico, including the conduct of post-Deepwater Horizon oil spill damage assessment. Sandra also worked on shallow corals along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts of Florida.

Most recently Sandra has begun working on another imperiled ecosystem in much shallower waters. Oyster reefs were once extensive and valuable components of estuarine ecosystems globally. Now almost

85% of these reefs have been lost, at great economic and ecological cost. She is the principle investigator of the Apalachicola Bay Systems Initiative, an $8 million project to revive the Apalachicola Bay ecosystem, and hopefully, the region’s famed oyster industry.

A husband and father, Joe is passionate about surfing, fishing, diving, sailing and farming. A veteran in the yachting sector with a U.S.C.G. 500-ton license (retired), Ierna is a graduate of Westlawn Institute of Marine Technology, with a degree in yacht design and naval architecture.

Joe’s professional career Joseph Ierna Jr. and wife Nicola on the oceans spans 43 years — he successfully navigated the globe’s The co-founder of Ocean Crest Alliance, oceans, captained yacht fleets, took part in Capt. Joseph Ierna Jr. grew up in yacht design and construction projects, and St. Petersburg, Florida, on the Gulf of served on a build team for the Americas Cup. Mexico. A graduate of St. Pete Catholic Now based on Long Island, Bahamas, Joe High, Joe had a passion for the ocean early and wife Nicola are both part of the OCA in life; ultimately, the ocean would become team working tirelessly towards development his playground, classroom and office. and the establishment of a Research

and Education Facility in support of the proposed 257,000-acre Marine Protected Area (MPA), known as the Long Island Marine Management Area (LIMMA). ‘’While building our property in the Bahamas, we had the vision to build a facility that would be used for conservation research, science, education and technology programs — or as we call them, CREST activities,” says Joe. “We wanted to support and provide opportunity to the community we loved, our home, and it became our first EShare program driver towards building financially sustainable blue economy properties around the globe. We consider ourselves stewards of Long Island’s land and sea, and we believe that we have a responsibility to treat it with the highest level of care and respect.”

Ocean Crest Alliance is a nonprofit organization dedicated to honor, protect and restore the health of the world’s oceans and the life of the earth’s systems. Visit oceancrestalliance.org for more information.

Joseph Ierna Jr.

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The Cost of Conservation

I

have a saying: “It takes cash to care.”

Some people might get turned off or even offended by this statement, but the truth is conservation costs money. Sure, there are numerous incredible volunteer efforts, such as the International Beach Cleanup that has attracted more than 16 million volunteers since it began in 1986. Concerned citizens from more than 100 countries have collected in excess of 339 million pounds of trash from the planet’s beaches. That is truly impressive. What some may not know is that this event was launched by two ambitious women, Linda Maraniss and Kathy O’Hara, who worked with the nonprofit organization Ocean Conservancy. Today, the OC is a multi-million dollar machine that invests tremendously into conservation. Just like the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation, the Ocean Conservancy’s work is funded by philanthropic groups and individuals and a percentage of product sales. The point — volunteers are essential, but they can only do so much. Effective, on-going marine conservation is expensive.

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There is great news on this front. More and more companies are devoting a portion of their earnings toward saving the planet. Not only is that a good public relations strategy, but it can also be a great business model. What has been called Cause Marketing has morphed into the term “Corporate Social Responsibility.”

CSR is gaining traction simply because more companies are seeing the wisdom in being green. In fact, if a company in 2021 doesn’t have a sustainability and conservation strategy, they are already behind the curve and are setting themselves up for failure. When it comes to the products they buy, consumers want to know how, where and from what those materials come from. For example, our customers are thrilled when they learn that Guy Harvey shirts are made in a facility that runs mostly on solar power and uses recycled materials (see article on page 15). Consumers want less plastic packaging and more earthfriendly products, and we are always working hard to deliver on those goals.

As companies continue to ramp up their investments into conservation, those funds help grassroots, nonprofit organizations, as well as the GHOF and hundreds of other groups that do vital work. That’s good for the planet, and we can all use some good news these days.

In this issue of Guy Harvey Magazine, we are shining a spotlight on some of those forwardthinking companies. One is Florida Power & Light. By investing in renewable power, they are taking solar power and electric vehicles to impressive levels. By 2030, FPL will have installed more than 30 million solar panels across their service area; by the end of 2021, they will have built more than 1,000 charging stations for electric vehicles (see article on page 46). That’s just good business, and it also benefits Mother Earth.

Beyond companies devoting their profits to conservation, other businesses have taken these concepts to the next level and created their business model 100% on sustainability and conservation. One of the best examples is

GUY TALK

4Ocean, founded by two surfer dudes who got fed up seeing plastic waste in the ocean. Floridians Alex Schulze and Andrew Cooper decided to form a for-profit company back in 2015 to sell bracelets, jewelry and beach-oriented products, all made with the plastic they removed from the ocean. So far, they’ve extracted more than 17 million pounds of plastic, and while I don’t know the exact number, their revenue exceeds $20 million a year. They are one of many new companies building a business to do well while also doing good. And then there’s Brightmark, another for-profit company that takes all kinds of plastic waste and turns it back into fuel — all through their patented process. If you thought plastic recycling was a doomed concept, think again. Brightmark is highly profitable, and they’re just completing construction on a $680 million recycling factory in Georgia. (see article, page 50) We’re absolutely in a paradigm shift in which sustainability has become foundational to a successful business. In fact, a new acronym, ESG, has been injected into the global corporate lexicon.

It means Environmental, Social and Governance.

Thousands of companies have ESG ratings, which measure everything from biodiversity to climate impact to racial diversity — and much more.

Investors are increasingly using ESG ratings to determine where to put their money.

I’m so pleased to see that there is a rapidly growing connection between corporations and conservation. This trend is favorable for us to fix the myriad issues facing our marine ecosystems.

For years, I’ve been saying that it takes cash to care.

Thankfully, more and more people are buying into that concept.

Fair winds and tight lines,

GUY HARVEY, PhD

is an internationally acclaimed artist, fisherman, scientist and world traveler who devotes much of his time and money toward ocean conservation.

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NEWS, NOTES & GEAR

BY FRED GARTH

Girls Can Fish!

Isn’t it amazing when fishing becomes a vehicle for helping people? Such is the case of young Caroline Lewis, a 10-year-old girl with her own 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. A fisher-girl since she was just 3, Caroline excels at both freshwater and saltwater fishing and has logged some incredible catches — including bull reds, cobia, large sharks, mahi mahi, red snapper, largemouth bass and jack crevalle.

Her passion for fishing led to her becoming a conservationist, something her dad, Tom, believes will eventually become her career.

During 2020, at the ripe old age of 9, Caroline caught her first cobia. In all of the excitement she yelled, “Girls can fish!”

Instantly, that became her tagline. From there, Caroline had a logo designed along with a group page for friends and family to share her fishing expertise and catches. What was intended to be a small family-only way to share her passion for fishing quickly gained popularity. Now, Kids Can Fish has grown to more than 6,000 members. Soon, outside entities wanted to support her creation, so the Kids Can Fish Foundation (KCFF) was established as a charitable organization.

Some of KCFF’s most popular features are selecting a “Kid of the Day” and the “Kid of the Month,” which is voted on by group members. The winning child receives a gift pack that contains fishing gear, tackle, apparel and a gift for the parent for supporting their child. Kids Can Fish has become one of the largest online “brag boards” for families to share their fishing accomplishments while reinforcing the importance of conservation to these young anglers.

KCFF has branched out even further with fishing camps and clinics, with Caroline leading the charge in teaching other kids about 10 | GuyHarvey.com

Caroline Lewis shows off her mahi-mahi collection.

fishing and conservation. Participants also receive fishing rod and reel combos, apparel and live instruction from volunteers.

Caroline also excels at throwing a cast net, which has led to sponsorships from Promar, Ahi USA, Fishbites, Batson Enterprises and Panther Martin — companies that are helping to fund kid’s fishing clinics. Another impressive and heartwarming accomplishment was a fundraiser for a boy named Nick in

Wisconsin who loves to ice fish but was born paralyzed. A KCFF fundraiser brought in enough money to buy Nick an all-terrain wheelchair; now he can access fishing spots he couldn’t reach before.

With all of the lengthy discussions about how to get more kids involved in fishing, perhaps we only have to turn to the kids themselves and let them lead the way, as Caroline Lewis is doing.

Meet the Skallywags The term scallywag has generally been associated with troublemakers and outlaws. But there’s a new kind of “Skallywag” in town: a family-run business all about celebrating life at sea and ocean conservation. Siblings Richard White and Kerry White, alongside Kerry’s husband Raymond Moody, have created a series of flags that represent the honor that comes with battling giant fish.

With flags representing 11 species — from blue marlin to wahoo — Skallywags Flags can be flown to celebrate what fish you’ve caught.

Best of all, the company is donating a portion of their profits to support marine conservation.

“We floated the idea by the one and only Guy Harvey,” said Richard White, “and he was keen to put his artwork stamp of approval on the project. The rest, we’re not afraid to say, is angling history.”

Skallywags fishing flags come packaged in recycled cardboard and reusable bags that are made from recycled bottles. The company

chooses suppliers who treat their workers well, and are serious about taking steps toward the conservation of our oceans. Plus, the flags stand up to life at sea and won’t go dull in the sun; they are made from top-quality, lightweight, 100% woven polyester fabric that’s treated with a water-repellent finish and dyed using a specialty acrylic pigment dye system.

Each of the signature fishing battle flags features original artworks by Guy Harvey and is 12-by-18 inches with a Velcro finish. They cost $26. The entire species list includes blue marlin, roosterfish, dorado, cubera snapper, wahoo, swordfish, sailfish, white marlin, black marlin, yellowfin tuna and striped marlin.

There’s a special kind of honor in coming back to shore with all your Skallywags battle flags hoisted.

“We can’t wait to see you all flying Skallywags flags out in the deep blue. Your kids will thank you when they’re pulling in their own ocean giants one day,” Smith said.

For more information, or to order your Skallywags fishing flags, go to: GuyHarvey.com.

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We all know that coral reefs are in peril around the globe, and the Florida Keys are no exception. The good news is that a diverse group of coral reef management and conservation leaders has banded together to respond to this environmental crisis and save Florida’s coral reefs. The Orlando-based Florida Coral Rescue Center (FCRC) is a state-of-the-art facility established for gene banking and caring for Florida corals rescued from reefs that have not yet been affected by the stony coral tissue loss disease (SCTLD) that is sweeping across the Florida Reef Tract.

As part of a national network of coral holding or gene-banking facilities coordinated by the Association of Zoos & Aquariums, the FCRC is the largest facility of its kind in the U.S. and provides a safe, stable environment for coral colonies to receive world-class care from a team of coral experts. It will play a significant role in the future of Florida’s Coral Reef.

Under the guidance of the AZA, the group consists of resource management agencies like Florida Fish and Wildlife

Conservation Commission (FWC) and NOAA Fisheries, zoological facilities such as SeaWorld, and funding organizations including the Disney Conservation Fund, Fish & Wildlife Foundation of Florida, Bass Pro Shops, Cabela’s Outdoor Fund, World Wide Corals Inc. and the Edith and Curtis Munson Foundation. These partners provide the funding, resources and expertise to help ensure there is a future for Florida corals.

“AZA is proud of the incredible collaboration between our accredited zoo and aquarium members, like Disney and SeaWorld, their financial commitment,

A Different Mating Game (continued from above) Rescuing corals is only the first step.

Ultimately, many corals will be needed for restoration efforts, requiring the rescued corals to reproduce and produce offspring. Since many of the rescue coral species have never been held in human care, aquarists have had a lot to learn about feeding, correct lighting and proper water flow. Apparently, they are doing a great job as the corals have begun to reproduce.

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Corals can reproduce sexually and asexually. Sexual reproduction provides the most genetic diversity among offspring due to the mixing of egg and sperm genetic material from the parents. Sexually reproduced corals are unique individuals while offspring produced by asexual reproduction are identical to the parent. Over the past year, FCRC corals have taken a huge step forward on their own and have been reproducing asexually, producing “gemmae” offspring.

and their investment of time and talent to help save this natural treasure,” said Dan Ashe, president and CEO of AZA. “Being able to share our global network of animal care and welfare experts and our coral management expertise is inspiring. A monumental undertaking like this is another demonstration of why zoos and aquariums are so vital to conservation. The coordinated, multi-facility AZA-Florida Reef Tract Rescue Project and the Florida Coral Rescue Center show that, together, we can make a difference for Florida’s reefs for future generations to share.”

Gemmae are identical to their parents. While not the optimum candidate for restoration in larger numbers, these coral clones ensure the genetic contribution of their rescued parents will continue to be part of Florida’s coral reef. Reproduction is a positive sign that the corals in the care of the FCRC are getting all that they need, not just to survive but thrive.

To follow the work of the FCRC, visit WildlifeFlorida.org.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF FLORIDA CORAL RESCUE CENTER (CORAL)

Save the Reef

Clean Energy, Clean Apparel Guy Harvey’s commitment to marine conservation extends all the way to his iconic apparel. The facility where Guy Harvey clothing is made is covered in solar panels, and the water is reclaimed and purified (see Guy Harvey Magazine Issue 36). Now, the latest innovation in apparel is called THREADCYCLED™ technology, making Guy Harvey one of the first apparel brands to adopt this new “zero waste” manufacturing process that repurposes 100 percent of the textile waste into upcycled yarn.

Starting in the fall of 2021, Guy Harvey will use this textile technology to turn scrap material from previously manufactured apparel into regenerated men’s high-quality, moisture-wicking T-shirts. More than 16 choices of short-sleeve tees, with or without a pocket, will be offered. Guy Harvey’s new THREADCYCLED™ line is made using a blend of 60% cotton generated from upcycled yarn and 40% recycled polyester sourced from recycled plastic bottles. These revolutionary new garments are priced in line with other Guy Harvey tees and contribute to Guy Harvey’s commitment to ocean conservation and sustainability while maintaining the highest level of performance and functionality.

THREADCYCLED™ is just one of the many ways Guy Harvey continues to elevate its cutting-edge sustainable manufacturing practices. The brand’s facilities and machines use carbon-neutral biofuels alongside solar energy for power, and that significantly reduces greenhouse emissions. The residual effect of this clean manufacturing process is the elimination of harmful dyes, chemicals and excessive water, leaving no trail of toxic waste. Additionally, in an effort to keep textiles out of the landfills, Guy Harvey strives to create high-quality and dependable products so they last for years to come.

“We are committed to sourcing the best practices when it comes to our apparel manufacturing to ensure we minimize the impact on our natural environment,” Dr. Guy Harvey explained. “The fashion industry contributes to upwards of 148 million tons of fashion waste each year, and we are proud to be on the forefront of positive change in the industry. With our new THREADCYCLED™ technology, we will be able to offer an upcycled alternative to traditional manufacturing practices with the same quality that our leisure and technical apparel is known for.”

“The Foundation was thrilled to help get the ‘lights turned on’ at the FCRC (or off, as the corals prefer). We’re hopeful this partnership of state agencies, companies and nonprofit organizations can serve as a model to tackle other significant environmental challenges as they arise.”

— Andrew Walker, president and CEO of the Fish & Wildlife Foundation of Florida “At the Center, we are caring for hundreds of corals, representing 19 species, that have little to no history in human care. This project is a unique challenge, and we’re having a profound impact on the future of Florida coral reefs.”

— Aaron Gavin, a SeaWorld/FCRC Aquaris

“One of the most rewarding parts about working on this project at the FCRC is being able to see the incredible amount of growth these corals have had since they have been here. When collected, each coral is mounted on a terracotta tile that serves as a stable base or anchor for the coral in the aquarium. The corals brought here in March 2020 are doing so well they need to be given larger tile bases.”

— Sara Urbanski, SeaWorld, FCRC Aquaris

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‘Meet Me Underwater’

A Photographic Celebration of Florida’s Aquatic Wonders, By Michael Patrick O’Neill Award-winning photographer Michael Patrick O’Neill has written a retrospective of his past 30 years covering Florida’s spectacular coral reefs, wetlands, estuaries and deep ocean. Meet Me Underwater is dedicated to all Floridians and everyone who has a little Florida in them. Its wide range of subjects, along with breathtaking images, will capture the attention of anyone who picks up the book — fishermen, divers or nature lovers who simply enjoy spending time outside.

An experienced visual storyteller, O’Neill and his team created the book with aerial, wide-angle and close-up photos that effortlessly lead the reader from one section to the next. The light and casual text frames the stunning images and provides valuable snippets of information, especially in the opening chapter titled “Blackwater,” which concentrates on planktonic creatures photographed late at night while drifting in the Gulf Stream off Palm Beach — an experience O’Neill compares to an astronaut in outer space.

This premium quality hardcover book is a visual treat and a valuable addition to any home ($29.95; BatfishBooks.com/purchase).

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PHOTO COURTESY OCEAN FIRST EDUCATION

Thank You for Supporting the GHOF's K-12 Education Initiative

Please join the entire Guy Harvey organization in thanking the companies listed on page 17 for their support of the GHOF education initiative. The amazing growth and expansion to schools, students and teachers would not be possible without the generous donation of time, energy and resources of these individuals and organizations.

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TOP TI ER SPONSORS

MI D TI ER SPONSORS

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PROMOTION

SHOPPI NG GU I DE Whether you are looking for a creative way to say thank you, a holiday gift or just want to treat yourself, visit GuyHarvey.com to shop a full range of Guy Har vey-branded apparel, artwork, souvenirs and more. Shopping is a win-win when ever y purchase you make benefits the Guy Har vey Ocean Foundation.

Men’s Bill Flag Performance Hoodie with Gaiter

This super comfortable performance hoodie is perfect for any outdoor adventure on land or sea. It provides UPF protection, and the attached gaiter provides additional sun protection for your face. $50

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Great for any time. Made in the USA. Sizes 28-46.

Order at least one size up from pant size. $26.95

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2. Guy Harvey Yellowfin Dog Collar Nylon dog collar is perfect for any dog out fishing, boating or just enjoying the outdoors.

