What makes two communities that live over 5000km apart and different oceans struggle daily with the same problems? When you know that both communities live in coastal villages where the population doubles every 20 years, and the primary source of both food and income is the sea – you will understand that the problems that they face arise primarily from overfishing.

Blue Ventures has worked for the last 10 years in western Madagascar with Vezo fishing communities to develop innovative and sustainable solutions to the fisheries problems that they face in small scale traditional fisheries.

Ghana, western Africa borders the Atlantic Ocean in the Gulf of Guinea and has become increasingly affluent through the exploitation of its natural resources such as gold, timber and oil. However, the western region of Ghana is home to the Fante people, who similarly to the Vezo, are traditionally reliant on the continued productivity of the sea for both income and survival. The Ghanaian fishermen have been lucky, there is a coastal upwelling that occurs twice a year, from June to September and a second smaller season between December and February. The cold nutrient rich waters bring with them high levels of productivity in the form of plankton blooms followed by Herrings and Sardines and next to them Mackerel and Tuna. They also have a coastline replete with diverse habitats of rocky reef, mud, sand and estuarine lagoons, where they can fish out of season.

The traditional purse seine fishing method used in Ghana

However, despite the complexity and diversity of habitats and fishing grounds, the relentless exploitation of these resources by humans has started to have a marked effect on the productivity of these systems, and the reports of decline that are being made by many fishermen are similar to those heard throughout Madagascar, and no doubt small scale fisheries worldwide.

“Before we would catch plenty of fish, now we catch the same type of fish but they are becoming less and less,” laments Nana Kwesi-Ayaah the Chief fisherman of Princess Aketechi, a small fishing town near to the southern point of Ghana.

Despite a number of forest reserves and protected wetland areas, there are currently no marine protected areas in the country. Blue Ventures researchers are working together with the Coastal Resources Centre (CRC), University of Rhode Island (URI) in a USAID funded project to help develop plans for a network of marine protected areas in the western region of Ghana that would be co-managed with local fishing communities.

“Traditionally Ghana has used the top-down approach to natural resource management,” explains George Hutchful, National Policy Coordinator for CRC –Ghana, “however with open access fisheries we are seeing that this approach doesn’t work, what we need is support from the fishermen themselves.”

What is being suggested by CRC and Blue Ventures is to trial community co-management of protected areas, giving local fishermen and fishing communities more power to decide how to manage local fishing grounds. Also empowering them to enforce local and national fisheries laws that could help them to protect their resources for the future.

Local fisherman ID their catch

“What we have seen from working with local communities in Madagascar is that once fishermen see for themselves the benefits of protection, there is increased compliance with fisheries management,” commented Yann Frejaville, Fisheries scientist, Blue Ventures.

Local chiefs currently lack the power to enforce fisheries legislation on fishers acting illegally in their own villages, “People use lights to attract the Herrings up from the depths, which means the Tuna have nothing to eat and so now they are not so many as before,” says Nana Frederick Chief fisherman in Butre, “Others use battery acid (Carbide) or ground mosquito coils in plastic bags, dotted with holes and tied to the bottom of their nets. These toxic substances leak out of the plastic bags into the water and repel the fish upwards from the depths into the fishermen’s awaiting net” elaborates Frederick. Other fishermen also tell us stories of people blasting the fish from the waters using dynamite, which comes from illegal mining operations in the region.

What appears to be universal in small fishing communities, whether in Ghana or Madagascar is the necessity for local fishermen and their leaders to feel empowered to make a difference in their own communities, and ostracise these smaller groups that are practising unsustainable and destructive fishing methods.

Although located hundreds of miles away in the Mozambique Channel, villages within the Velondriake Locally Managed Marine Area (LMMA) felt the effects of cyclone Funso’s outer edges last week. A recent report estimated that 3,000 people within Velondriake and neighbouring areas were displaced from their houses. The cyclone’s most aggressive day happened to coincide with one of the highest tides of the year, and crashing waves pulled at the first line of houses. The flimsy homes – constructed of reed and mangrove – collapsed with ease and scattered out to sea. The bad weather also made fishing (the main source of food and income here) nearly impossible and highly dangerous. Locals reported that it was the worst storm since 2005.

Disastrous climatic events in this region actually occur relatively frequently. A recent survey from the National Institute of Statistics (INSTAT) found that nearly 30% of households in the southwest region have experienced a natural disaster over the 12 preceding months including cyclones (13.3%), flooding (5%), drought (11%) and insect invasion (3.8%); these disasters have resulted in houses and infrastructure damaged or destroyed in 23% of cases, food insecurity in 75%, and destruction of lifestyle in nearly 10%.

