News Releases

Scientific Team to Census Gulf of Maine Marine Life

June 27, 2005

The Gulf of Maine Area Program, housed at USM's Muskie School of Public Service and Bioscience Research Institute of Southern Maine, is bringing together a team of more than a dozen scientists to determine the use of the Gulf of Maine's offshore banks and ledges by seabirds, marine mammals and large fish. Developing a better understanding of how natural changes in this environment affect marine life usage patterns will help future management of the Gulf of Maine and its resources.

Using a 48-foot lobster-type research vessel, the RV Galatea, the team will make as many as 10 trips in July to Platts Bank and Three Dory Ridge off the coast of Cape Elizabeth to research and record the conditions of the bank and ridge when these predatory creatures are present and absent. The team also will conduct aerial surveys from a small Cessna aircraft.

TIME/PLACE: 10 a.m. to 12 noon, Friday, July 1, at Gulf of Maine Research Laboratory, 350 Commercial Street, Portland.

EVENT: Principal investigators from the Gulf of Maine Area Program study will be available at the dock near the research vessel Galatea to discuss the purpose, goals and the methods of the research to be conducted during the month-long study. Attending: Lewis Incze, senior research scientist, USM Bioscience Research Institute, and chief scientist, Gulf of Maine Area Program; Peter Stevick, research scientist, Gulf of Maine Area Program; and Scott Kraus, senior scientist, Edgerton Research Laboratory, New England Aquarium, Boston.

CONTACT: Suzy Ryan, Gulf of Maine Area Program, 207-780-4826; or Lynn Novak, USM Office of Public Affairs, 207-780-4200.

ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND:
The Gulf of Maine Area Program is one of seven initial field projects of the international Census of Marine Life program, and the only ecosystem-based field project. The Census of Marine Life is a global network of researchers in more than 70 nations engaged in a 10-year initiative to assess and explain the diversity, distribution and abundance of marine life in the oceans and how it changes over time.

The Gulf of Maine Area Program is one of seven initial field projects of the international Census of Marine Life program, and the only ecosystem-based field project. The Census of Marine Life is a global network of researchers in more than 70 nations engaged in a 10-year initiative to assess and explain the diversity, distribution and abundance of marine life in the oceans and how it changes over time.

In April, the Gulf of Maine Area Program launched the online portal, The Dynamic Atlas of the Gulf of Maine, bringing together decades of data about the complex marine ecosystem off New England and Canada's southeast coast. Available online at http://gmbis.iris.usm.maine.edu, the portal enables resource managers and scientific researchers to combine and analyze information in unprecedented ways, creating new insights into the Gulf of Maine's ecology. For example, the Atlas can be used for simple analyses, such as calculating the rate at which fish species are being first identified in the various regions of the Gulf, or the prevalence of different species of fish in the different areas of the Gulf, and how abundance and distribution is changing over time.

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