Plastic clip-style buckle for a secure fit with a metal buckle loop. Made in the USA. Sizes: Small, Medium, Large $17 4

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3. Guy Harvey Blue Escape Dog Bed Your dog will love this beautiful pillow-top bed, and it will certainly brighten up any room. Printed with 100% bio-degradable water-based ink and made from ecofriendly rPet material. Water repellent inner and outer cover. Made in the Americas.

Small/Med – 34” x 26”, $99 Large/XL – 42” x 34”, $109

4. Guy Harvey USA leash Nylon dog leash measures 1” wide and 6’ in length.

Perfect for an active lifestyle and guaranteed to turn heads. Made in the USA. One size. $20

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Guy Harvey Expeditions

BY GHM STAFF

If you’ve even envisioned yourself being on a fishing boat with Dr. Guy Harvey, you can now make that dream a reality. The Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation has organized several epic aquatic adventures to Panama, Mexico and Guatemala, and the good news is — you’re invited to come along for the ride.

Tropic Star Lodge, Panama

Known as one of the hottest fishing destinations on the planet (Guy has been there more than 50 times), the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Panama is prolific with blue and black marlin, tuna, dorado, sailfish, roosterfish and many more sportfish. It’s also home of several GHOF research projects aimed at protecting this amazing fishery. In September 2021, Guy and daughter Jessica, who is also a marine biologist, hosted 25 anglers at Tropic Star Lodge (TSL) for fishing, camaraderie and scientific marine research. As expected, the fishing was off the charts, and dozens of billfish were raised and reeled in. All of those fish were released safely, and some were tagged with satellite tags for tracking (see GHRITracking.org).

The fish-tracking concept has proven to be effective in protecting these majestic species because scientists can determine where they roam and then write regulations to restrict those areas from commercial fishing.

Sometimes it’s a battle keeping commercial fleets from catching sportfish, but without the data collected by GHOF, the fight would be much harder.

The September trip was so successful that the GHOF quickly planned another TSL trip, open for 25 more 20 | GuyHarvey.com

anglers. This expedition is scheduled for Nov. 9–14. Space is limited, so if you’re interested, contact GHOF as soon as possible (see contact info at the end of this article). The price is $9,800 per angler for five days of fishing, dining and hanging out with Guy and Jessica. The money raised from these expeditions helps to fund the vital scientific research conducted by the GHOF. If this coming November is too soon for you to make plans, dates for 2022 have also been reserved at TSL. See ad on the back cover for more information.

Pacific Fins Resort, Guatemala (Sailfish Capital of the World)

In 2002, the Guatemalan government implemented some of the world’s strictest fishing regulations. That’s a good thing for us fishermen. Marlin and sailfish used to be sold as food in local markets and exported to other countries. These days, any commerce of billfish is highly illegal in Guatemala and can result in massive fines and even jail time. In other words, it’s 100% catch and release for offshore anglers.

What prompted the government to take such dramatic conservation action? Well, the leadership of the sportfishing resorts in the country,

PHOTO BY CRISOD / ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS

EXPEDITIONS

such as Pacific Fins, took action. They explained the economics of fishing tourism to the government officials in these terms: each one of the live blue marlins can inject hundreds of thousands of dollars into the economy via fishing tourism, whereas a dead blue marlin may only fetch a few hundred bucks at the fish market. It’s hard to refute that kind of logic.

This is why fishing offshore in Guatemala is sort of like being in a giant aquarium surrounded by sailfish. They are swimming around everywhere along with billfish, dorado, tuna and their cousins. It’s not unusual to raise 40 sailfish in one day of fishing.

If that makes your hands sweat and your heart race, you can come join Guy Harvey at the Pacific Fins Resort April 19–23, 2022 with 18 other anglers. The GHOF group will take over the entire five-star resort for four days of amazing fishing and fun. Cost for this expedition is $5,100 and is all inclusive — fishing, food, adult beverages and time spent with Guy. As with all of the GHOF expeditions, the money

raised helps to fund the vital scientific research conducted by the GHOF. For more information, see the ad on page 11.

Isla Mujeres, Mexico (Whale Shark Extravaganza) Each summer, hundreds of whale sharks come to Isla Mujeres to feed and breed. It’s a bit like clockwork because they return in massive numbers and lumber along peacefully offshore feeding on plankton. July and August are the peak months for the migration and set the stage for the GHOF to study these gentle giants of the sea. Over the past decade, the GHOF has tagged some of these behemoths (see GHRITracking.org) and discovered that they travel thousands of miles before returning to Isla Mujeres. Using this knowledge of their behavior, the GHOF is lobbying for greater protections for whale sharks.

Don’t be mistaken however, this is NOT a fishing trip but simply a life-changing

snorkeling adventure. There's nothing quite like swimming next to a 40-foot-long fish that seems to be unconcerned with the tiny human trying to keep up. For the record, whale sharks are sharks but do not have fleshripping teeth like their white shark cousins.

Whale sharks are filter feeders like humpback whales, and they eat tiny krill and plankton instead of humans.

The dates for this trip are mid-August, and the cost is $4,500 per person, which includes everything — lodging, meals, drinks and three days mingling with the whale sharks. Guy and Jessica will be there along with a GHOF film crew on location filming for a future documentary. This expedition is limited to 20 people. Remember, the money raised from these expeditions funds the vital scientific research conducted by the GHOF. For more details on these expeditions, contact Brian Rowland at browland@guyharvey.com.

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EDUCATION

GHOF K-12

EDUCATION UPDATE

BY VALERIE GAYNOR

PHOTO COURTESY OCEAN FIRST EDUCATION

I

t’s fair to say that the 2020–21 school year was the most challenging in modern education history. Learning from home was difficult for students and their parents, but it was particularly hard for teachers, who had to quickly become effective virtual instructors — all on the fly.

Most teachers had to put in hundreds of extra hours, many late nights in front of the computer and extra time searching the web for learning materials and websites they could incorporate into their virtual classrooms. Did all of that extra work mean that teachers got paid more? Well ... you know the answer to that. Absolutely not. In fact, some teachers were laid off because student populations dropped. The year in education was truly a hardship, if not a bit bizarre.

As the science supervisor of Martin County, Florida, I work with more than 300 K–12 teachers in our district. I can tell you from experience that our teachers went the extra mile, actually many extra miles, just to keep up.

Their dedication was inspiring and reminded me of why I became a teacher in the first place: to help students prepare, grow and become successful in life.

I’m also an avid water puppy. Whether it’s a day at the beach, going out on the boat to fish and/or scuba dive or just swimming in the ocean, I love that salty liquid. All of that time on and under the water turned me into a conservationist. I want to vigorously protect my playground. It also tuned me into the value of hands-on learning. Remember how you loved

field trips when you were in school? Well, teachers love them too because kids learn so much when they get their hands dirty (or wet).

While the lack of activity in the ocean and on the reefs was helpful for the health of the ecosystem, the lack of travel and cancellation of field trips definitely hindered our ability to teach and student’s opportunity to learn.

Hands-on learning can certainly happen in the classroom or out in the field, but with COVID, both of those options were cancelled. I will tell you that in my experience, our teachers rose to the occasion and provided outstanding instruction during a difficult time for all. I was honored to work alongside our teachers and assist them through the huge learning curve. Through these trying times, I saw innovation, inspiration and a bit of magic provided by many teachers, organizations, and communities. It really does take a village, and this past year proved that we can work together for a common goal, especially when it is as important as teaching our students.

As fate would have it, the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation began working on an online marine science and conservation curriculum before anyone had even heard of COVID-19.

Way back in 2019, the GHOF was developing courses for the classroom and online. By the time the pandemic was at its peak, the GHOF educational curriculum was cooking — but not quite fully baked. Now, as the new school year is moving forward without COVID restrictions, the GHOF’s education offerings are vast and varied and available for hearty consumption.

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EDUCATION

Here’s a look at what students and teachers have at their disposal for free from the GHOF.

ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE

Florida Virtual School and GHOF developed a fun, comprehensive, statestandard based, environmental science curriculum for high schoolers. This is 100% online and is available to Florida students for free. The course is chock full of Jessica Harvey’s (Guy’s marine biologist daughter) educational videos and is fully accredited. While environmental science is not a required course, it’s highly popular as a precursor to biology, which is required. It’s also a great course for real life as our planet continues to face growing environmental threats. The GHOF is proud to have this extremely valuable and vital course in its arsenal.

MARINE SCIENCE 101

Again, the GHOF partnered with a highly respected learning company — Ocean First Education — to create beautiful, exciting and standards-based marine science courses. High school students can learn all about the marine environment with the added spice of Guy Harvey art, photos and video. The courses take on modern and relevant issues, such as plastics in the ocean, overfishing, shark finning, invasive species, coral reefs and anything and everything about our life-giving water. This curriculum is offered free of charge to any school on planet Earth — as well as Mars once Elon Musk builds his colony there.

Students can go online and discover a whole new world, including the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation’s Environmental Science course on Florida Virtual School (top) and the K-12 learning platform on Discovery Education’s Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation Channel (bottom).

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DISCOVERY EDUCATION

The Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation channel on Discovery Education’s recently enhanced K-12 learning platform is officially a hit. Out of more than 650 educational channels on the platform, the GHOF channel consistently ranks among the most accessed. With more than 100 marineoriented educational videos and more being produced and uploaded regularly, the channel is a favorite among the 45 million Discovery Ed students and 4.5 million educators using Discovery Education’s resources. Discovery Education’s collection of high-quality, ready-to-use digital lessons, and intuitive quiz and activity creation

tools — including resources from the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation — is available to subscribing schools.

SEAWORLD For several years, the GHOF has worked with SeaWorld’s Animal Rescue Center. Over the years, SeaWorld has rescued, rehabilitated and returned almost 40,000 animals, such as manatees, dolphins and birds (see article in Guy Harvey Magazine issue 37). Now, a new collaboration in education is blossoming between the GHOF and SeaWorld. Teacher workshops, new marine science curriculum and future educational events are all on tap.

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FLORIDA POWER & LIGHT

Florida Power & Light is more than just an energy company (see article on page 46). They are leading the nation in clean energy as well as education.

A new partnership with FPL to educate students and teachers in marine science and conservation is in development.

There is no ecosystem on the planet quite like the Florida Everglades.

This unique habitat is not only important to the wildlife that reside there but also to the health of our oceans. Ron Bergeron (also known as Alligator Ron) and his foundation have partnered with long-time friend Dr. Guy Harvey and the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation to create an exciting new Sawgrass to Seagrass curriculum to teach students about the history of the Everglades and the interconnectedness of these freshwater and saltwater ecosystems.

The Sawgrass to Seagrass courses are designed for middle school and high school students with no shortage of exciting videos, photos and activities weaved throughout. Not only will this curriculum be free to teachers and students but there also will be educator professional learning experiences right in the Everglades, so that teachers can learn about this vital ecosystem first-hand to take it into their classrooms.

Alligator Ron (right) is not only a very successful businessman, but he is also passionate about Florida wildlife and the need to protect it. He dedicates half of his time to Everglades Conservation and is currently serving as a commissioner for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission. He is also the Florida Wildlife Conservation Point commissioner over the entire Florida Everglades.

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There are myriad problems facing our troubled waters — overfishing, invasive species, coral reef diseases, plastics in our waterways, red tides, ocean acidification, loss of wetlands, agriculture runoff and so forth and so on. The good news is that the GHOF and many other outstanding organizations are working toward solutions. Plus, Gen Zs and millennials are well aware of the mess that we and our ancestors have created, and they are getting involved in major ways. The GHOF believes

PHOTO COURTESY OF FLORIDA POWER & LIGHT COMPANY (MANATEE LAGOON)

BERGERON EVERGLADES FOUNDATION

EDUCATION

COUNTY COLLABORATIONS BAY COUNTY

Manatee Lagoon, an FPL Eco-Discovery Center, is designed to help visitors understand Florida’s manatees and their surrounding ecosystem.

that one of the best ways to sustainability and clean water is through the magic of education — helping students and teachers make a difference in the world by focusing on the problems and ferreting out the solutions.

If we educate our students and provide them with real life learning opportunities, whether virtual or in person, students will work for a better solution. They will save that which they know and love because our future depends on a healthy watery world.

Bay County is the first county in Florida to work with Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation, creating countywide educator professional learning experiences for their STEM teachers.

These engaging, hands-on learning experiences are made possible by a generous grant from the St. Joe Community Foundation. The teachers will be trained on the use of all Guy Harvey educational content and will get to enjoy an experience out in the field, putting their new knowledge to use. Not only will they leave with a wealth of knowledge and renewed passion, but they’ll also be taking home a Guy Harvey “dive bag” that will include items for activities they can use in their classroom.

MARTIN COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT On Aug. 3, the GHOF created a collaboration with the Mar tin County School District’s secondary teachers.

The teachers got to go seine netting, boating and learned about the

Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation’s education resources.

The Martin County School District brought back real-life application and hands-on field work in the summer of 2021. In June, students attending summer school were provided the opportunity to have a field day at the Environmental Studies Center in Jensen Beach, Florida.

Students did a fish count while seining, learned about boating safety on their boat ride and participated in a plankton tow and lab. They even were able to meet the resident loggerhead sea turtle, Shelby, and Joey the alligator.

Since turtle nest season is during the summer months, the staff explained the problem of lights from condos and houses or other bright lights attracting baby turtles away from the water they’re supposed to be heading for. They also learned how their nests are marked and made.

There were smiles, giggles and squeals of joy from the students. The ESC even ran a full summer camp this year with boating, seining, sand sculpture contest, fishing and a variety of other activities.

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GHOF, MarineLab Join Forces on

Conservation Education

BY GHM STAFF PHOTOS COURTESY OF MARINELAB

I MarineLab’s location in the Florida Keys gives it the perfect locale for research.

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f you've been following the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation recently, you know that marine science and conservation education has risen to the top of the list. Educating kids — and teachers — on the importance of ocean conservation is a critical step in saving our reefs, our fish, our oceans and our planet.

That’s why the GHOF has developed a new collaboration with MarineLab in Key Largo, Florida. Since 1985, MarineLab has been teaching more than 4,000 students and teachers per year with its 3-to-5day, hands-on lab and in-water programs. GHOF is complementing the existing MarineLab experience with a 150-hour, state-approved ocean education curriculum, ranging from virtual programs to workbooks and lesson plans. And all of this is free to teachers.

One of GHOF/MarineLab’s unique initiatives is inviting K-12 teachers from around the Caribbean to attend their weeklong course under a scholarship program partly funded by the GHOF. Spreading the good word of marine conservation across Florida and the rest of the country is underway, but reaching out to teachers from the Bahamas, Jamaica, Virgin Islands and other island nations is critical in getting the message

MARINELAB

Ian Koblick

to locations that are surrounded by water. These regions are feeling the most pain brought on by ocean acidification, coral bleaching, overfishing and other marine conservation issues.

Located just one hour south of Miami on Largo Sound within the John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park, MarineLab is on the doorstep of some of the most pristine water and coral reefs in the Florida Keys. The MarineLab campus houses up to 100 students and teachers, with classrooms and laboratories on site for easy learning. Five vessels are available for immediate snorkeling access, along with a floating conference center that includes two classrooms and campus-wide, high-speed internet access.

Also on site is the world’s only underwater hotel, the Jules’ Undersea Lodge, operated by Key Largo Undersea Park. The habitat, which is only reachable by scuba, was originally known as the La Chalupa research laboratory, an underwater laboratory used to explore the continental shelf off the coast of Puerto Rico.

In the early ’70s, Ian Koblick, who runs MarineLab, developed and operated La Chalupa research laboratory, which at the time was the largest and most technologically advanced underwater habitat of its kind.

Koblick, who has continued his work as a pioneer in developing advanced undersea programs for ocean science and education, is the co-author of the book Living and Working in the Sea, and he is considered one of the foremost authorities on undersea habitation.

The partnership between Guy Harvey, Ian Koblick and MarineLab will be key in educating students and teachers in the importance of marine science and conservation.

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Ladies Coral Way Sleeveless Dress Whether youure up for a day of shopping with friends or kicking by the pool, Guy Harvey dresses are the perfect choice.

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www.GuyHarvey.com

All billfishing in Guatemala is catch and release

April 19–23, 2022 Total Cost: $5,300 ■

Lodging per double occupancy 5 days/4 nights

■

Greeting at airport and all transfers; return to airport

■

3 full days of fishing with captain and mate

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4 anglers per boat with all equipment

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A Guy Harvey gift package to include shirt and other items from their store

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A Pacific Fins gift package upon arrival to room

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Subscription to Guy Harvey Magazine

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Open bar private dinners (full a-la-carte menu) each night by Pacific Fins chef with Dr. Guy Harvey

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Breakfast, hot lunch and snacks prepared fresh on board by Pacific Fins crew with soft drink/water beverages

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During stay, Dr. Guy Harvey will paint an original piece of art to be auctioned off on the last night

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Personalized signed print of Guy Harvey art

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Sightseeing afternoon upon arrival and lunch at La Casa Del Ron (Service tips not included)

For available expedition dates, contact browland@GuyHarvey.com GHOF.org | 31

PHOTO BY ROMRODINKA / ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

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SAWGRASS TO SEAGRASS

SAWGRASS TO

SEAGRASS The fight to maintain a delicate balance

BY AMANDA MARTIN

ONCE CONSIDERED A MOSQUITO-INFESTED SWAMP,

the Everglades has finally achieved the gold medal recognition it deserves. Approximately 4 million acres of diverse wetlands, rivers, lakes, prairies and forests are not only home to thousands of vital species, but they also provide fresh, clean drinking water for 9 million people in Florida every single day.

The wetlands improve water quality by filtering out pollutants and absorbing excess nutrients, replenishing aquifers and reducing flooding. This critically important ecosystem is unlike any other in the world and is home to countless plant and animal species, many of which are threatened or endangered. Sadly, even with this precious gem in the backyards of so many Floridians, many of them are not aware of its importance.

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SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

MUCH MORE THAN A SWAMP

The Everglades was once believed to be a worthless swamp. In 1881, a Pennsylvania land developer named Hamilton Disston purchased most of the Everglades with the goal of creating a network of drainage canals to drain the swamp, but he was unsuccessful. In 1904, Napoleon Bonaparte Broward (for whom the county is named) promised to drain the Everglades during his campaign for governor.