Storms often batter the Velondriake LMMA

The destruction of this storm, along with these other recent disasters, highlights the extreme vulnerability of coastal populations to extreme weather events. As climate change impacts continue to materialize, villages like those in Velondriake will certainly witness an increase in the frequency and intensity of these events.

Blue Ventures’ integrated activities aim to reduce this vulnerability within the villages of Velondriake. Conservation measures such as limiting destructive fishing and permanent marine reserves ensure a healthy reef, better able to protect villages against big swells and provide enough fish to feed households. Supplemental income generation through sustainable aquaculture allows families to increase their incomes, allowing them to invest in better housing or save for future food shortages. Looking in the longer term, providing access to family planning and community health further reduces vulnerability in that it allows couples to choose how many children to have and gives them the knowledge to keep their families healthy; healthy mothers can contribute to increased household income and savings. Finally, providing education to children allows them to eventually enter careers that are more stable and higher paying – not necessarily dependent on natural resource exploitation.

Cyclones like Funso, and other natural disasters, are predicted to only increase in the coming decades. Luckily, there are interventions, such as these implemented by Blue Ventures, that can build adaptive capacity of vulnerable communities.

When Ryan Walker, a biologist based at the Open University, and his team crawled on their hands and knees through 60 kilometres of clothes-shredding, hair-plucking spiny forest between Toliara and the Mangoky River, racking up 150 man-hours of surveying, they found just 96 spider tortoises, a critically endangered species found only in southwest Madagascar.

On the 30th January, however, Blue Ventures volunteers counted 99 spider tortoises in a single day and in a far smaller area — five hectares – near a fishing village south of Andavadoake, in a survey that lasted just 50 man-hours. “Mbo misy tsakafy maro ty etoy laha hoary amy ty tany sasany agny satria fady ay mihina azy,” the President of the village told me – “The tortoises are more abundant here than anywhere else, because it is taboo to eat them.”

Will the spider tortoise soon be a memory?

The spider tortoises belonged to Pyxis arachnoides brygooi, the northern subspecies of P.arachnoides, which is endemic to a 600 kilometre long sliver of spiny forest. The subspecies is extinct across 50% of its original range, and numbers may have fallen by as much as 90%. Not only is the spider tortoise the target of an international yet illegal pet trade – each tortoise, thanks to the golden spider-web like patterns on its carapace, fetches up to $10,000 – but it is also roasted alive and eaten by the Mikea, an elusive forest people. In addition, the spider tortoise’s habitat, spiny forest, has halved in area between 1970 and 2000.

Using a $5000 grant from the Turtle Conservation Fund, Blue Ventures will continue to gather information about the spider tortoises, including their age, sex, weight and carapacial dimensions, in addition to raising awareness about the plight of this unique species: spider tortoises are the only tortoises on Earth that have an anterior plastral hinge, a ‘drawbridge’ at the front of their carapaces that they can winch up.

With 57 of the world’s 131 species of chameleon, including the largest and the smallest, Madagascar has a monopoly on the family’s diversity. This unusual individual (see photo, below) was spotted clinging to a wooden fence during breakfast today. Named for its wart-like scales, Furcifer verrucosus is one of the largest species of chameleon in the world – just 10 centimetres short of its title-holding cousin, Furcifer oustaleti, which has a maximum length of 70 centimetres. The warty chameleon, as it is commonly known, also possesses a fearsome row of 40, four millimetre long spines on its back. Like all chameleons, it is well-adapted to tree life, with tong-like hands and feet that latch on to twigs and a long, prehensile tail that acts as a back-up lasso.

The warty chameleon, a handsome fellow

Although some species of chameleon change colour to blend in with their backgrounds, the majority only do so to express irritation or anger when they’re cover has been blown. As we watched, the individual blanched and developed vertical brown bars – the chameleon’s equivalent of a grimace. Humans are only just starting to catch up with this astounding ability to change colour to suit mood: in 2006, scientists at the University of Connecticut in Storrs developed threads that, when exposed to an electric current, change from orange and red to blue, a technology that paves the way for “smart,” mood-sensing garments. Of course, the chameleon’s control over its canvas is far more sophisticated – but then it has had over 20 million years of evolution to perfect the art.

For more info on how chameleons are influencing fashion please visit this web page by National Geographic

What constitutes a duvet day for a Vezo shark fisherman? Not the threat of capsizing in seven metre waves, it turns out. Yesterday, Andava bay was peppered with pirogues en route to the Mozambique Channel – exactly where a powerful, dangerous cyclone called Funso is currently fuming. Ten kilometres out to sea, the fishermen will unravel and sink 200 metre long nets, anchoring them with heavy weights to keep them stable in the powerful currents. When the fishermen haul the nets in, there’s a distinct possibility that their pirogues will capsize and they will drown. “Rozy mivaka,” explains Thomas, an ex-shark fisherman who is now heads up Blue Ventures’ shark fishery monitoring project – “they’re terrified.”

