Alert Diver Category: Parting Shot

UPON SURFACING, I heard a fellow diver ask, “How cute are those brooding anemones?” This observation piqued my interest because I’d never heard of this behavior despite a lifetime of […]

IN THE ADAMS RIVER IN BRITISH COLUMBIA, huge flows of sockeye salmon swim upstream to complete their life cycle, marked by the compelling need to return to their birthplace to […]

Whale sharks are easy. Basking sharks are hard. Whale sharks usually inhabit warm, tropical waters, while baskers prefer cooler, temperate regions.

I had dived in Makako Bay, Hawai’i, many times over many years without seeing a single knobby sea star. The first time I encountered one, however, it wasn’t just one, but more than a hundred of them together. They were all gone a day later, and I haven’t seen one since. 

Smalltooth sawfish are critically endangered, making them exceedingly rare to encounter on dives in Florida. Some scientists believe sawfish face the greatest extinction risk of any family of marine animals.