His efforts were more successful than Disston’s.

Following two back-to-back major floods in 1947 and 1948, our forefathers drew a line in 1949. They said inside this line will be persevered forever and outside will be drained for agricultural use, flood control, safety and welfare to the general public. The system that once flowed freely from the Kissimmee River into Lake Okeechobee through the river of grass and into Florida Bay was compartmentalized, and its natural sheet flow was cut off with levees, dikes, canals and pump stations. This compartmentalized system would pump water from the developed areas onto the area of the Everglades that was intended to be saved, doubling the amount of water with half the area to store it. This created a huge problem for the ecosystem. A wetland is extremely sensitive to water levels. Too much water or too little water can have devastating impacts. It is crucial to understand that a natural wetland has a shallow depth of water, compatible with the ecology, environment and wildlife.

Now, after more than 30 years of relentless efforts by conservationists to restore the Everglades, the tides have finally turned in their favor. The plans are complex and expensive, but the bottom line is to correct the past, decompartmentalize and re-establish the natural sheet flow of water with the proper quantity and quality compatible with the natural system. This will benefit the Everglades, but the hope is that it also will eliminate the blue-green algae that has plagued coastal communities and created 34 | GuyHarvey.com

“The Everglades is one of the most unique places on this earth. It is up to us to be good stewards.” Ron Bergeron

a balance in Florida Bay that has killed off sea grasses due to high salinity from lack of freshwater and other factors.

It is extremely important to realize this journey of water from north to south is what replenishes the aquifer that provides drinking water for the 9 million people that live in South Florida.

No Everglades = no water.

The good news is that there is hope.

Hope for an Everglades resurgence. Hope for cleaner water. Hope for native species to thrive. And hope for successful conservation from the Sawgrass of the Everglades to the Seagrass of the ocean.

THE ALLIGATOR MAN

If you don’t know Alligator Ron, let me introduce you to this fascinating man. He is a proud Gladesman who spends most of his

time deep in the swamps. He got his name “Alligator Ron” after he lost a finger wrestling an alligator. He’s devoted most of his life to saving the Everglades.

A natural ranch deep within the Everglades is where he calls home. Alligator Ron’s family has been in Florida for eight generations; they have lived and breathed within the elements of the Everglades since the 1800s. He grew up in Davie when it had a population of just 500 folks, and his parents owned and ran a small grocery store.

“There were more places to tie your horse than park a car in front of my dad’s store,” Ron said. “My parents demanded respect, discipline, responsibility and kindness from me.”

At the age of 18, he left home; he mowed pastures, baled hay and harvested fruit. He never turned down a job and worked many 18-hour days, sometimes sleeping under his

SAWGRASS TO SEAGRASS

Too much water or too little water can have a devastating impact on the Everglades and its wildlife.

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SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

tractor. By the age of 25, Ron had become a very successful businessman and entrepreneur, yet he lived in a house trailer until he was 40.

In addition to his entrepreneurial efforts, which have now grown into overseeing more than 60 companies, Ron’s dedication to the land and its creatures never wavered.

His love of the Florida wildlife and understanding of their needs to be protected motivates him to budget time and money to Everglades conservation. He currently serves as a governing board member of The South Florida Water Management District, appointed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, as well as the Everglades Task Force, which oversees Everglades Restoration. He also served two terms and was appointed by two governors as a commissioner for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission. He also was the point commissioner over the entire Florida Everglades.

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SAWGRASS TO SEAGRASS EDUCATION

Over the years, Ron has also become good friends with Dr. Guy Harvey. They joke that if Harvey will wrestle an alligator, Bergeron will scuba dive with sharks. So far, neither has happened. However, both men understand the intricate link between the land and the water and conservation of each.

“The Everglades is one of the most unique places on this earth. It is up to us to be good stewards. It is impossible to save the estuaries of the Gulf and the Atlantic without the proper quantity, quality, timing and distribution of freshwater, the journey of water from the Everglades to the ocean,” Bergeron said. “That’s why we call it Sawgrass to Seagrass. It’s all connected.”

Water is the key focus on the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation, but that extends to the boundaries such as mangroves and seagrasses.

“We need to be able to educate the next generation about the connection between the land and the sea ...

Those kids who are in elementary school now will be scientists and engineers bringing the Everglades back to life 10, 25 or 50 years from now.”

Ron Bergeron

SAWGRASS TO SEAGRASS

“The marshes and mangroves act as nurseries for many of the gamefish species we love to catch,” Harvey said. “Just snorkel around the roots of mangroves, and you’ll see juvenile snook, crabs, turtles — basically the building blocks of the saltwater food chain.”

This like-mindedness has led to an ambitious K–12 education curriculum that is free to students — not just in Florida but also anywhere on the planet. The courses, focused on middle and high school students are jam-packed with education on the history of the Everglades, hydrology, wildlife, flora, fauna … the entire gamut that is the Everglades. This information is delivered using dynamic videos, vivid photos and hands-on activities that can be used in the classroom.

“We need to be able to educate the next generation about the connection between the land and the sea,” Bergeron said. “We’re finally on the path to restore the Everglades, and that’s fantastic.

Yet, we’re facing a long road ahead. This is not a process that will happen overnight. Those kids who are in elementary school now will be scientists and engineers bringing the Everglades back to life 10, 25 or 50 years from now.”

During the past two years, the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation has launched a full suite of educational content on the oceans. So it’s fitting that Bergeron and Harvey teamed up to create the Sawgrass to Seagrass curriculum, which teaches students about the interconnectedness of the Everglades and oceans.

In addition to the curriculum, which is available online and in classrooms, a primary goal is to engage the teachers themselves on an upfront and personal level. It’s not enough to just put the content in the teacher’s hands. A series of onsite teacher workshops gives them the full Everglades experience, such as boat rides through the river of grass, allowing them to see first-hand what sawgrass looks and feels like and why it’s important to the wetlands. Teachers get to see amazing wildlife up close (but not too close), to create lifelong impressions, instilling a love and respect for nature that they will take back to the kids in the classroom, creating more Everglades advocates.

For more information go to: BergeronEvergladesFoundation.org.

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SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

OCEAN CREST ALLIANCE LEADS THE WAY Building a blue economy in the Bahamas and globally

BY JOSEPH IERNA JR., FOUNDER OCEAN CREST ALLIANCE PHOTOS BY ALESSANDRO SARNO

O

ne of the best tools we have right now for improving the health of our marine ecosystems is a Marine Protected Areas (MPA). And to operate and manage an MPA effectively, we have to run them like any other business. We can’t depend only on governments and grants to pay for MPAs. We need a new source of revenue that will allow for proper management — sustainable funding — and that is what is leading our efforts at Ocean Crest Alliance (OCA), to create a Blue Economy that will contribute to marine reserve management and in turn create new business and job opportunities for generations to come.

MPA SUCCESS

During our tenure, we worked to create a new business model at the park that would operate financially sustainable, something that had not been achieved in the park’s 58 years of operations.

“I can say with great confidence that Joe and the OCA completely transformed the Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park and made it shipshape and much more functional,” says Eric Carey, executive director of the BNT. “Last year, for the first time ever in its history, Exuma Park covered its operating cost, A group of kids on Long with a significant surplus to Island learn about the Bahamas Plastics Initiative. support other parks.”

So how did we achieve this success in such a short period of time? First and foremost, we worked to create or enhance several revenue streams, one being through Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) to help with the sustainable management of the 174 square miles of marine habitat. For example, one way PHOTO COURTESY OF OCEAN CREST ALLIANCE (KIDS)

From January 2018 to May 2020, the founders of our nonprofit, OCA, signed a two-year contract with the Bahamas National Trust (BNT), to manage and operate one of the oldest marine parks in the world — the Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park (ECLSP). The BNT manages 32 national parks across the Bahamian archipelago, relying mostly on government, grants and private donations to stay solvent.

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we drove more revenue was by increasing user fees for boats (mostly yachts) based on length, passenger count and other factors. These luxury vessels want to anchor in the park and enjoy some of the most pristine waters on the planet.

In almost all cases, they are more than willing to pay a fair user fee, especially knowing that those dollars are being used to maintain and improve the facilities, such as the visitor’s center or the series of mooring balls that protect the reefs from anchor damage.

In addition to being financially sustainable, this MPAs success was also designed to be replicable, based on the location, the local framework, the number of the users of the MPA and the ecosystems requirements. This business model is scalable globally and is being tailored accordingly to attract the many PPP opportunities as well as Venture Capital groups,

BLUE ECONOMY

The calm and clear turquoise waters over the Bahamas are breathtaking, and keeping these waters pristine is a full-time effort.

ALESSANDRO SARNO

looking to get into and support a potential lucrative business of the Blue Economy.

This type of co-management agreement was adopted and created between the OCA founders and the BNT to improve the management and operations of the ECLSP through investable initiatives, such as adding more moorings, expanding the dive operations, offering snorkel, kayaking and land-based tours, providing more lodging opportunities, and any other traditional revenue streams that are offered to tourists.

This is not rocket science, but when a park is running on financial fumes, which is most often the case, there’s no money for expansion. VC money can provide the capital needed to build out infrastructure and staffing needs so that parks can capitalize on traditional tourism income. The only

difference is to create a for-profit business within the operations to help enhance the nonprofit entity of the park, satisfying the financial needs for both. This type of arrangement has been operating within our land-based national parks for years, with both business entities generating sustainable funding to run their respective operations while maintaining the management goals and commitments to keeping the park natural and pristine.

If the co-management operations move along without a hitch, it becomes an attractive and effective model for private investors, who are keen to put their money to work in ocean conservation. In the past, when wealthy users donated funds to parks, the only financial benefit was getting a tax write-off. If done properly, funding

Born and raised in Italy, Alessandro Sarno made his first trip to the Bahamas approximately 12 years ago, and it was a trip that changed his life. Mesmerized by the incredible blue waters, he was compelled to buy his first camera.

What started out as a short vacation transformed into a deep love for both photography and the Bahamas, where he still feels most inspired to capture the everyday moments of life. Sarno has published five coffee table books portraying life in the islands: Exumas: The Kingdom of Blue, Eleuthera:The Garden of Freedom, Junkanoo:The Spirit of a People, Catch Da Cat, and Blue And Beyond. Sarno’s photography focuses on the details and crossroads of daily life: community gatherings, worship services, wildlife, vistas of solitude, rhythms of connection, forgotten corners, unexpected treasures and other small details illuminating humanity’s vastness.

His personal notes and thoughts on what makes for a more memorable and deeper visitor experience are found in his unique curated photography books: The Exuma Cays Land & Sea Park, Eleuthera, and White Bull on the Highway. For more info, visit TheLonesomePhotographer.com.

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SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

can now become investments with significant returns. This is both good for the giver and the environment.

Of course, the notion that our unspoiled oceans and coastal areas should be managed for the benefit of private investors is uncomfortable for some. No one wants to see an Atlantisstyle resort or Disney World atmosphere built in an ultra-pristine national park. That’s why the management company and agreement are critical to the overall planning. Profits are great to attract more investors — but not to the detriment of the ecosystem.

MPA CHALLENGES GLOBALLY

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The caves along Cape Santa Maria on Long Island in the Bahamas are a perfect place for exploring.

management of these reserves can be hard to come by. And if you are not policing the area for illegal activities, or if you are not clamping down on development and pollution, then you will see no real improvement — or perhaps even degradation — in the biodiversity and water quality.

VALUE OF MPA’S

The first hurdle in creating successfully managed MPAs is convincing governments and the local stakeholders of their value. That process can take years of working with the various parties, such as the fishing, tourism and energy industries impacted by new MPAs. More data is needed to show that MPAs are in the best interests of the country’s economy, especially countries like the Bahamas that are reliant on tourism and fishing — their No. 1 and No. 3 economies respectively. Data has

already shown that effectively managed marine reserves can produce on average approximately seven times more biomass than an unprotected area, providing a blueprint of success to all stakeholders of the area.

Like Florida and other beach/waterrelated locations, Bahamian tourism is reliant on thriving coral reefs, clean beaches and abundant marine life. That is why the tourists come. If those assets deteriorate, tourism and revenue drop, and both the environment and economy suffer.

The dive industry in the Bahamas generates nearly $115 million per year, with a large percent of that money coming from shark diving, according to a 2018 study in the scientific journal Biological Conservation. The study found that the Bahamas has the largest shark diving economy in the world. This is exciting because it demonstrates the stream of economic benefits that the Bahamas is

PHOTO BY ALESSANDRO SARNO

While we have seen an increase in the number of Marine Protected Areas globally, most do not achieve what they are designed to do. Unless we start running MPAs like any successful business, they will fail. As our dear friend and supporter Dr. Guy Harvey says, “It takes cash to care.”

MPAs take on many flavors, from an area being closed to all human activities — such as fishing, boating and extraction, called a No Take Zone (NTZ) — to areas designated as Marine Managed Areas (MMAs), which encompass sustainable fisheries, naturefriendly tourism and conservation areas called a multi-use zone. The methods may vary, but the goal is clear: to mitigate the negative impact of human activity and to protect and support marine life in all its forms.

Presently there are 14,092 MPAs around the world, with 1,014 being fully/highly protected and 13,078 being less protected/unknown or as many call them “paper MPAs” — meaning there is no effective level of management being implemented. As a percentage, this equates to 6.4% of our oceans under protection, with 2.7% being fully protected and 3.7% being less protected. This figure is seen as too low by many conservationists, who argue that 50% would be a more appropriate target.

The global challenge is that many of the countries that have marine reserves are typically developing economies with myriad issues needing attention. The political will and vast financial resources needed for

BLUE ECONOMY

OCEAN CREST ALLIANCE ADVENTURE CENTERS Diversity is key to sustainability

receiving from conservation actions it took many years ago.

Even with excellent examples like this, it’s still hard to convince governments of the relationship between ocean health and climate change and the subsequent impact on coastal areas.

Science has proven that sea levels are rising.

Investing in our marine environment, such as mangroves and sea grasses, creates a buffer to coastlines as well as carbon sequestration.

The long road to operate financially sustainable MPAs is what leads Ocean Crest Alliance efforts, but ultimately it is the political will of the government and the community that will bring success to these efforts. That is the chief challenge. We are hopeful that once we have a couple of models in place and the benefits become clear, governments will be more open to the idea of co-management of our marine resources by community stakeholders and NGOs such as OCA.

Following our first-hand experience in operating and creating a financially sustainable MPA in the Exuma Cays, Ocean Crest Alliance designed a PPP model for the co-management of an even larger MPA, a 257,000-acre park known as the Long Island Marine Management Area (LIMMA). At the heart of this MPA will be an OCA Adventure Center, which we plan to build to create income via user fees paid by the many visitors — tourists, filmmakers, scientists, researchers, adventurers, explorers and others who just want to relax on the beach and enjoy the sunset.

Other focus areas for the park include coral reef ecosystem improvements, reducing pollution, expanding clean energy, enhancing local food production, promoting community engagement, developing alternative incomes for local citizens, increasing scientific research and finally compliance and enforcement. On this latter point, enforcement, which has always been one of the most difficult aspects of marine conservation, the Bahamian government will provide wardens who will have policing functions so our marine resources are protected.

To start with, 13 permanent staff will be hired, with annual operational expenses

expected to run to about $1 million.

Capital expenditure for vessels, scientific equipment and the actual construction of an adventure center will add another $3 million. We anticipate these same costs for other OCA Adventure Centers we build on other islands and in other countries.

Beyond the heavy focus on the environment, the financial return on the investment could be as high as 20% to 30% annually. Based on what we have learned from the effects of COVID on the global tourism sector, we wanted to be conservative with our numbers. At 20% yearly growth year over year, and based on our five-year projections, we show a gross revenue of $3,499,770. This sor t of return makes for an attractive investment for PPP and VC groups.

To finance the Adventure Center projects, investment will come from the many blue economy financial institutions, public and private investors, VC groups and grants. To get each center up and running will cost approximately $5 million. Once we show how this proof of concept works on small MPAs such as the ECLSP and LIMMA, the concept can be scaled up to accommodate the larger MPAs around the planet, thereby providing a template for Blue Economy growth around the globe.

Ocean Crest Alliance is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to honor, protect and restore the health of the world’s oceans and the life of the earth’s systems through conservation, research, education, science and technology. The projects and programs we are involved with provide relevant and beneficial information to every marine ecosystem worldwide and to all of earth’s living systems. Our Mission contributes to United Nations SDGs nº14 (‘life below water’), nº2 (‘achieve food security), nº7 (‘sustainable energy’), nº8 (‘decent work’), nº5 (‘gender equality), nº12 (‘sustainable consumption and production’), and nº13 (‘climate action’) as a priority. We will dedicate our resources to build marine operation facilities, design and build a fleet of vessels to support the sustainability of the various contracted research projects, as well as, to assist in the establishing of Marine Protected Areas (MPA’s).

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42 | GuyHarvey.com

FISHING APPS

A BETTER APPLICATION Fishing apps have a potential new role: assessing fish stocks through digital crowdsourcing

BY SID DOBRIN

PHOTO BY RYNO BOTHA / ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS

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et’s face it, fishing regulations can be confusing sometimes. The laws our governmental fishery managers write determine how many fish we can legally catch, when we can catch them, and how big or small the fish have to be. Like a lot of you, I keep up with these rules as best I can, even though they change year-to-year and state-by-state.

Fortunately, there are apps (I have several on my phone) on my smartphone that help me see up-to-date regulations that will help me avoid an expensive ticket from a fish and wildlife officer. If you think the laws and regulations can be bewildering, think about how complex it is for management agencies — both federal and state — to come up with the vast sets of rules in the first place. Before they write the laws, they have to determine how many fish of each species are swimming around. This is known as

Fish Stock Assessments. Scientists who work for the management agencies try to figure out if the population of fish is growing, depleting or staying in balance. This requires lots of research, and agencies like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have developed lots of ways for assessing different fish stocks.

Traditionally, agencies like NOAA conduct their own stock assessments and then make the rules we have to follow based on what they learn. However, the growing popularity of mobile digital apps in fishing has opened the doors to new approaches for gathering information about stock assessments. Like a lot of other things in our daily lives, mobile apps can now provide information that might be useful to the agencies that monitor fish stocks. Citizen science and crowdsourcing have the potential to provide

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SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

agencies with a lot of information they might not otherwise discover. It’s a new idea but using crowd-sourced information has the potential to really help agencies like NOAA in keeping up with changes in fish stocks.