So why do they do it? Surprisingly, it’s because the Vezo believe sharks are easier to catch during violent storms, explains Thomas. One hypothesis is that blinded by turbidity, hammerheads and guitarfish fail to see the net before it’s too late, and become hopelessly entangled. Tuna and other large pelagic species of fish are also more likely to be trapped in the nets when visibility is poor, and the smell of their blood attracts sharks (Sharks are incredibly sensitive to the smell of blood: it is said that they can detect the equivalent of one teaspoonful in an Olympic sized swimming pool).

Could sharks such as this (blacktip reef shark) be just a memory soon in Madagascar?

Despite the dangers of shark fishing in a cyclone, it certainly pays off: shark fins fetch up to $50 per kilogram, a seventh of the annual income of fishermen in these parts. Ratsimba, a fisherman from Andavadoaka, has caught seven sharks this week. “One for every day,” he jokes. Yet the plight of sharks in Madagascar is no laughing matter: exports of shark fin plummeted from almost 50 metric tons in 1992 to around 15 metric tons in 2003 — and according to Blue Ventures’ own research, over 1300 sharks were caught along a 50 km stretch of coast in Velondriake between 2006 and 2007.

Such overfishing of sharks can have unpredictable and catastrophic impacts on marine ecosystems. Sharks consume rays, skates and smaller sharks, and when their populations crash, the abundance of their prey rockets. A study published in Science in 2007 found that a decline in the abundance of eleven species of shark in the coastal, northwest Atlantic led to an explosion of cownose rays, which feed on scallops. As a result of the explosion, a century-old scallop industry in the region died out (Ransom A. Myers, et al., 2007, Science 315, 1846).

Fishermen rely on catching sharks like this hammerhead as a large of their income

The good news is that marine reserves can reverse the decline, while providing economic benefits to local fishing communities. A protected area in Mexico that is no bigger than Manhattan, and was established in 1995, saw a tenfold increase in shark biomass between 1999 and 2009 (Galland, G. et al., 2011, Coral Reefs 30, 215). Despite just 35 per cent of the reserve being ‘no take,’ very little fishing takes place because many locals have realised that working as an eco-tourism guide is far more lucrative than fishing.

If such a small reserve can have such a large impact on shark abundance, then imagine what Velondriake could accomplish…

Please use this link to see a video by Jon Slayer which documents the Connecting Classrooms participants trip to a baobab forest. This film highlights the importance of activities like this in youth centred conservation.

Please do check our website  and Vimeo page regularly for updates and the latest videos from Madagascar & Belize.

“I was free diving in the seagrass meadow, looking for Murex shells,” he explained. “I looked up and there was a huge pig-like animal snuffling in the sand, right next to me.” He had never seen anything like it, he added. Afterwards, the fisherman came home, mentioned the bizarre creature to his wife, and fell asleep. “Someone must have overheard me and got the story wrong, but it’s not my fault,” he pointed out.

What the fisherman might have seen was a dugong, otherwise known as a sea cow. Dugongs are the only herbivorous, truly marine mammal in the world. They can put away as much as 40 kilos of seagrass every day, rooting up the rhizomes that lie beneath the sand with sharp incisors. They are only found in the calm waters of lagoons and bays, and are prisoners of their sluggish metabolism, unable to generate enough heat to colonise the cool waters found outside the tropics. According to village elders, dugongs used to be common in the seagrass meadows south of Andavadoaka. In fact, the name of a nearby village in the Bay of Assassins, Lamboara, means “dugong” in the local language, Vezo (“lambo” means pig, “hara” coral). Now, however, they are now extremely rare – so rare, in fact, that even experienced fishermen no longer recognize them. The decline is partly due to hunting, but also because the dugong’s primary habitat, seagrass, is under threat. The world’s seagrass meadows are shrinking at an unprecedented rate: between 1980 and 2006, seagrass meadows disappeared at a rate of 7 per cent of their total global area per year, an annual loss of 110 km2 and 14 per cent of all seagrass species are at an elevated risk of extinction (Short et al., 2011).

Still, it’s wonderful to know that there might be some hope for dugongs in Velondriake.

In September 2011, Velondriake began producing a bi-monthly radio show in partnership with Blue Ventures, called Feom’Bezo (The Voice of the Vezo), sharing news from across its array of projects.

