Models of whale distributions often offer static snapshots that overlook the fluid nature of habitat use. In regions where systematic surveys are infrequent, long‐term observations from tourism vessels provide valuable opportunistic data. In the northern Gulf of Maine, humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae ) have anecdotally been observed shifting from traditional foraging grounds off Maine toward northeastern Canadian wate...

Anthropogenic climate change is fuelling repeated marine heatwaves and has triggered the fourth global mass coral bleaching event in 2023–2025, causing widespread coral mortality worldwide. Here, we document the impacts of this event on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR), where heat accumulation peaked in February–March 2024 and caused mass coral bleaching for the seventh time since 1998. We use data from the Australian Institute of...

Soft corals (order Alcyonacea) are an important component of tropical coral reefs, and often form locally abundance dense carpets. Some soft coral species are prone to bleaching and heat stress like scleractinian, reef-forming corals, but others appear resistant to bleaching stressors. Despite the importance of soft corals in tropical reefs, there is limited knowledge regarding their demographic ecology. Spatial point process...

Fan shells (Family Pinnidae) have high ecological importance but are facing global declines including in New Zealand. Given the scarcity of data regarding the degree of these losses, understanding current population spatial extents and distributional drivers is needed for restoration management. A subtidal towed underwater camera survey was conducted at 62 sites to elucidate Atrina zelandica extent in Tauranga Harbour, Bay of...

The risk exposure to rip currents may be reduced by increasing beach users’ ability to effectively identify the presence of rips. Static photographs have been widely used to assess and improve beach users’ identification ability, however this has not led to an overall increase in skill. This pilot study assesses the public’s knowledge of rip currents using two different media types and whether static or moving images make it m...

By March 2020 coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) was anticipated to present a major challenge to the work undertaken by scientists. This pandemic could be considered just one of the shocks that human society has had and will be likely to confront again in the future. As strategic thinking about the future can assist performance and planning of scientific research in the face of change, the pandemic presented an opportunity to...

Climate change is causing rapid warming in the Arctic, which, alongside other physical, socio-economic, cultural, geopolitical, and technological factors, is driving change in the far north. This research presents a conceptual model summarizing Arctic change factors which in turn was used in the design of a Delphi exercise which leveraged a variety of experts to forecast trajectories in different parts of the Arctic. Based on...

Theory suggests that animals make hierarchical, multiscale resource selection decisions to address the hierarchy of factors limiting their fitness. Ecologists have developed tools to link population‐level resource selection across scales; yet, theoretical expectations about the relationship between coarse‐ and fine‐scale selection decisions at the individual level remain elusive despite their importance to fitness. With GPS‐te...