Many of the new fishing apps that anglers use include social media and networking features that let anglers share and boast about the fish they catch. Anglers can tell others what fish they caught, where they caught the fish, and what bait and gear they used. They also can upload pictures of their fish. All of that information can be useful for fish stock assessments.

One company — FishAngler App — is hoping their app will do just that: help management agencies get a better picture of how many fish are out there so the agencies will have detailed information when making new laws and regulations.

In “The Bite” segment of the Spring/Summer 2021 issue of Guy Harvey Magazine, Emily Roden reported about the partnership between Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation and FishAngler, an app that provides anglers with a lot of great information about fish species, tackle, fishing spots and just about everything you might want to know about fishing. Because it has so much information, it’s a great app for new anglers and crusty old fishermen. The FishAngler app lets users interact with one another like they would on other social media apps, but it’s only about fishing. FishAngler has more than 2 million registered users worldwide, so there are a lot of people uploading a lot of useful information to the application.

FishAngler developers Tom and Jane Wye hope that all of the 44 | GuyHarvey.com

information users are uploading to the app will be useful to how agencies do stock assessments. They see FishAngler as being able to provide information that can be useful for making fishing regulations and also useful for how agencies and anglers think about conservation.

There are a lot of reasons why the kinds of crowd-sourced information that FishAngler anonymously gathers and provides can be useful for thinking about stock assessment.

Crowd-sourced data can enhance the information that management

agencies gather on their own. This is particularly helpful because FishAngler’s users see fish from a lot of bodies of water that the agencies never look at. According to Tom Wye, there are 7,728,610 bodies of water in the U.S., but only about 271,882 of those have official names and are recognized by the official agencies.

So there are many bodies of water where people fish — like small private ponds or creeks — that never get counted in stock assessments. Using the anonymously sourced information that FishAngler’s users provide about

With detailed information provided by fishing regulars, apps can help agencies better assess fish stocks.

PHOTO BY MICHALDZIKI / ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS

FISHING APPS

those bodies of water can help the agencies see a broader picture of how many fish are really out there.

Similarly, collectively, FishAngler users have posted information about more than a million fish that have been caught. Their database includes over 33,000 unique species of fish. That means that each time an angler anonymously posts information about a catch, they are adding information to what we know about that fish, where that fish lives and how to catch that fish. Taking all of the logged catches together, that’s a lot of new information about fish. This also

lets the people who count fish for stock assessment get more accurate counts.

While regulating agencies are not yet using FishAngler to help with stock assessment, the app is gathering lots of important and useful information. The Wyes are eager to work with researchers to put FishAngler’s information to work in support of conservation and management efforts. Clearly, the kind of crowd-sourced information FishAngler can provide is important, and the role of platforms like FishAngler appear to be critical to what comes next for stock assessment and management practices.

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FROM 35 MULES TO

30 MILLION SOLAR PANELS Florida Power & Light Company helps build toward a cleaner energy future

BY GHM STAFF

46 | GuyHarvey.com

2030 with its revolutionary “30-by-30” plan.

To date, the company has installed 12 million solar panels and counting. Silagy says it’s a move that makes sense for the environment and FPL’s 5.6 million customers.

“Investing in a cleaner, more sustainable energy source like solar is the right thing to do for Florida,” explained Silagy. “By 2030, FPL projects it will generate 40% of its electricity from zero-emissions sources with solar and energy storage being responsible for half of that energy generation. That will help us protect Florida’s diverse ecosystems while keeping customer bills low and reliability high.”

The company first started studying solar in the mid-1980s. Then, in 2010, FPL built its first ever large-scale solar energy center.

By 2016, the company was building solar energy centers that were three times the size of the inaugural solar site and less expensive, allowing the company to capture economies of scale to save customers money.

“We’ve always wanted to bring the benefits of solar to our customers, but the trick was finding a way to balance customer bills with the need for more clean energy,” explained Silagy. “Large-scale solar energy centers hit the sweet spot. As the price of solar panels declined, we were able to install more solar, more affordably — and now, nobody in America is building more cost-effective solar than FPL.”

(Above) FPL’s Interstate Solar Energy Center can be seen by travelers commuting on I-95 and Florida’s Turnpike. It is located in St. Lucie County.

(Right) FPL Echo River Solar Energy Center in Live Oak, Florida, features solar panels mounted on tracking systems, which follow the path of the sun throughout the day to maximize clean energy production.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF FLORIDA POWER & LIGHT COMPANY

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hat was once a swampland featuring alligators as roadside attractions has transformed into the third most populous state in the nation. The dramatic influx of new Florida residents in recent years means an increase in the demand for services, including a lot of electricity. One company is rising to the challenge and becoming a leader in clean energy along the way.

“Florida is a rapidly growing state and on the front lines of climate change and frequently severe weather — all of which we must recognize and prepare for,” said Eric Silagy, president and CEO of Florida Power & Light Company (FPL). “That’s why we’re committed to building a more resilient and sustainable energy future that all of us can depend on — including future generations — by continuing to make proven, long-term investments in infrastructure, clean energy and innovative technology.”

Even though FPL — a subsidiary of NextEra Energy, the world’s largest producer of power from solar and wind — is the state’s largest electric utility company, it grew from humble beginnings. The company started in 1925 as a conglomeration of small enterprises, including an ice plant, a sponge fishing boat and 35 mules.

Fast forward almost a hundred years, and the company has replaced its mules with a promise to install 30 million solar panels by

CLEAN ENERGY

CHARGING TOWARD A MORE SUSTAINABLE FUTURE WITH INNOVATIVE BATTERY STORAGE TECHNOLOGY

FPL is also working on energy storage solutions to fully leverage the benefits of solar technology. Solar is a variable energy source, which means the amount of solar energy generated can vary based on the weather and seasons, as well as at nighttime when the sun is “turned off.” Energy storage enables the company to store excess solar energy when the sun is shining and deploy it when it’s needed most, such as at night or on a cloudy day. The company is building the world’s largest solar powered battery storage facility on Florida’s west coast. The FPL Manatee Energy Storage Center will be charged by a nearby solar energy center and will be able to store enough clean energy to power approximately 329,000 homes for more than two hours.

“Effective energy storage is essential for a clean energy future,” said Temperince Morgan, executive director of The Nature Conservancy in Florida. “We need to explore all available solutions in our efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and implementing new technology, like FPL’s large-scale battery storage project, is critical to building a cleaner,

Battery Storage containers at Dania Beach, FL. GHOF.org | 47

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

FPL EVOLUTION ELECTRIC VEHICLE CHARGING PROGRAM ▪ Launched in 2019, FPL EVolution is an innovative pilot program designed to boost Florida’s EV infrastructure, support EV adoption and increase range confidence.

▪ The program will install over 1,000 charging ports at more than 100 locations across FPL’s service area by the end of 2021.

▪ Once complete, FPL EVolution will increase the availability of universal EV charging stations in Florida by 50%.

▪ Included in the charging network is an 800-mile stretch of fast charge stations capable of powering up most car batteries in about 30 minutes.

▪ With the fast charge network, drivers can charge approximately every 50 miles along major highways and corridors, such as Florida’s Turnpike and I-95.

▪ The pilot program also includes Level 2 chargers at workplace and destination locations.

▪ In addition to accelerating the adoption of EVs, this high-tech electric vehicle initiative will generate valuable data to help ensure the continued reliability of the energy grid for all FPL customers.

▪ EV drivers can download the FPL EVolution app to find and navigate to the closest FPL EVolution charging station, check port availability, charging history and trends, and discover nearby amenities.

FPL Manatee Energy Storage Center

more affordable and more sustainable energy future. The solutions we forge today are fundamental to our economy, our communities and our planet, now and for future generations.”

FPL’s clean energy story doesn’t end there. The company is also investing in electric vehicles (EVs) through its FPL EVolution program. This innovative pilot program improves the state’s current EV infrastructure by installing charging ports across FPL’s service territory.

“As someone who has crisscrossed the state and logged thousands of miles behind the wheel of an EV, I can tell you that range anxiety is real, but our EVolution program is helping drive the state toward a more sustainable energy future by making electric vehicle charging ports more accessible,” said Silagy.

STEWARDSHIP TO PROTECT AND PRESERVE THE PLANET

FPL EVolution fast charging stations in Yulee, Florida.

48 | GuyHarvey.com

FPL isn’t just committed to advancing clean energy. It’s also committed to being an industry leader in environmental protection and stewardship, including wildlife and habitat protection. As part of that commitment, FPL has partnered with Audubon Florida — an organization that advocates for the protection of land, water and wildlife — to ensure its solar energy centers are good stewards of the environment.

The company’s commitment to stewardship begins long before the construction of any solar site. During development, FPL identifies the presence of threatened or endangered species as well as ecologically important areas like wildlife corridors and wetlands. FPL then works with Audubon Florida and other local organizations to craft site-specific environmental plans which can include

CLEAN ENERGY

PHOTOS COURTESY OF FLORIDA POWER & LIGHT COMPANY

Manatee Lagoon – An FPL Eco-Discovery Center®

planting native plants to make solar energy centers more bird and pollinator friendly, as well as installing nest boxes and T-perches to improve habitat conditions.

This isn’t FPL’s only environmental stewardship initiative. Another example is Manatee Lagoon - An FPL Eco-Discovery Center® that the company built and operates as an environmental education center. It is designed to help visitors understand Florida’s manatees and their surrounding ecosystem, and it’s located next to the company’s Riviera Beach Next Generation Clean Energy Center, where manatees gather during winter to take advantage of the plant’s warm water outflow.

As part of Manatee Lagoon’s mission, FPL has forged a partnership with the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation to create exciting educational opportunities for Florida teachers, students and families. This unique educational platform was designed to help communities learn about Florida’s wildlife and how it can be preserved for future generations.

“We’re excited to partner with FPL on our K-12 Education Initiative,” said Dr. Guy Harvey. “It’s vital that we collaborate with companies that have the same vision as we do for a cleaner, sustainable future.

FPL’s commitment to expanding their solar

farms and protecting critical animals like manatees is a great illustration of their social responsibility and why we’re proud to call them a partner.”

ALL ROADS LEAD TO SOLAR ENERGY

There is no instruction manual for building a cleaner energy future, but for FPL, all roads lead back to solar. Its solar build-out allows the renewable energy source to help power almost everything we use in our daily lives.

It certainly seems like solar is fundamental to FPL’s secret sauce, but Silagy tells us there is more than one ingredient.

“We don’t want to simply install solar panels,” said Silagy. “We want to continue making forward-thinking, cost-effective investments on behalf of our customers because we have a responsibility to do right by the future generations of Floridians. We started from humble origins, and nearly a century later, we’re still challenging ourselves to be even better so that we set our future generations up for success and demonstrate to the world that Florida is a leader in clean energy and sustainability. This requires us to embrace fresh ideas and not be afraid to disrupt ourselves along the way.”

About Manatee Lagoon – An FPL Eco-Discovery Center® Manatee Lagoon has been educating the public about manatees and Lake Worth Lagoon for five years, and inspiring communities to preserve and protect Florida’s environment and wildlife for future generations.

On cold winter days, the facility’s observation deck is the ideal spot to view manatee herds basking in the warm-water outflows from Florida Power & Light Company’s adjacent Riviera Beach Next Generation Clean Energy Center. On weekdays, the center offers an observation deck to spot manatees, a solar-canopy shaded picnic area, solar trees with a new educational augmented reality 3D exhibit, and tropical grounds with picturesque views of the Lake Worth Lagoon. For more information and for updates on hours and operations, visit VisitManateeLagoon.com and to explore virtual offerings, visit VisitManateeLagoon.com/ Virtual-Learning.

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NEW HOPE FOR THE

PLASTIC PLAGUE An Interview with Bob Powell

BY GHM STAFF

E

lectric cars, electric bicycles, solar farms, windmills — the transition in our energy economy is taking place before our eyes. Many of these changes are being driven by the business community, with automakers like General Motors announcing that it will only make electric vehicles by 2035 and Florida Power and Light’s commitment to massive solar power expansions (see FPL article on page 44). Yet, even with major advances in clean energy and a focus on reducing greenhouse gases, that doesn’t change the fact that our oceans are still under serious pressure.

It’s been said that by 2050 there will be more plastic by weight in the ocean than fish. That is simply frightening. Fortunately, there are a lot of nonprofit and for-profit organizations and government agencies focused on reducing, recycling and reusing plastics. One such innovative group is a relatively new company, Brightmark, which is in the process of building a $680 million plastic recycling center in Macon, Georgia.

GHM sat down with Bob Powell, CEO and founder of Brightmark, about the future of energy and plastic.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF BRIGHTMARK

Plastic Pellets

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BRIGHTMARK

GHM: How did you go from working for an accounting firm to a leader in the recycling industry?

Powell: Mine has been a long journey to get to where we are today, but I distinctly remember when I seriously started thinking about the negative effects humans have on the planet. It was a trip to Asia when I was with the Arthur Andersen accounting firm.

We were helping our client buy a power plant, and I was in Jakarta, Indonesia where there’s lots of traffic and open sewers. There were kids playing in the sewer, and I’m thinking like, “Wow, these kids are about the same ages as my oldest son, Sean.” That was the first time that I thought about getting into the waste business.

Then, part of my expertise was helping clients buy coal-fired power plants. I saw how the ash got thrown in these pots that have heavy metals that leach into the ground. As a company, we were looking at it just from a cost perspective, as in, what are the costs to clean up so we could put that in the financials.

I didn’t think a power plant would have a toxic waste dump. I realized that cleaning up waste could be a good business and a good thing for the planet.

GHM: In 2016, you and your team came up with a concept of getting Renewable Natural Gas (RNG) from cow manure.

I’m sure you’ve had to endure many poop jokes, but tell us how the cow manure business solidified?

Powell: <laughs> Yes, we basically went into the manure rental business. It’s not very sexy, but it’s a win/win because we pay the farmers a premium price to take their manure for 21 days, we extract the methane to use as fuel and they get their manure back. They like to use it for bedding, so they don’t want to sell it to us. So we came up with the idea of just renting it. That way, we don’t have to dispose of it, which would create yet another environmental challenge.

Five years ago, we were just five people in a dark office with secondhand furniture living on hope. Our breakthrough came when that GHOF.org | 51

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Brightmark founder and CEO Bob Powell surveys several bales of plastic.

Only about 9% of plastics are recycled via traditional methods.

GHM: Recycling has been around for a long time, but it seems like you’re the first company to figure out how to make money.

Powell: Much of the recycling today is mechanical, which is basically melting the 52 | GuyHarvey.com

plastic or chopping it up. First of all, you can’t do that with 100 percent of the plastics out there — only plastic types 1 and 2 — so there’s a major limit on that. What we do is break down plastic, via an advanced recycling process, into the base building blocks — hydrogen and carbon atoms — so we can create new plastics or fuel that can be used to power vehicles or equipment.

The other issue with traditional recycling is that only 9% of plastics are recycled. When people put all of that plastic into their recycling bin, the majority of it goes into a landfill. That’s not recycling, it’s “wish-cycling.” We wish it’s getting recycled, but it’s not.

The best part about our process is that the plastic can be recycled over and over and over.

As long as they can be brought back into the same circle. We call that the Circular Solution.

The profit side of the equation comes from our proprietary process. The energy we use versus the energy we produce is an 1-to-11 ratio, so

that makes recycling plastic a very profitable business, really for the first time. As Bob Dylan said, “the times they are a-changin’.” In this case, the times have already changed.

GHM: If only 9% is getting recycled, how do we as a society increase that?

Powell: You increase it by having a real solution for the waste management companies. We make it economically viable because we can pay those companies to bring their plastics to us. Right now, they’re paying landfills to take it, but they can make more money by bringing it to Brightmark.

GHM: You’re building a brand new, $680 million plant in Macon, Georgia.

You’re going big time.

Powell: Yes, we are expanding rapidly. We built our first facility in Ashley, Indiana, and started in April of 2019. When we’re finished

PHOTOS COURTESY OF BRIGHTMARK

first dairy farmer raised his hand and said he would go with us. Now we are the market leader in RNG in farming communities.

That all started with those farmers. There was nothing of appreciable value in the manure other than they could sell it for fertilizers, which has the side effect of causing algae blooms. Now we provide them with an additional income stream that is exciting for family farms.

We currently work with 33 farms, process over 5.3 billion gallons of manure each year and generate over 2.7 million mmBtu of biomethane, which is the equivalent of heating 46,697 homes yearly.

BRIGHTMARK

this year with that project, we will be creating ultra-low sulfur diesel as transportation fuel.

It’s the most environmentally friendly form of diesel. Another product that we create from plastic is part of an additive to gasoline. The other product is paraffin wax, which can be used for candles and other applications. And, of course, we will make other plastic products from recycled plastic.

The new plant in Macon, Georgia, is on 5 million square feet of property. We will be able to take 400,000 tons — 800,000,000 pounds — out of the planet at that facility. We have to do this at scale and globally so we can get to the point that we’re recycling more than we’re producing.

GHM: You began five years ago in a small office with five people. You’ve had some impressive growth.

Powell: Yes, we’re now somewhere around 140 employees. When the Macon plant is complete we’ll add another 100 at least.

GHM: What shaped your love of the ocean?

goal of having 20% green energy by 2020. At first, we were freaked out because we didn’t think we’d make it, but we blew through that goal and other communities are doing the same. Now clean energy is price competitive because we’ve invested with optimism around solving the energy crisis. I believe there’s a future when combustible products will go away simply because they won’t be economical anymore.

GHM: What other cool stuff is Brightmark into?

Powell: We also make energy out of food waste as there’s a tremendous amount of food that goes into the trash. We’re changing that. Another element of our business that we’re excited about is working with a group called, RecycleForce. It employs formerly incarcerated people and started out taking

e-waste — old computers, phones and such.

They were paying a lot of money to landfill the plastics, so they reached out to us. Now, instead of them having to pay landfills, we’re paying them and providing them money they really need. Ultimately, they’re not just recycling plastics, they’re recycling lives, and that is a great feeling. For example, the average recidivism is 70%. RecycleForce has been able to reduce that to 20% by providing meaningful work and wages.