In episode 7, the radio show gets the community excited for the upcoming Teariake festival in Morombe.

Teariake (Love the Sea) is a new community conservation organisation, based just north of Velondriake, that the Velondriake Association has been helping to train during its beginning stages. Its new locally-managed marine reserve is in place, and the community is ready to celebrate!

Plus Joeline talks about the recent Saturday Schools activities, where the kids have been making art from beach rubbish, and Hery talks about what it means to be a new Junior Reporter, using film to inspire other youth to get involved in conservation.

Listen to or download the radio show podcasts here

Finally, Valerio, a young local musician and president of the Aloalo youth environmental club, talks about what motivates him and the other students in his music group to write songs about protecting the environment.

BV Scholar Profile – Valerio

I arrived in Sarteneja, Belize a little after 5pm – just in time to watch the sunset creep over the small town. Sarteneja is right by the ocean with beautiful views of the azure water lined with palm trees. There is not a single paved road in the town other than the landing strip, and I mean only a strip there is no airport or other buildings to speak of.

A typical Belize sunset - not bad!

 My first week in Belize was packed with activities. It began with orientations to Sarteneja and Blue Ventures with the other volunteers. The volunteers make up quite a diverse group with people from the US, England, Norway, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, Canada, Guatemala, and Belize – we all had something new to learn.

I had never done a homestay before and found my family to be more than generous and they really made me feel at home, not to mention the feasts that I ate. My plate was filled with so much food it was very difficult to finish my plates of fresh fish or lobster.

During the first week we took a hike out to Wildtreks, the local manatee (and now monkey) rehabilitation centre. The hike took about an hour, it was hard to believe that anything in the small town of Sarteneja could be so far apart, all the while fighting off mosquitos and finding our way around puddles that filled the whole street. Once there though, it was awesome to see a baby howler monkey and a manatee that was about ready for release, being fed.

Feeding a manatee at Wildtreks

After that we also conducted some manatee monitoring in the area and after having a look out, got to snorkel a freshwater spring in the ocean where the manatees like to hang out and drink the water. There was also a goliath grouper that lives under a rock ledge there and after MUCH help from some of the locals in the Sarteneja Alliance for Conservation and Development (SACD) we were finally able to spot the grouper!

We also had the opportunity to get up at 5:30 am and go with some local fishermen to analyse their catch. Their traps are made of many long wooden sticks starting from shore and going out a ways into a circle with chicken wire lining it. The fisherman then jumps in with a net and rounds up the catch. Once it was on the boat we were able to see the species and measured the lengths. When the net came up through there was a large tarpon in the net! We think the tarpon had been having a little bit of a feast on the rest of the catch.

Before heading off to Bacalar Chico Dive Camp (BCDC), we also conducted a Marine Protected Area (MPA) lesson at one of the local schools for Standard 4. They were quite accommodating and we gave a lecture for about half an hour before they had a sort of recess/madness/free time. When everyone was rounded up again we finished the lesson by breaking into small groups and doing activities related to MPAs.

Then before we all knew it, it was off to BCDC!!!

by Trevor Jones, PhD, Remote Sensing Scientist

Greetings from the opening day of the Climate change, deforestation and the future of African rainforests (CCDFAR) conference at Oriel, the fifth oldest college in Oxford, the third oldest University in the world. This timely international gathering brings together the expertise of scientists, practitioners and students representing over 30 institutions, universities, organizations and governmental agencies for an interdisciplinary examination of the challenges facing Africa’s tropical forests. This, the first of three days, has focused on a contextual introduction to the history of the relationships between humans, climate, and forested ecosystems. The next two days will address contemporary change in the forest dynamics, the effects of climate change on forest cover and function, direct human pressures on forested ecosystems (e.g., deforestation, hunting), and the potential challenges of forest conservation in the 21st century.

The format of CCDFAR includes 20 minute presentations followed by 20 minute question periods, poster presentations, and panel discussions. This information exchange will result in the dissemination of a summary document, a synthesis paper, and a special journal issue, all of which will summarize the challenges facing Africa’s tropical forests in the 21st century.

Blue Ventures (BV) has been selected to attend this important conference to present a poster summarizing our Blue Carbon (BC) project. The BC project directly addresses many of the themes of this conference, particularly contemporary change in forest dynamics, anthropogenic pressures on forest ecosystems, and the potential and challenges of conservation in the 21st century. Owing to our reputation, the timeliness and importance of our BC project, and the added bonus that we are the only marine conservation organization in attendance (!), our work has thus far received keen interest. Throughout the coming days, BV is sure to greatly benefit from and contribute to this landmark meeting.