GHM: Any final thoughts?

Powell: Yes, not everything we’ve done is perfect, but we’ve got a great group. It’s all about trial and failure until we get it right.

We have to have both an economic and environmental solution. One comes with the other if we’re going to create a world without waste.

Brightmark opened its first plastics renewal facility in Ashley, Indiana.

Powell: I grew up in Georgia, and my brother and I would go down to Panama City Beach when we were younger. It all started there on those white beaches and in that clear water.

Then I had the opportunity to go scuba diving.

Once I was below the surface, I felt this sense of connection with the whole ecosystem of plants and animals that help support us.

The diving experience and the feeling of weightlessness is very Zen. The ocean is just this amazingly beautiful and fragile place, and that inspires the work we do. It’s exciting to know that we’re helping the oceans and the planet. We all have a role to play, just like the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation has a role.

It takes a village to make this happen. We’re excited to partner with GHOF in those efforts.

GHM: Do you think that we will ever get to a place where we’re making more clean energy than we can use?

Powell: Yes, I do and I have a lot of reasons to feel that way. In San Francisco, we had a GHOF.org | 53

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AN ESSENTIAL BALANCE Responsible development requires concern for sustainability

BY STEVE BORNHOFT

▪ SUSTAINABLE CITIES AND COMMUNITIES. Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable.

▪ LIFE BELOW WATER. Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development.

▪ LIFE ON LAND. Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems; sustainably manage forests; combat desertification; halt and reverse land degradation; halt biodiversity loss.

54 | GuyHarvey.com

▪ GOOD HEALTH AND WELL-BEING. Ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all people at all ages.

As the developer of coastal and nearcoastal tracts of land and the owner of vast environmentally significant acreages that historically have been home to rich communities of plant and animal life, the St. Joe Company, headquartered in Panama City Beach, Florida, feels a responsibility to safeguard the environment even as it proceeds to create neighborhoods, establish businesses and bring about a new city.

“Beyond federal, state and local requirements, we have internal frameworks and guidelines that we abide by,” said Catherine McCloy, St. Joe’s director of planning and development. “We live here, our families live here, and we grew up here, so it’s important to us intrinsically to preserve and maintain the environment in pristine condition as much as we can.”

Ten years before the United Nations adopted its SDGs, the St. Joe Company, working with state and federal agencies such as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission, voluntarily established regional general permits and ecosystem management agreements.

PHOTOS COURTESTY OF WATERSOUND CLUB

I

n 2015, the United Nations adopted 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) as part of a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that, by 2030, all people will enjoy peace and prosperity.

The goals, then, may be more aspirational than achievable, but they do provide a framework worthy of pursuit and one that relates closely in several regards to the activities of developers in Northwest Florida, including the most land-rich of them all, the St. Joe Company.

Among the 17 goals, here are four with strong application to regional development activity:

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

“We live here, our families live here, and we grew up here, so it’s important to us intrinsically to preserve and maintain the environment in pristine condition as much as we can.”

Catherine McCloy, St. Joe’s director of planning and development

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“We plan around the environmental features that are in place, extend roadway networks and fill in with lots in between.”

Catherine McCloy, St. Joe’s director of planning and development

56 | GuyHarvey.com

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT The St. Joe Company worked with several local and state agencies to responsibly build Latitude Margaritaville Watersound.

“They set aside certain areas for conservation,” McCloy explained. “There are thresholds on how much wetlands we impact.

We abide by stormwater management guidelines that are 50 percent more strict than those required by government regulators.

They add up to an environmental planning framework that affects how we plan and how we move forward with development.”

St. Joe is in the unique position of being able to set aside thousands of contiguous acres for conservation purposes versus isolated little green spaces. Of the 110,000 acres in its state-approved West Bay Sector Plan, 53,000 acres are reserved for conservation.

“What entity other than a government agency is able and willing to set aside that amount of land for restoration and preservation?” McCloy rhetorically asked.

An Ecosystem Management Agreement executed between the St. Joe Company and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection relies heavily on the concept of Conservation Units, said to be “areas of high quality habitat and landscape function, which have been identified and are to be excluded from development.”

Conservation Units specified by the agreement link wildlife corridors and protect uplands and wetlands from St. Andrew Bay to the Point Washington State Forest and Devil's Swamp mitigation bank. (St. Joe, as the owner of the bank, sells mitigation credits to smaller developers so that they can satisfy regulators’ set-aside requirements.)

Further connections extend to Northwest Florida Water Management District lands and eventually the Choctawhatchee floodplain and Bay systems.

“The result is a two-pronged ‘Bay to Bay’ wildlife corridor which helps preserve the ecological integrity of two of Northwest Florida's most rapidly developing watersheds,” the agreement notes.

The Ecosystem Management Agreement team identified five ecological criteria

for analyzing and selecting areas for inclusion in Conservation Units: regional significance, biodiversity, water quality, essential fish habitat and nursery/living marine resources.

Agreements, McCloy said, apply to developments both little and big — an addition to St. Joe’s Breakfast Point residential neighborhood located within blocks of its corporate headquarters, on one hand, or on the other, the projected 170,000unit Latitude Margaritaville Watersound, the equivalent of a midsized city under development north of Panama City Beach.

Wetlands delineations, soil analyses, flora and fauna inventories and the locations of water bodies, creeks and tributaries all figure in the compiling of agreements.

McCloy, in her role, gets involved in drafting site plans, including provisions for pocket parks, conservation areas and stormwater retention ponds.

“We take into consideration wetlands, topography and where water naturally wants to go,” she said. “We plan around the environmental features that are in place, extend roadway networks and fill in with lots in between.”

From the standpoint of a developer selling residential lots, lifestyle considerations are important. Homeowners enjoy looking out a window to see a great white egret alight at the edge of a blue pond. It slows their heart rates down a bit.

St. Joe, in its planning, has allowed for hundreds of miles of trails with connections to the Gayle’s Trails system in Panama City Beach. The Latitude Margaritaville project is laced with walking and other trails.

“We look at things holistically and plan for the long term,” McCloy said.

To the extent that they succeed, birds and bees, magnolias and mankind, stand to benefit.

Steve Bornhoft is the executive editor at Rowland Publishing in Tallahassee.

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WHERE HAVE ALL THE OYSTERS GON E? The fight to save oysters and the habitat that they help maintain

BY DR. SANDRA BROOKE

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destroyed natural shoreline buffers, such as salt marshes and coastal woodlands.

For a long time, oysters seemed an endless resource; images of massive piles of oyster shells outside shucking houses were common as oysters were canned and shipped elsewhere for consumption. Today, things are very different; approximately 85% of the world’s oyster reefs have been lost, making them among the most imperiled marine habitats in the world. In North America, two oysters have been harvested commercially: the Olympia oyster (which comprises two species: Ostrea conchaphila and O. lurida) on the west coast, and the Eastern oyster (Crassostrea virginica) on the east coast and Gulf of Mexico. Today, there are very few remaining beds of wild Olympia oysters, and the massive

reefs formed by the Eastern oyster have been reduced to 10% of historic levels.

What went wrong?

Declines in oyster populations have similarities across species and geographic locations, with the primary cause being overharvesting. In several regions, the fishery had significantly declined or collapsed by the mid-1900s. Oysters are sedentary, readily accessible and have been exploited by coastal communities for centuries. Given these factors, widespread and systematic overharvesting is not surprising. The failure of these populations to recover may be explained in part by their ecology. Oysters are ‘ecosystem engineers’ and ‘foundation species,’ creating vast complex intertidal or subtidal structures

PHOTO BY LYNN HAYNIE KELLUM / ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS (TOP PHOTO)

O

ysters are not particularly charismatic creatures; they resemble small rocks, with a gooey interior. These unprepossessing shellfish however have supported coastal communities across the globe for millennia, initially through subsistence harvesting then by large-scale commercial fishing. Food and industry are not the only services oysters provide. Agriculture and urban development release large quantities of nutrients into watersheds, creating dense algal blooms that can cause a variety of ecological problems.

Oysters can help mitigate the effects of high nutrient levels by consuming suspended particles, effectively cleaning the water and depositing organic material onto the sediment.

The clear water that results from oyster feeding allows the development of seagrass beds, which are important nursery and feeding grounds for many aquatic species.

Oysters will settle on a variety of hard substrates, and they grow quickly, particularly in sub-tropical regions with mild winters.

Over time, these cycles of recruitment, growth and mortality create large complex three-dimensional structures that provide habitat for diverse and abundant communities of fishes and invertebrates, some of which are economically important. Reef structures also buffer wave energy and protect adjacent shorelines from erosion. This service is particularly valuable in areas where sea-level rise is threatening to inundate low-lying coastal areas and where development has

OYSTERS

that are vital to estuarine communities, forming the substrate and structure necessary for diverse marine communities. Loss of habitat integrity is an unfortunate byproduct of large-scale oyster harvesting. As reef height declines, the remaining habitat is susceptible to sedimentation and hypoxia, which causes physiological stress in the oysters, making them more vulnerable to disease. Reduction in available habitat means there is less settlement space for new recruits, and eventually there are not enough adults in the system to rebuild the reefs. With oyster depletion, water filtration capacity is diminished, causing changes in water quality and impacting multiple components of the estuarine ecosystem.

Over-harvesting, coastal development, dredging of navigation channels, deforestation and upstream changes to water flows, and nutrient and pollutant inputs have caused, or contributed to, the loss of shellfish populations worldwide.

Oyster resource management should incorporate habitat sustainability and replenishment, but this is generally not the case. In the U.S. alone, tens of millions of dollars have been spent on restoration of depleted oyster habitats, with the primary goal of recovering commercial fisheries. With few

exceptions, funding for these efforts has been short term (often in response to natural or anthropogenic disasters) and insufficient in scope to replace the natural reef area lost. The overall success of these efforts is unclear as post-deployment monitoring data is not always collected and/or available. The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the United States, with a watershed that extends across six states. That bay ecosystem has been impacted by urban and agricultural runoff that degraded water quality, which was compounded by the collapse of oyster populations from overharvesting. Efforts to restore the Chesapeake Bay were begun in 1967 by the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, and the Chesapeake Bay Program was initiated in 1983. Through these and other programs, such as the Oyster Recovery Partnership, which deploys hatchery-reared larvae and newly settled oysters, called spat, to augment natural recruitment, Chesapeake Bay oysters have started to recover and support a small wild harvest. However, despite many years of effort and significant investment, the oyster populations there are a tiny fraction of their historical levels.

Gulf of Mexico oyster populations have also been significantly depleted but support higher

Spat traps are simple structures made out of oyster shells that offer a place for oyster larvae to settle and develop into spat, aka newly settled oysters.

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SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

ARE OYSTER FARMS THE ANSWER? With the widespread decline of wild populations, oyster aquaculture has expanded rapidly to fulfill market demands. Farming can theoretically give wild stocks some respite from harvest and allow them to recover if appropriate restoration approaches are also employed. In contrast with some other aquaculture industries, oyster farming has low environmental impact and some environmental benefits. Farmed oysters do not create point source pollution problems, do not require the use of antibiotics to prevent diseases caused by high stocking densities, and since farmed oysters are often reproductively sterile triploids, the danger of genetic mixing with wild stocks is minimal. Farmed oysters filter the surrounding water, thereby performing similar ecosystem services as wild oysters, and there is anecdotal evidence that improved water quality has allowed seagrasses to develop near oyster aquaculture leases. Increased plastic debris from dislodged aquaculture equipment, the ‘eyesore’ of large leases that disrupt the view of estuarine waters, and market competition with wild harvesters are some negative aspects of this industry. Expansion of oyster farms across the U.S. is a byproduct of the demise of wild populations, and while they provide some economic and environmental benefits, services such as shoreline protection and habitat provision are not provided by farmed oysters.

They are not a substitute for natural reefs.

Oysters are critical to the proper functioning of estuarine ecosystems, but to bring back anything resembling historic levels will require investment in large-scale long-term restoration and collaboration among various resource management and stakeholder groups.

This approach has shown some success in the Chesapeake Bay, but it has taken considerable resources and effor t for moderate returns.

The demise of the humble oyster has made it painfully clear that the economic costs of good stewardship are minor compared to the far greater cost of our mistakes.

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Oyster shells are shoveled off a boat in the hopes that the shells will provide a safe haven for growing oysters to latch onto.

commercial harvest than anywhere else in the U.S. In 2010, the Deepwater Horizon wellhead exploded, releasing millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf. Oyster populations were severely impacted, especially in Louisiana. While the oil spill was an ecological and economic disaster for the Gulf of Mexico, the settlement funds from this accident have supported large oyster restoration efforts across all the Gulf states. To date, over $230 million have been spent on oyster restoration and related projects, and this created unprecedented opportunities to coordinate restoration and management approaches across the Gulf of Mexico.

One of the most productive and lucrative oyster fishing areas was Apalachicola Bay in northwest Florida. This large estuary provided 90% of Florida oysters, and they were in high demand for their sweetsalty flavor. A series of droughts from 2007–12 increased predation by marine predators and caused high oyster mortality, but the populations did not rebound

when the rains returned. Habitat was depleted as harvest continued, although oyster populations were at critical low levels. In 2013, the wild oyster fishery in Apalachicola Bay was declared a Federal Fishery Disaster, releasing funds for economically impacted oystermen and for oyster reef restoration. Although there is no evidence the Deepwater Horizon oil reached Apalachicola, Florida oil-spill settlement funds have also supported oyster restoration projects in Apalachicola Bay. Despite this significant economic investment, the oysters did not recover, and in late 2020, the Apalachicola Bay was closed for five years to wild oyster harvest.

In 2019, Florida State University was awarded a five-year grant to identify the primary causes of oyster population decline, understand why they are not recovering and use science to develop recommendations for restoration and management of oyster resources. The Apalachicola Bay System Initiative (ABSI) has initiated or completed multiple

OYSTERS

Research conducted by ABSI includes rigorous field components, analytical studies in the lab, and field and laboratory experiments. The data from these different components are used in models to help forecast how oysters are likely to respond to a suite of different environmental and management conditions.

scientific projects, including development of high-resolution hydrodynamic models of river flows and estuarine dynamics. These models will be used to investigate effects of different climatic and management scenarios on distribution of environmental conditions, flow regimes and larval dispersal patterns. ABSI is also generating detailed bathymetric maps of historical oyster reefs for comparison with previous mapping efforts to reveal how reef height and footprint has changed over time.

The traditional approach to oyster restoration is to place a thin layer of material over a large area. If reefs are structurally depleted, however, it may be a better strategy to place more material over a smaller area, which increases reef height and provides habitat that is less

prone to sediment and hypoxia. This spring, the ABSI team worked with local oystermen to deploy a restoration experiment that will test the performance of different materials (oyster shell and different sizes of limestone rock), deployed as mini-reefs (10 meters by 10 meters by 0.5 meters) in the bay. Early observations show encouraging spat settlement, but it remains to be seen if these will survive. The ABSI research hatchery has produced two batches of spat from Apalachicola Bay oysters.

These have been deployed on the restoration experiment to assess survival and growth of the hatchery spat versus those from natural

recruitment. These experiments will be monitored, and the results used to generate other experiments that will lead to restoration recommendations. Other components of the project will generate decision support tools that can be used by resource managers to inform adaptive ecosystem management approaches.

Community engagement, primarily through the Community Advisory Board, is critical to the success of the project and implementation of ABSI recommendations.

More information can be found on the ABSI website: marinelab.fsu.edu/absi.

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ARTIFICIAL REEF

AN UNEXPECTED

EXPERT Lessons from an Artificial Reef Guru

BY DANNY THORNTON

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B Scott and Martha Harris started the Andrew “Red” Harris Foundation to honor their son, who died in a tragic boating accident.

The couple are the driving force behind the foundation, which has a mission to build reefs that will ensure the long-term health of the oceans that Andrew loved. The Jupiter Lighthouse, of which they made a replica for their artificial reef system, is in the background.

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ack in 2017, Guy Harvey Magazine published an article (see sidebar excerpt on page 68) about Andrew “Red” Harris, an inspirational 26-yearold from Jupiter, Florida, who was killed after he was hit by a boat as he tried to save his girlfriend from drifting away in a rip current.

The heroic tragedy inspired his parents to start a foundation to build artificial reefs in their son’s name.

Enhancing the marine environment made sense because he loved fishing, diving and being on the water. Doing something good for the ocean would create a legacy in his name and maybe even help to soften their grief. Over the past seven years, the Andrew “Red” Harris Foundation has raised and spent more than $2.5 million to build more than 2 miles of offshore reefs. That includes 36 deployments comprised of 6,250 tons of limestone boulders, 300 4-ton “coral head” modules, 280 3-ton “hollow boulders,” 4,000 8-foot-long concrete culverts that weighed between 1 and 3 tons, and a 17-foot-tall replica of the Jupiter Lighthouse.

This is not your casual weekend project.

The Foundation has created this immense amount of habitat, and it has enhanced the marine environment in ways no one anticipated. Also, something unexpected emerged. Scott Harris, Red’s father, has become somewhat of an artificial reef guru.

“I asked a lot of marine scientists about the best materials and locations and so forth, and I got a lot of different and mostly general answers that seemed to have the common thread of ‘it depends.’ I was hoping to get specific information like what shape of boulder or what kind of module design worked best, but I found out on my own that it depends on the application and the site,” said Harris.

“Fortunately, we have really good experts and partners here in the Palm Beach County government, and they have supported us every step of the way.

Jena McNeal, an environmental supervisor with Palm Beach County Environmental Resource Management, and her predecessor, Carman Vare, are two of the best reef builders around, so we just forged ahead with their guidance.”

McCulley Marine Services and their barge captain, Scott Bachman, have completed all 35 of the offshore deployments. Capt. Scott knows all too well how the Gulfstream-driven current is constantly changing speed, intensity and even direction. Plus, the wind tends to blow the barge and tug around.

“We have to hit a pinpoint spot on our thin sand ridge sites,” Harris said, “and it’s not easy to keep the barge on target. Mix in vicious, South Florida afternoon thunderstorms and equipment that’s pushed hard in a harsh environment, and you have very challenging situations. Working inshore would obviously be tremendously easier, but we’re committed to building world-class habitat to capitalize on northern Palm Beach County’s unique Gulfstream-fueled marine life growth.”

The original reef building expedition in 2015 was supposed to be in 95 feet of water, but on the day of the deployment, the current was too strong. Their second choice was closer to shore — in just 35 feet of water with less current — near a 10-year-old reef the Florida Department of Transportation had built using a local bridge that had been dismantled.

“We went just north of the FDOT reef,” Harris said. “That was the first time I learned about scouring.

I saw that, after a few months, the sand underneath some of our reef structures had been swept away by the current, and some of our modules looked like Noah’s Ark on top of a mountain. Our modules interacted with the current and scoured away sand, exposing buried parts of the FDOT reef that had

ARTIFICIAL REEF

Alongside wife Martha, daughter Christina and son Ryan (left), Scott Harris has become a newly minted expert on artificial reefs thanks to the projects completed by the foundation. The Harris family is standing on reef materials made by the Artistic Stone Company.

been put down 10 years before. Over the years, a lot of the FDOT reef had been swallowed up by the ocean floor.”

Over the past few years, Harris and his team have gotten a good handle on building reefs in areas that will stand up to the test of time and enhance the marine ecosystem for decades to come.

“I’ve learned that where an artificial reef is located is more important than what it is made of,” Harris says. “In our area of southeast Florida, there is ancient bedrock beneath the sand floor of the ocean. The bedrock is exposed in some areas on the present day shoreline, like at the Blowing Rocks preserve in Hobe Sound and other rocky areas in northern Palm Beach County. This bedrock floor extends for miles offshore, rising and falling from as much as 10 feet below the sand floor of the ocean to areas where the bedrock rises above the ocean floor and we have live reefs.”

“If our materials are placed in areas where the bedrock is 10 feet below the ocean’s sand floor, everything will sink out of sight in a year or two and be lost. But artificial reefs are not allowed to be built where live rock is exposed.

So, the ideal site is an area where a thin layer of sand covers the bedrock.”

After the first year deployment at the FDOT Reef site, Harris spent days surveying the ocean floor while scuba diving with a sledge hammer and spear inside the boundaries of the local GHOF.org | 65

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A 17-foot-tall replica of the Jupiter Lighthouse has blossomed with marine life growth.

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Army Corp of Engineers-permitted artificial reef sites. All the while, he was looking for areas where there was a thin layer of sand over the underlying bedrock.

“It was nothing but sand as far as I could see, so I would pound the spear down three feet or so again and again in search of bedrock,” Harris said.

“Finally, I had a eureka moment. I hit the spear and it went ‘boing!’ I had discovered a sub-sand ridge where, decades or centuries ago, a reef had once existed before it was smothered by sand, most likely due to a hurricane. I could brush the sand away with my hand, and it looked like a travertine floor underneath.”

Morgan and Eklund Surveyors, now part of Continental Shelf Associates, donated a subbottom survey that took six employees a full day to complete. They learned that this ridge is between 50 and 150 feet wide and a mile long.

Everything the Foundation has built in Jupiter after the first year is on top of this ridge to make sure that the reefs will never sink under the sand.

One of the most important morsels of knowledge Harris gleaned from putting manufactured concrete modules, giant boulders and culverts on the ocean floor is what he calls the “scouring effect.”

“The current interacts with boulders and other structures and moves the sand one grain at a time, 24/7, until the underlying bedrock gets exposed,” Harris said. “It creates something like a comet trail — some as much as 50 feet long. The bottom is transformed from a lifeless smothered sand floor to a vibrant rocky cragginess that creates a habitat for crabs, shrimp and all kinds of sea life.

Plus, it’s excellent for coral recruitment. We have seen huge growth of gorgonians and other corals in areas that were just fields of sand before.”

Not a fan of using old ships for artificial reefs because they rust, collapse and can become dangerous to divers, Harris believes that rocks and concrete work best in the long term.

“Ships are great for eco-tourism, and a lot of divers love them because they’re exciting to dive on, but saltwater deteriorates metal fairly quickly,” Harris said. “I want something that's going to be there generating new life for 50 or 100 years or more.”

ARTIFICIAL REEF

In 2016, the foundation placed 15 coral head modules at the Blue Heron Bridge Snorkel Trail in Palm Beach County.

IN THE BEGINNING

The Harris family began their organization in July 2014, just a month after the accident, and by November, they had formed a viable plan to build and deploy concrete modules.

A year later, they deployed 40 artificial reef modules; the next summer, they deployed 100 more — 50 pyramids and 50 custom-designed coral heads. They also put down 15 prototype concrete block reefs and a 17-foot-tall replica of the Jupiter lighthouse that the Town of Jupiter funded. A few months later, in November 2016, they placed 15 coral head modules at the Blue Heron Bridge Snorkel Trail in Phil Foster Park in Palm Beach County.

In 2017, the Foundation reached the north end of the Jupiter ridge site with 132 more coral heads and another 1,000 tons of boulders deployed in four reef piles. In 2018, they began building the huge Juno thin-

sand site with 32 coral heads and 500 tons of boulders. In 2019, the Juno site received 280 of the Foundation’s 3-ton hollow boulder designs that connected three new 250-ton boulder reefs.

The south extension of the Jupiter Reef ridge is in 58 feet of water and was completed in 2020 with 4,500 tons of boulders deployed as six massive 20-to-25-foot-tall reefs. Each are 300 feet apart, and they are so large they create current swirls on the ocean surface.

In 2021, the foundation filled in the gaps between the 2020 Jupiter boulder reefs with 2,500 8-foot-long concrete culverts, creating trails between the boulder reefs and five new culvert reef piles.

“A couple of months ago, a local family contacted me,” said Harris. “Their parents, Nanie and Curtis Weaver, both passed away last year, and they left a charitable remainder

A goliath grouper visits Andrew’s memorial plaque.

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SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY Andrew “Red” Harris

REEFS WITH A CAUSE The Harris family honors Andrew’s memory by building reefs for snorkeling, diving and fishing. The Andrew “Red” Harris Foundation has made it their mission to build reefs in the waters he loved to ensure the long-term health of the oceans and to assure that he will not be forgotten. They’ve held tennis tournaments, golf tournaments and other events to raise money to build reefs.

Understandably, Andrew’s mom and dad, Scott and Martha Harris, are the driving force behind the foundation. They were determined to do something in Andrew’s memory, but they weren’t sure where to begin.

“We started out with college scholarships,” Scott said, “but didn't get much interest from local schools. It’s a very crowded space. Then we started to think about Andrew’s hobbies like golf, fishing and snorkeling and decided that artificial reefs would be perfect!”

“Andrew loved fishing and diving and we thought, ‘how hard could it be?’ ” Scott says with a laugh.

It’s no surprise that 100 percent of the money raised for the foundation goes to reef building. Of course, the Harris family itself has also been a major donor.

“We are not just asking others to contribute, we are putting our own money and time in,” Harris said. “It’s important to us, and our community increasingly sees the benefits as our dreams become real and our projects move from theoretical to actual, even though the new reefs won’t reach full maturity for a couple years.”

“Our long-term goal is to honor Andrew's memory by seeing the Foundation become a self-sustaining organization for building and advancing the science of artificial reefs,” Harris said.

— Excerpt from 2017 article in Guy Harvey Magazine

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trust. The whole family loves boating on the ocean, and the children think contributing the trust funds to build a reef in their parents’ honor would be perfect. We are also scheduled to receive a large grant soon, and these funds will allow us to go ahead and expand the Juno site with three barge loads of culverts later this summer instead of waiting until next year.”

THE FUTURE

The next expansion focus is the Juno Reef, a mile and a half square grid in 80 feet of water that is the closest place on the coast where the Gulfstream approaches the continental U.S. “Our Jupiter site is largely built out,” Harris says, “and we have always been laser-focused on Jupiter, but we have been successful in reaching our goal of creating a sustainable engine to build new offshore reefs off Palm Beach County. So instead of saying we are

ARTIFICIAL REEF

done and calling it a day, we are going to let the Foundation keep building new habitats as long as we have great sites. And our Juno site actually has many advantages. Its proximity to the Gulfstream means the visibility is better for divers, there are more large fish there and it is more centrally located for fishermen and divers to access.

“We’ve got many years of deployment on the Juno site, it’s so much bigger than our Jupiter site,” Harris said. “Eighty feet deep off Juno is an iconic local fishing and diving destination.

The Gulfstream brings in a hugely vibrant nutrient stream, and our reefs will provide the structural habitat that marine life needs to thrive there.”

At this point, the Foundation is only limited by the funds they can raise. Two key supporters that have contributed to the overall

success are the Al Packer Ford Dealership in West Palm Beach as well as Marc Collette with the Artistic Stone Company, which provides the coral heads and hollow boulders for the projects. It has a great new partner in Forterra Pipe and Precast as they have donated more than $450,000 of culverts this year as part of their Reef of Opportunity.

The Foundation’s funding comes from a wide variety of sources. Local government entities like Palm Beach County, the Town of Jupiter and the Jupiter Inlet District are big supporters. Business organizations like the Marine Industries Association of Palm Beach County and businesses such as Engel Coolers have been huge supporters since the beginning. Two local businesses, Treasure Coast Carpets and Interiors and Pinder’s Seafood, support the Foundation every year

and are key to spreading the word, and that’s alongside a large group of local residents who love what the Foundation is doing.

The Florida Blue Foundation funded the entire cost of their 2018 donation of a five-book set of the Professor Clark The Science Shark book series to every third grade classroom in Florida — 11,000 sets in all. Written and beautifully illustrated by family friends of the Harris family, Scott and Karen Lamberson, the books tell the story of Andrew meeting an orphaned tiger shark pup who grows up to become Professor Clark.

Sponsorships range from $200 to sponsor a hole in their golf tournament to $600 for a truckload of culverts, to $12,000 for trucking a barge load of culverts to $20,000 for the barge operation itself.

For more info or to donate, visit the Andrew “Red” Harris Foundation at AndrewRedHarrisFoundation.org.

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WINDOWS OF THE WORLD A BI L L BOYC E P ER S P EC T IVE

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A P H OTO STO RY

LIFE CAN BE A WONDROUS JOURNEY

Travel enhances wonderment. Moments like these in Southeast Alaska near Petersburg will make your heart soar and soothe your soul.

when you choose the right road and the light to lead it. Who would have known that a kid from California, who found an addiction to the sport of fishing at age 4, would take his love of all things piscatorial on a career path that included fisheries biologist, photojournalist, TV host and then producer of several international fishing/adventure series?

Along the way, I’ve traveled the world, met the most amazing anglers, captains and crews, and fished on everything from little car-top skiffs to the world’s most modern mega sportfishers. Although these experiences will always remain vivid memories, it is the photography I was able to capture along the way that now serves as my most treasured possessions.

As I have gracefully aged into six decades on our wonderful planet, these places, people, photos and fish are what make my life rich far beyond any monetary compensation I was lucky enough to have garnered along the way.

It is in this article that I am honored to share some of these amazing regions of the world, the allure of their majesty, and the fish and friends I met along the way.

I have showcased six regions — three in this issue and three in the issue before this — that have touched my heart in different ways. For this edition of Guy Harvey Magazine, I’ve highlighted Baja, Mexico, Alaska and the Caribbean, with a spotlight on the islands of St. Lucia, Grenada and the Turks and Caicos. In the last issue, I shared my photos from Panama, Central America, the Seychelles Islands in the Indian Ocean and Tahiti in the South Pacific.

I hope you enjoy the images as much as I did taking them.

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BAJA, MEXICO

PETERHERMESFURIAN / ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS

Few places on earth can grab your soul like the Baja peninsula. From the extreme ecological differences found on the Pacific shores to the calm tranquility of the Sea of Cortez, its many personalities are as varied as the wonderful people that inhabit its 1,100 miles of desert habitat. Once only a fly-in fishing destination to a few lucky anglers in the 1940s, ’50s, and ’60s with access to a plane, the trans-peninsular highway “Mex-1” was paved in 1973 and opened up the Baja to those with vehicles rugged enough to venture its remote reaches. But even then, it was only explored by those with a pioneer spirit, not afraid of “living on the edge.”

Now fast forward a few decades and the roads have been improved, with lots of roadside infrastructure that make the journey much less arduous. International airports now provide access from most parts of America. Not spoiled by these newfound amenities, you needn’t dig very deep to find that same adventurous spirit of discovery to what is and always will be … THE BAJA. From her tranquil islands in the Sea of Cortez, to the long string of missions built by Spanish Franciscans as far back as the late 1690s, you will still find lonely desert ranchos and seaside taco stands, secret surf spots and favorite fishing holes — all to remind you that Baja still has her way of grabbing your soul and not letting go.

Like a high school sweetheart who you’ve never been able to forget.

Once offshore, migrating gray and humpback whales, massive schools of common dolphin, packs of jumping devil rays, foamers of tuna, roving packs of striped marlin, and a variety of seagoing bird life can be found on your bow at any given moment. Take them all as life’s blessings, gifts the Baja gladly gives.

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BA JA , ME X I CO

Left: These playful sea lions are always in a good mood in their Baja domain. And why not? An abundance of food and few predators make their lives an easy one.

Below: There is nothing quite like the start of the most prestigious marlin tournament in the world, the Bisbee’s Black and Blue Tournament, where 150 speedy sportfishers race past “Land’s End” to be the first on the marlin grounds.

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BA JA, ME X ICO

Right: High flying devil rays can be seen and heard for miles. Concentrations by the thousands during annual migrations can also be construed as spawning aggregations.

Below: Humpback whales are a consistent visitor to Baja waters and are joined by a mass breeding migration of gray whales on the Baja Pacific. There’s also a large resident population of finback whales in the Sea of Cortez.

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Large schools of common dolphin are found throughout the Baja. This roving pack was heading to Carmen Island near Loreto.

Left: Surfing is a popular sport all along the Pacific side of Baja, where waves are big and crowds are small.

Right: For sportsmen, sport fishing has put the Baja peninsula on the map since the 1940s. It’s still the largest driver of tourism to this day.

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CARIBBEAN

ST. LUCIA | GRENADA | TURKS AND CAICOS To Europeans five centuries ago, the concept of strings of island groups extending dozens of lines of latitude from Florida to South America would have been as foreign as thinking the world was actually round.

And through years of discovery, colonization by many European cultures, these islands have created their own distinct personalities and are inhabited with friendly, sun-loving, life-loving people who know how lucky they are to have been born in the Caribbean.

Though the music, food and commerce can change from island to island, the spirit of the people and their mutual dependence on what the ocean can provide unites them. With high protein diets of fish and nuts — and blessed with lots of rain, sun and year-round mild temperatures — agriculture thrives and provides nutrition. Some islands are flat, basically atolls in nature such as the Turks and Caicos, while others have steep volcanic peaks, which at times can create their own weather like St. Lucia and Grenada.

As for fishing, they all have a common denominator of deep blue waters teeming with lots of migrating pelagics, such as blue marlin, white marlin, sailfish, yellowfin tuna, wahoo, dorado and sharks. And while most tourists go there for the sun and the fun, a few lucky ones who prioritize sportfishing will take home a vastly different experience.

PETERHERMESFURIAN / ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS

Many islands are surrounded by barrier reefs, which can form inner water flats that are home to angler favorites, like the bonefish.

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CA RI B BE A N

The Caribbean is home to a wide variety of pelagic species; large wahoo are abundant throughout the region’s offshore waters.

St. Lucia is most renowned for the Pitons, the island’s iconic twin volcanic peaks.

Resorts abound for sunseeking international tourists.

Most of the elevated Caribbean islands can create their own weather precipitation, and rainforest habitats are the result — such as this waterfall in Grenada.

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SOUTHEAST ALASKA What kid isn’t affected with the thought of being in the Alaska Wilderness and exposed to the wildest elements of the American frontier? I surely was, and I knew at some stage in my life I would live it, love it and cherish those memories. In 1980, I was hired as a fisheries biologist on the Tongass National Forest in the southeast panhandle of Alaska, and I spent the next six months flying all over that massive forest doing salmon surveys and managing land masses destined to be put to the axes of Louisiana Pacific lumbermen.

Living by boat in the fjords of Southeast Alaska for 10 days at a time, we could hear wolves at night and arctic loons at sunset, and we surveyed rivers and streams where bears sightings were a near daily encounter. I can look back at those times and know my childhood dreams were blessed with affirmation — Alaska is truly America’s lasting wilderness.

Alaska is also a place a photograph can rarely do justice to what the eyes are seeing. There are thick forests of Sitka spruce, Douglas fir and cedar; waterfalls flowing from year-round precipitation; and fog layers that shroud the trees and river mouths every morning, only to be magically revealed when the sun finally melts it away.

I have had the joy of returning several times in the past 40 years.

And every time I fly home, as the jet lifts over the snow-capped peaks and misty fjords, I always say the same thing — “I’m sure glad we still have a place that wild and untamed left in the United States.”

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Humpback whales by the thousands spend their summer feeding cycles in the nutrient rich waters of Alaska’s panhandle.

SO U TH E A ST A L A S K A

Left: Totems of the natives of the Pacific Northwest tell their family stories in the carvings and the unique paint schemes.

Below: Salmon-choked rivers in Southeast Alaska show us that nature endures and perseveres in these beautiful waterways.

Pods of killer whales remind everyone who is really the king of these waters as they search for salmon, seals and other smaller cetacean species.

PETERHERMESFURIAN / ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS

As glaciers recede, flotillas of icebergs fill the bays at the foot of these ice fields to create a surreal seascape.

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Silky Shark

A FUTURE FOR SHARKS

BY STEFANIE BRENDL 80 | GuyHarvey.com

A FUTURE FOR SHARKS

A Caribbean reef shark

F

or most of human history, protecting wild animals was not seen as a critical component to our own lifestyle. The result has been that countless species have gone extinct or are well on their way. For many decades, humans have been the primary drivers of change on the planet, during which time we have brought biodiversity to the brink of collapse. However, as we face many environmental problems, it seems that we finally are realizing that protecting biodiversity is not a luxury that we pursue simply for enjoyment or for ethical or moral reasons.

We now know that all the species on land and in the water make up a complex network that is essential to our own survival and to everything that is critical for our society, including carbon sequestration, food production and clean air and water.

What we do, or fail to do, in the next decade may determine whether we will continue to prosper.

This isn’t about saving the planet — this hunk of magma and sea water will survive no matter what we do. Planet Earth can shake off a species and start from scratch. It wouldn’t be the first time.

What’s at stake is our own species’ existence, our culture, our economies and our quality of life.

So how does that relate to sharks, a species that I and my nonprofit organization are focused on protecting? Well, they are a key component of diversity in the ocean. As predators at or near the top of the food chain, they play a critical role in keeping fish populations healthy and strong and balancing the complex food chain. But much like we have done with so many species on land, we don’t actually value sharks for the incredible job they do. While the media only talks about sharks when they bite someone, people in the fishing industry only count the cash value of shark’s parts. Yet their true value is nearly incalculable, because across the range of 400 or more species, sharks fulfill so many crucial ecosystem services.

Good luck trying to replace that function with anything man-made.

If we have learned anything from our past mistakes, we should take decisive steps to protect species in the ocean instead of waiting until they are drastically overfished or end up on one of the endangered species lists. The big question is whether people will recognize this responsibility and will give animals, such as sharks, a fighting chance.

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BEST HOTSPOTS TO DIVE WITH SHARKS Some places seem to have held on to their shark populations due to the fact that people love to dive with sharks. And there are other spots rumored to be out there, in need of study and protection. Most of these locations have already lost some of their former biodiversity and shark numbers, but there is still potential to protect something before all is lost. Most locations vary in species seasonally, so make sure you do your research before you plan a trip.

Isla Guadalupe, Mexico Great white sharks Ningaloo Reef, Western Australia Whale sharks Neptune Islands, South Australia Great white sharks Cape Town, South Africa Great white sharks, also sevengill, blues and makos along the coast Republic of Palau Reef/tropical sharks and mantas Fiji Several reef species, particularly famous for bull sharks Rangiroa, Fakarava, Moorea, French Polynesia Reef/tropical sharks and mantas Bahamas, Bimini Reef Sharks, particularly famous for tiger sharks and great hammerheads Jardines de la Reina, Cuba Reef sharks 82 | GuyHarvey.com

Cocos Island Reef sharks, pelagic sharks, famous for schools of scalloped hammerheads) Galapagos Reef sharks, famous for whale sharks, hammerheads Jupiter, Florida and Oahu, Hawaii Great place for intro level shark encounters for non-divers Isla Mujeres and Isla Holbox, México Whale sharks Playa del Carmen, México Bull sharks Maldives Whale sharks, reef/ tropical sharks and mantas Bikini Atoll, Marshall Islands Reef/tropical sharks Southern California Sevengill sharks, leopard sharks, pelagic species

SECURING A FUTURE WITH SHARKS Let’s leave out emotions and any ethical concerns for a moment and look at this from a purely economic point of view. Besides their contribution to a balanced ecosystem, sharks are also the drivers of billion-dollar industries.

Add up the profits alone from scuba diving tourism, recreational fishing and the film and media industry — all of which make big profits every year off sharks — and you will end up with billions of dollars generated every year.

It is all money made off living sharks.

Those same sharks can make money for many decades of their lives. In contrast stands the one-time income from extractive fishing, which makes use of that resource once. And then it’s over for that individual animal. If you want

to argue dollars and jobs, protecting sharks makes a whole lot of sense.

Years ago, an international movement made sure large sections of wilderness on the African continent were protected, the last haven for animals that used to roam in great abundance on this globe. Elephants, lions, rhinos and so many other species are now fenced into game parks and reserves.

But there are not enough wild animals to keep any semblance of balance in the natural systems. We have taken over that role — poorly.

Sharks have been roaming the oceans for more than 400 million years. Now, we are decimating them at unprecedented rates. While there are a multitude of problems that need to be addressed — overfishing, bycatch, the international trade of shark fins, loss of habitat and fish

A FUTURE FOR SHARKS

A group of lemon sharks swarm the crystal-clear waters.

populations — we must also start to plan for shark reserves in our ocean, to protect the few precious locations that exist where rare species are hanging on by a thread. These locations are few and far between, and they are vulnerable. It is frightening to think how quickly they could be gone.

Marine parks are much more difficult to establish than those on land. Humans have a tendency to ignore anything that is sightunseen. Sometimes, protecting a place because of one particular species, that one charismatic animal, is the pathway to turning things around. There are outstanding examples we can learn from, such as the Shark Reef in Fiji’s Beqa Lagoon or Palau’s (in Micronesia) Shark Sanctuary. In both cases, the economic value of scuba divers paying to dive with sharks was recognized, sharks were protected, and the benefits were felt in the local community as well as in the health of the reefs and fish

populations. Both locations have established economic models that are sustainable for generations to come. Everyone wins. But what is even more amazing is that this protection of sharks paved the way for even greater measures. A few years ago, Palau decided to essentially make their whole Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) a Marine Protected Area with extremely limited commercial extraction.

Sharks can lead the way but we have to give them a break, and we can’t take anything we have right now for granted. For example, the white sharks of Isla Guadalupe, Mexico, are the superstars of theIsla shark diving world. Guadalupe Mujeres Island is to sharks what Virunga, Rwanda, is to mountain gorillas. And that is how we should start looking at these important locations.

Whatever protection has been established is fragile. The animals are one poaching incident away from being gone. Commercial fisheries

interests and corrupt governments are not helping the matter.

If you want to call that alarmist, just look at what happened with South African great white sharks. We took that place for granted.

They had tons of sharks. Some even feared there were too many. Then things took a drastic turn a few years ago, for reasons that lead back to how humans manage the sea. The South African population of white sharks suddenly disappeared. It's hard to know if they will come back or recover because it’s unclear whether the sharks have been killed, died off or moved on.

(The blame was shifted to rogue Orca attacks, which is a highly questionable theory. The much more likely reason is probably linked to increased longline fishing).

The same can happen in Guadalupe, or places like Bahamas Tiger Beach, which are rare gems where the high biodiversity is still somewhat intact. For now, the constant pressure to bring back shark fishing is always looming, because people take a short-term view and see more profits in killing sharks.

There need to be places where sharks are fully protected. And with it, we must put in place supportive programs for local communities to benefit from conservation. When fishing is the only alternative, sharks cannot be protected.

They will be taken, even if it is illegal.

If sharks are not commercially extracted, then those communities that desperately need to fish sharks for sustenance will have a more secure resource in the future. Because the people who need to catch a shark to eat it are not the problem.

Dive tourism has traditionally been the most powerful economic driver of sustainable, non-extractive industries. Tourism is at its most powerful where charismatic megafauna (mantas, sharks, turtles, whales) are present. But this cannot be the only option. Many regions are simply not accessible enough. Solutions must be tailored to the individual locations.

One size does not fit all. We must be strategic in finding whatever is needed in the respective regions to help make a shark reserve or an MPA a benefit to the animals as much as the human communities. That is the only way it will last.

Incremental progress is needed, and it has to start now.

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This is Your Ocean:

SHARKS

A look back at 10 years of Celebrating Sharks

BY GEORGE C. SCHELLENGER

M

y pitch on Oct. 1, 2010 was simple: create a film that would allow viewers to “experience what it’s like to come face to face with sharks at Tiger Beach in the Bahamas.

Reveal why sharks are so valuable to the reef and the economy. Discover why sharks, even in this paradise, could be on the verge of being slaughtered. Find out what’s being done to protect them — and what you can do before time runs out.”

I wrote that as a pitch to Wyland, Guy Harvey and Jim Abernathy on what we could accomplish on a week-long expedition to Tiger Beach in the Bahamas.

To rewind the clock a bit, it all started at a meeting with Jim and Wyland during a goliath grouper dive off the coast of West Palm Beach in the summer of 2010.

Wyland, Guy Harvey and Jim Abernathy get ready to take the big dip.

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We heard Sunco Wholesale Seafood Company was considering harvesting shark fins in the Bahamas, and they were looking for a permit from the government.

Those who know the Bahamas know that if shark fishing were allowed by the government, it would be a very short harvest. Even though it seems like there are a lot of sharks in the Bahamas on a good shark dive, they were all the same sharks centered in one dive location.

Take them out, and the shark population would crash.

We wanted to show what was at risk, and we had a great team to tell the story. Guy Harvey had just raised $500,000 to help restore the Gulf of Mexico after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Wyland had just completed 100 “Whaling Walls” around the world, which depicted the grandeur of marine life. Expert shark diver, photographer and filmmaker Jim Abernathy had published the first in a series of children’s books called Sharks: Close Up. Wyland and team got back quickly to say the film was a go, but I had no idea it would completely, and forever, change my life.

I came to the project as a journalist and producer.

My brother and I had just finished a series of DVDs and VHS tapes (yes, 2010 was a long time ago) for school libraries across the country to help teach young students about ocean exploration and conservation.

To make those films, I’d worked side-by-side with Jim Abernathy on several trips to Tiger Beach. I’d witnessed Jim’s incredible skills underwater, and I saw this project as a way to combine art and science to shatter the public’s perception of sharks.

We wanted to show what was at risk, and we had a great team to tell the story.

10 YEARS

Jim Abernathy gets up close with Emma the tiger shark.

With everything ready, we set sail on Jim Abernathy’s vessel, the Shear Water, in October 2010. Wyland would be on board the entire expedition, Guy Harvey would meet us in the Bahamas. On the first night, we were able to go night diving with dolphins, which provided some spectacular video — and it also gave Jim the chance to take some truly enchanting shots of dolphins after sunset.

The next morning, we found ourselves at West End in the Bahamas to collect Guy Harvey. It was the first time I’d ever met

Guy in person, and his enthusiasm for the project was palpable. With the full team now ready, we left West End for Tiger Beach.

Tiger Beach, by the way, is the reference to a shallow area (15–20 feet deep) a few miles away from West End. There’s actually no beach at Tiger Beach.

One of my favorite things about a Jim Abernathy shark expedition are his briefings.

I knew I had to reveal to the audience the precautions we take when diving with large predators. Jim is very direct in his approach,

“… but the more serious sharks, the tiger sharks, the great hammerheads and the bull sharks, if one of those sharks bit us, chances are we’re going to bleed to death on the boat.” His briefings are stark, but safety is everything.

For the briefing, I had Jim sit in the middle of Guy and Wyland. Wyland reacted to everything Jim said in a way that was very engaging for the audience. Wyland is quick to point out, “It’s pretty serious business when you’re diving with sharks.”

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10 YEARS

Guy also listened attentively to everything.

“I want to dive by Jim’s rules and do what he asked me to do because it made sense.”

With the dive briefing over, we jumped in the water. The weather was perfect, as if nature was helping us tell this story. I was able to get some cinematic shots of Wyland, Guy and Jim with the sharks in gin-clear water.

The Bahamas are always magical, but on the first day we shot This is Your Ocean: Sharks, we couldn't have asked for anything more — and the next “star” was about to align perfectly.

Enter Emma the tiger shark. She is one of the most photographed wild animals in the world — and her celebrity status hits you to the core when you meet her. Jim had already known this 14-to-16-foot “supermodel” tiger shark for several years. I knew she was going to be critical to the film. Emma delivered by swimming around Jim, Wyland and Guy repeatedly. It led to some of the most amazing moments in the film. As Wyland says, “Emma is just an enormous tiger shark that has so

This is Your Ocean: Sharks debuted in a 650-person theater at California’s Newport Beach Film Festival in May 2011.

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much character. One look at Emma and you have to say, ‘wow, that is a superstar shark.’ ” One critical visual for the film would be unprecedented. Jim found a way to have Emma give him a “kiss” or “head bump” on the mask. It was captivating to watch and really drove home the point that sharks have not been portrayed accurately.

I knew in a heartbeat one of these “kisses” would be the centerpiece of the film.

Soon the expedition was over and there was even more work to do back on shore.

I went back to the editing studio to begin to put together the film, Jim went back to Tiger Beach to continue to get more video.

I met Guy in Davie, Wyland in Boca Raton and Jim in West Palm Beach for follow up interviews. To help flesh out the film, we decided that another expedition to the Bahamas was necessary so that we could work with Eric Carey and the Bahamas National Trust. He gave us additional background into why people still enjoy the pristine waters of the Bahamas even to this day.

Back on shore as the film came together, we had one other surprise that would give the film additional star power. Wyland asked Dr. Sylvia Earle, the legendary oceanographer and “Her Deepness” to be our narrator. She immediately said yes; now we had a voice for the film.

Next, we needed a venue to show the finished work. We were able to secure a 650-person theater at California’s Newport Beach Film Festival in May 2011. Ann Church, from KIDS FIRST!, the Coalition for Quality Children’s Media, worked with us to help craft the film for all ages. We hoped the film would be a catalyst for the next generation to join the fight for conservation.

We were all given a tremendous boost when legendary IMAX film producer Greg MacGillivray selected This is Your Ocean: Sharks for “Excellence in Documentary Filmmaking.”

His company has produced such IMAX films as Everest and The Living Sea. This is Your Ocean: Sharks would play in theaters in Washington, D.C., London, Vancouver, Hong Kong and Palm Beach. The fundraiser in Palm Beach was a fundraiser for the Bahamas National Trust.

By the end of it all, we couldn’t be happier.

Sunco decided not to apply for a shark fishing permit, and the Bahamas made its waters a shark sanctuary.

Over the past 10 years, I’ve worked with the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation on more than a dozen other films, many focused on sharks, including This is Your Ocean: Sharks — Part 2, where we took a group of students to Tiger Beach; and This is Their Ocean: Sea of Life, where

Left to right: George C. Schellenger, Jim Abernathy, Greg MacGillivray, Shawn Heinrichs, Guy Harvey and Wyland at the Newport Beach Film Festival.

we introduced students to whale sharks off the coast of Mexico. These documentaries fit in with the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation’s continued commitment to inspire and educate the next generation.

But This is Your Ocean: Sharks was a lifechanging project. Through the incredible passion and commitment of Jim, Guy and Wyland, sharks were seen differently, and the film has played a key role in the campaign against shark-fin soup.

For many years This is Your Ocean: Sharks was consistently one of the top shark films on iTunes; in fact, you can still watch it there today and on Amazon Video.

Even 10 years later, there is work to be done.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature says more than 30 percent of shark species

and their relatives are threatened with extinction.

Overfishing is still a problem worldwide. Even so, there is hope. The United States Senate passed the Shark Fin Sales Elimination Act in June of 2021 with the intent of banning the buying and selling of shark fins and related products in the U.S. As we enter this new world after a global pandemic, social responsibility to our planet falls upon us all. We all must do our part.

The one question I’m always asked when it comes to the film, “How is Emma the tiger shark?” I can tell you she is still alive and well in the Bahamas.

Thanks to Jim, she continues to be one of the most photographed wild animals in the world. She is a special creature, and if anything, This is Your Ocean: Sharks captures her essence and the magic of a place called Tiger Beach.

GEORGE C. SCHELLENGER is a two-time, Emmy award-winning producer and author with more than 30-years of experience in television and content development — with an ongoing focus on conservation and environmental education. He has a master’s degree from the University of Missouri with a focus on environmental reporting.

For the past decade, he’s worked with legendary marine biologist and artist Dr. Guy Harvey to create compelling content about the ocean and the creatures who live there, with a focus on large pelagic animals.

He’s written two books, Not Because It’s Easy and Sharks, Space,Time: Field Notes from a Road Less Traveled.

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SHARK TEETH

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C AT CH I NG

PREHISTORIC SHARKS

BY NICK HONACHEFSKY

PHOTO BY COOKIESFORDEVO / ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS (ONE TOOTH)

M

y fascination with dinosaurs, like most people enamored by the prehistoric fauna, started at a young age, fantasizing about creatures of epic proportion with everchomping jaws. As a die-hard saltwater angler, I also entertain a strong love for sharks and everything related to the marine environment. So how could I match up the two into a new passion?

In my youth, I always heard stories about prehistoric shark teeth being found in the freshwater streams in coastal New Jersey, so one summer afternoon around six years ago, I decided to do some research to hit an often cited shark-toothy brook. Equipped with a homemade sifter, I stepped knee deep into the brook hoping to dig around and maybe pull up an ancient treasure. My first couple of pulls gave up zilch. After

an hour, I didn’t seem to have any luck so I decided to take a quick breather to sit on an exposed gravel bar strewn with stream pebbles. As I sat down I looked down into the island of rocks, staring blankly, mesmerized by the rock patterns — and there it was. Standing out, betrayed by a gleam of sparkle from the morning sun, sat a shiny, black pointed feature.

I reached over and pinched it with my fingers.The blood rushed to my head as I realized I just found a Scapanorhynchus texanus “goblin shark” tooth, extinct for 75 million years, and now I held its timeless spirit. What did this thing gnaw on before it died? What kind of experiences did it have in a Cretaceous Period setting? Fifty other shark teeth of various species found their way into my pockets that morning, and I was completely, utterly hooked on hunting for fossil shark teeth.

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SHARK TEETH

HISTORY LESSON

Mother Earth is an ever-changing organism.

Throughout millennia, tectonic influence and natural geologic activity push and pull continents and oceans in a forever shifting skin of planet Earth. Seabeds turn into mountains, glacial influence carves deep gouges into buried geologic epochs, all exposing time capsules of ancient sea beds containing long-buried fossils of terrestrial and marine organisms.

Various shark tooth fossiling arenas exist across the United States, in places you would least expect. From the Peace River in Florida to the phosphate mines of North Carolina to the farm streams of New Jersey, hot spots are aplenty. The Peace River in Florida and surrounding Venice Beach delta expose Miocene and Pleistocene fossils that range from 10,000 years to 15 million years old, including the ultimate shark — megalodon — along with ice age fossils of mammals, including vertebrae, teeth and claws from giant sloths, mastodons and saber-toothed tigers. The North and South Carolina saltwater sounds along the Crystal Coast and the phosphate mines inland at Aurora each unearth Miocene deposits of megalodon teeth and extinct gigantic great

white shark predecessors, along with preserved stingray barbs and sea turtle scutes. Jersey’s Cretaceous treasures in freshwater creeks harbor ancient beasts, including 75-millionyear-old goblin sharks, shortfin makos and crow sharks. There’s also the chance of finding parts of true monsters, such as mosasaur, plesiosaur, enchodus and xiphactinus.

FINDING PEACE

Courtney Marie Martin is a dedicated fisherwoman and marine artist based in Charlotte Harbor, Florida (OhanaCreationsFL.com).

She garnered serious attention when posting her Meg finds on social media the past few years. Martin’s prehistoric playground is the epicenter for Megalodon teeth — the Peace River. Though the area gets plenty of pressure from day-tripper fossil hounds, she finds outof-the-way spots on her own. “Google Earth is your friend,” says Martin. “I scan the area via satellite to search out hard turns in the river, log jams and debris fields, find a close parking spot, then hike into the section of the river. Of course, if crossing private property, 90 | GuyHarvey.com

you should get permission from the landowner first. I usually barter with my artwork, fishing trips or flat out cash money for access.

Those hard-to-reach spots are where you’ll find many more Megs.”

The best times to hunt for prehistoric shark teeth is during the rainy season, but that can be a double-edged sword. Rushing waters will literally move the ground, uncovering teeth below the surface mud, extracting them out of the riverbanks and pushing teeth downstream. But if there’s too much riverflow, you can’t access the grounds. “The dry season from February to May is prime Meg hunting conditions on the Peace,” says Martin. “There’s only occasional storms running through, just enough to get things moving but not shut it down.”

TOOLS OF THE TRADE

Your best tools to scan for shark teeth are your hands and eyes, used for visual scanning and picking through exposed rock, but even they can use some help. Sifting screens will allow dirt and mud to pass through while rocks

and fossils stay in the screen for inspection.

Construct a sifter screen with two-by-fours, roughly 16-by-24 inches with a metal mesh tailor-made to the size of the fossils you will be sifting for. As an example, if you’re targeting teeth a half inch or greater, you should have no less than ¼-inch mesh. If targeting small teeth or microfossils, drop down to a 1/8inch mesh. A small folding camp shovel with about a 6-inch blade or a simple garden trowel will do the trick to scoop mud into the screen. Fingerless gloves help when diving in deep river pools to feel around the mud while protecting you from sharp rocks and sticks.

Just remember, most states do not allow you to dig into the riverbanks, only on the river floor.

SCAN GRAVEL BARS

Gravel bar islands accumulate after heavy rains. If shark teeth are the primary target, program yourself to recognize angular shapes that stand out. In a river full of mostly smooth, water-worn orange or brownish oval rocks, a blackened point or jagged edge of a fossilized tooth will pop out to you — they’ll do the same when it’s wet or sunny, as the patina omits a shine like a beacon. All material collects in pockets of the same density. Where you find a gravel bar full of 2- to 3-inch larger rocks, you may find a large 2-inch goblin shark tooth or mosasaur tooth. Likewise smaller ¼-inch teeth will end up on sand bars mixed in with finer silt and small pebbles.

DIG DEEPER

The good stuff is always down below. Martin looks for deeper pockets in the dry season.

“While most people are happy standing knee-deep to scour gravel banks, I target the deep pockets that average 4- to 6-foot deep, sometimes down to 13 feet. The big stuff is always stuck in the underwater root systems or deep under the silt of a log jam. It’s not easy, it’s pitch black down there, and I always end up scratched and bruised after my trips.” Riverbends tend to collect and amass GHOF.org | 91

SHARK TEETH

heavier stuff as debris has a tough time turning the corner, instead getting rooted down into the riverbend. Look for logs damming up a river and search both up-current and down-current sides.

BACK BAYS AND PHOSPHATE MINES

North Carolina is a hotbed of exposed shark teeth that flow in and out and down with the tidal influence. Wayne Justice, activities organizer of the N.C. Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores along the Crystal Coast, (NCAquariums.com/pine-knoll-shores) hits the Bear Island sound islands in Swansboro on his free time. “Shell piles collect on the islands off Swansboro. There’s a place called Shark Tooth Island there that seems to attract teeth that come spilling out of the Bear Island sound.” The easiest way to find fossils in the river is to get down on your knees and simply run your hand over the white shells, looking to expose the black teeth.”

The Phosphate mines along saltwater rivers in Aurora, North Carolina, are brimming with Meg teeth and various other species of extinct sharks.

Cynthia Crane, director of the Aurora Fossil Museum (AuroraFossilMuseum.org), operates a hands-on program for visitors to find the shark teeth of their dreams. “Phosphate spoil pits are located just outside the museum for visitors to dig out various species, including megalodon (carcharodon megalodon), snaggletooth (hemipristis serra), and giant great white (carcharodon subariculatus),” says Crane. “The phosphate miners remove the overburden, pumping the layers through pipes to screen it through water, and the ‘reject’ material is brimming with fossil shark teeth.” Meg teeth sit generally above the Pungo River in the Yorktown formations. “At the museum, we offer the ability with displays not only to study and see the history of prehistoric shark population, but with some luck you can go home with a few shark teeth for your collection.”

Prospecting for prehistoric fossil shark teeth can spark the same passion and excitement anglers often find in pursuit of their quarry. There’s something inherently cool being able to “hunt” dinosaurs, holding in your hand parts of some of the baddest creatures ever to exist on Earth.

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REGULATIONS

Fossil hunting regulations for shark teeth and other fossils vary greatly from state to state, and even town to town — some rules being circuitous and some cut and dry — but it’s mandatory you do some research first according to the area you plan on fossiling.

FLORIDA: Dr. Richard Hulbert, collections manager of vertebrae paleontology for the Florida Museum of Natural History, offers insight: “As long as you are only just collecting shark’s teeth, you do not need a fossil collecting permit. But if you find any other bone, like a shark vertebrae or ground sloth fibula, you need the permit and must report the find, otherwise sans permit, you must put any non-shark tooth fossil back.”

Regarding general access to fossil grounds, Hulbert states, “You cannot fossil hunt in any non-navigable waterways or body of water that exists within any Florida State Parks or Wildlife Refuges. “You can generally enter waterways through public boat ramps or via permission from private land owners or at bridge crossings, where there is usually an easement for public access. It can get pretty tricky crossing lands to access waterways as

many of the water management districts do not allow you to walk across their land to get to the river. Some areas will have signage that prevents fossil hunting, it is best to go to individual Water Management District websites in the area you plan to hunt for more clarity. Without a doubt, if you plan on hunting shark teeth in Florida, contact the local area Division of Fish and Wildlife for local specific rules as there may be special regulations between towns, counties and municipalities.”

“One, obtain a permit. Though not needed for shark teeth, it will have all general collection rules, regulations and instructions on the back as well as allow you to keep any other potentially spectacular fossil finds.

Two, contact the Division of Fish and Wildlife beforehand to understand if there are any management restrictions in the specific area you plan to fossil hunt.” The full regulations for Florida fossil collecting can be found at FloridaMuseum.ufl.edu/vertpaleo/ amateur-collector/fossil-permit.

NORTH CAROLINA: “Shark tooth hunting is pretty much in a limited area in North

Carolina, with most of the meg and tertiary teeth found in rivers along the southeastern coastline at spots like Palmico Sound, Tar River and Edisto Beach,” states Dr. Christian Kammerer, research curator of paleontology at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. “Regarding any regulations for hunting shark teeth, there is no license or permit required to search the riverbanks or beaches, as they are considered public property. I would however recommend checking with local municipalities regarding their laws regarding what they consider ‘altering of the landscape and destruction of public property’ before you start digging in any riverbank. It’s kind of a vague notion and generally is not enforced, but it’s best to check.” Kammerer adds, “If you do happen to find yourself on any N.C. State Park land, you do need to obtain a permit from the parks system, but there aren’t many rivers containing shark teeth that run through them along the coast. One more resource for prospective fossil hunters is the North Carolina Fossil Club (NCFossilClub.org), They are the state’s primary association of amateur fossil hunters and run a number of collecting trips annually.”

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Rio Lady’s Big Adventure One big lady reveals the mysteries of her underwater journey

BY GEORGE C. SCHELLENGER

O

ne of the best ways to stay in “live” constant contact with the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation, and stay up to date on research from the Guy Harvey Research Institute, is to follow GHRITracking.org. For the past several issues of this magazine, we’ve been providing snapshots of some of the creatures we’ve been tracking.

For this issue, we wanted to present Rio Lady. She represents whale sharks (the largest fish in the sea) and some very impressive migration tracking. This animal represents one of the longest tracked creatures on the planet — more than 20,000 miles.

As you look at the incredible 4-year, 17,000-mile track on the next two pages, you really understand how international these animals are. Spending part of her time in the Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean, you notice all the

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SHARK TRACKS

territory she passes through. This is why it will take a concerted effort on the part of so many countries to protect pelagic creatures.

There’s so much more about this impressive 26-foot shark named Rio Lady. Consider this: 12 years ago, in 2007, she was tagged and tracked by the Georgia Aquarium and the Mote Marine Laboratory. Rafael de la Parra, the executive director for Ch’ooj Ajauil AC, tagged her in the waters off Isla Mujeres, Mexico. She traveled more than 9,621 miles in 600 days and went as far south as St. Peter and St. Paul’s Rocks off the coast of Brazil. These islands are in the middle of the Atlantic, halfway between South America and Africa. That track is proudly framed on the wall at the Georgia Aquarium.

In her latest track, from 2018 to the current day, Rio Lady is swimming her way through a lot of

Rafael de la Parra, the executive director for Ch’ooj Ajauil AC, tags a whale shark named Rio Lady.You can follow her track via GHRITacking.org.

territory. She was tagged for the second time off the coast of Isla Mujeres in August of 2018 during the annual whale shark aggregation. During the summer, whale sharks from parts of the Atlantic gather to feast on tiny creatures in the productive waters off the coast of the Yucatán.

Speaking of adventurous, Rio Lady was tagged for a second time by Rafael from Ch’ooj Ajauil AC. Rafael is great to be on the water with, and yes, I’d call him a whale shark whisperer.

He’s devoted his life to watching out for these big animals and what it will take to protect them. Rafael is also a family man, and they are on the boat to help them with the tagging — or to make sandwiches for a day on the water.

To tag a whale shark, Rafael swims alongside the animal with an air-powered drill (from his dive tank). He methodically places the tag while swimming, which is no easy task. Whale sharks may seem to swim around lazily, but when you’re in the water with them, they are moving fast, and so is Rafael.

He prepares the equipment and the tag aboard the boat, then jumps in for the tagging. The tag itself is connected to a tiny float to prevent it from sinking. Rafael lines everything up to put the tag on the dorsal fin. The process doesn’t hurt the animal in any way; think of it like getting your fingernail clipped.

Once the tag is attached, the float is disconnected and the shark is on its way.

GHRITacking.org has several actively tracked whale sharks, and the tagging with Rafael continues to this day.

Meanwhile, Rio Lady continues her record voyage. The good news for scientists is that she should be back off the coast of Isla Mujeres in the summer of 2022. If Rafael needs to, he will replace the tag again and Rio Lady will continue to reveal her mysterious life in the open ocean — and continue being a very big ambassador for life on our planet.

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The Ocean First braintrust — Graham Casden, Cathy Christopher and friend.

Last Cast

I

BY FRED GARTH

used to belong to a snow skiing club in Pensacola, Florida. We had a ton of members. Weird, huh? Not really. One of the dudes in the club told me that Florida has the most skiing clubs in the country, and Colorado has the most scuba diving clubs. I’m not sure if he was right or wrong, but he said it with such conviction that I believed him.

A quick internet search (which has to be true, right?) reveals that Colorado has more certified scuba divers per capita than any other landlocked state and fifth most in the country.

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Maybe it’s like this: people who are freezing their patooties off in Colorado in January daydream a lot about hot sandy beaches and total submersion in the warm ocean, and those of us in Florida, who are sweating like a sumo wrestler in a Walmart parking in July, wish we could be zipping down a mountain covered in epic white flakes. (Editor’s note: that’s what really rad skiers and snowboarders call “snow”.)

So, if you’ve ever thought about starting a scuba diving shop — and I mean who hasn’t — and you were thinking that Miami or San

Diego or maybe Honolulu would be a good location, then you’d just be fooling yourself.

No, you need to be thinking of places like Boulder, Colorado, where the air is parched and the good citizens are just itching to go underwater and blow some bubbles.

I’m just assuming that was the logic a nice fellow named Graham Casden had when he bought a dive store in Boulder 14 years ago. A transplant from Southern California, Casden has the air of a Tony Hawk surfer dude. He’s thin and lanky, smart and confident, and, of course, wears beige sneakers. He’s the total package.

Casden left the beaches and sunsets of SoCal to attend the University of Colorado in Boulder and decided to stay for a while. Then he bought a dive shop. Under his guidance, he’s built his dive store — called Ocean First, even though it’s 1,500 miles from any sort of ocean — into the second largest Scuba Schools International dive center in the United States. With just under 1,000 dive shops scattered across the 50 states, the fact that Ocean First certifies more than 1,500 divers per year is a testament to his business savvy and understanding that teaching diving isn’t just about jumping into a swimming pool and breathing underwater. Casden has become an educator. Ocean First has grown out into three separate companies, the others being Ocean First Education, which develops marine science curricula for K–12, and Ocean First Institute, a 501(c)(3) that focuses on conservation through research and education.

“When we dive beneath the surface,” Casden said, “we experience this entirely new and foreign universe. Most of us want to know what we’re seeing, so we offer extensive marine

PHOTOS COURTESY OF OCEAN FIRST

Training pool

LAST CAST

science learning opportunities. It’s a foundational aspect of our business.”

The formula worked so well that Ocean First Education began offering their curriculum, not only to divers-in-training, but also to students in K–12 schools. Soon, students and teachers in 35 states were using it. Two years ago, the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation took notice, which led to a partnership with Ocean First Education to expand and enhance their marine science offering. They added the sizzle of the GHOF’s rich library of videos, photography and, of course, Guy Harvey’s iconic art to their marine science and conservation content.

“There was no need for us to reinvent the wheel,” said Dr. Harvey, “when Ocean First Education had already developed this incredible curriculum that meets state and national standards. We just integrated our assets and tried to make a great educational experience even better.”

So far, the strategy is working. The rebranded GHOF/Ocean First marine science curriculum is spreading across Florida like a sticky heat wave, and teachers from Key West to the Panhandle have embraced it.

“We want to make sure we get it right in Florida,” Dr. Harvey said, “then roll it out to anyone and everyone who wants it. Not only that, but we believe the courses should all be free, so there will be no barriers to students and teachers to learn the importance of protecting our vital marine environment.”

Enter Cathy Christopher, OFE’s director of education. A former teacher who lived in Florida for 17 years, she now endures Colorado’s snowy winters.

Along with Casden, Christopher is the braintrust behind the K–12 education curriculum.

“It’s true, I don’t like the cold weather,” Christopher said, “but I moved from Florida to Colorado because I’m passionate about education and conservation, and the program we’ve developed is one of the best in the world. Plus, Graham is nice enough to let me lead dive trips to warm, exotic places when it’s freezing here.” Did I mention that Casden is also gracious?

The partnership between the GHOF and OFE is also expanding. Christopher is curating new educational content each day, increasing the free offering to students and teachers.

“We’re working with organizations like Bonefish & Tarpon Trust and Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission,” she said, “and taking the excellent content they already have and making sure it meets state and national standards before we make it available to the public.”

It’s a match made in, well, Colorado and Florida, between divers, fisherman and even snow skiers, with the goal of promoting marine conservation, education and good environmental stewardship. So, the next time you go to Colorado to snow ski, you should think about getting scuba certified. I know this cool place in Boulder I can recommend.

FRED GARTH

For the past 25 years, Fred D. Garth’s articles have appeared in numerous books, magazines and newspapers around the world.

Ocean First’s retail shop

Ocean First Headquarters in Boulder, Colorado

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Pick a cause.

Any Cause.

What do you love most about the Florida outdoors? The incredible variety of wild species? The expansive waterways and unique landscapes? The endless recreational opportunities? Whatever it is, the Fish & Wildlife Foundation of Florida is committed to helping you support it. Through our many partnerships with conservation and education programs statewide, we’ve raised and donated more than $45 million since 1994. The best part is, your donation goes to the cause of your choice. So pick a project. Choose a charity. Find a fund. And show some love to what you love most about Florida’s wildlife.

FIND YOUR CAUSE FOR THE WILD. WILDLIFEFLORIDA.ORG 98 | GuyHarvey.com

CONSERVING NATURE AND OUR OUTDOOR HERITAGE

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Guy Harvey’s

at Tropic Star Lodge Nov. 14-19 2021 • May 21-26, 2022 • Sept. 24-29 2022 • Nov. 2022 TBD Twenty-five anglers each trip will have the opportunity to join Guy and Jessica Harvey on a 5 day/5 night VIP experience at the world-famous Tropic Star Lodge in Piñas Bay, Panama.

Total Cost: $9,800 ■

Five day/five night all-inclusive stay at Tropic Star Lodge.

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Personalized 30-minute video of your adventure.

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Five people each day will fish with Guy Harvey.

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Breakfast/lunch and happy hour snacks.

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Lodging at Tropic Star, double occupancy.

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During the week, Guy will paint an original piece to be auctioned off on the last night.

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Two private “arrival” and “departure” cocktail parties at Tropic Star’s mountaintop Palace.

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Round trip air charter from Panama City to Piñas Bay.

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Ground transportation from airport to hotel and domestic/international airport.

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VIP greeting by Tropic Star representative as you depart your flight and personal support while going through customs. While waiting for transfer, admission to airport VIP lounge pending COVID restrictions.

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Four people each day will fish with Jessica Harvey and with a scientist from Guy Harvey Enterprises.

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Additional fishing days will be standard trips on a Tropic Star boat with captain and a mate.

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A personalized Guy Harvey print for each angler.

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Welcome bag with Guy Harvey Tropic Star clothing and souvenir items.

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Lifetime subscription to Guy Harvey Magazine.

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Private dinners each night with Guy, Jessica Harvey and a scientist from Guy Harvey Enterprises.

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Two drinks per day and wine at dinner.

For available expedition dates, contact browland@GuyHarvey.com