HOST Damond Benningfield
DISCUSSION
The pistol shrimp has terrible eyesight. But some species of the shrimp get help — not spectacles, but a companion fish: a goby. It keeps an eye out for predators. […]
Radio Program
Our regular Science and the Sea™ radio program presents marine science topics in an engaging two-minute story format. Our script writers gather ideas for the radio program from the University of Texas Marine Science Institute’s researchers and from our very popular college class, Introduction to Oceanography, which we teach to hundreds of non-science majors at The University of Texas at Austin every year. Our radio programs are distributed to commercial and public radio stations across the country.
HOST Damond Benningfield
DISCUSSION
Bodega Bay is best known for its birds. Not real birds, but the scary ones from a movie: Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Birds.” The film was set and shot in the […]
HOST Damond Benningfield
DISCUSSION
We might not always think so, but people who spend time preening in a mirror are actually passing an intelligence test — showing an awareness that the thing in the […]
HOST Damond Benningfield
DISCUSSION
A calm day on the beaches of the Pacific Northwest can turn deadly in a hurry. A single large wave can rush ashore, running inland up to 50 yards farther […]
HOST Damond Benningfield
DISCUSSION
An ancestor of modern-day whales may have paddled across the Atlantic Ocean like an otter. And when it reached the Americas, it could have walked out on its back legs. […]
HOST Damond Benningfield
DISCUSSION
Like its garden-variety namesake, the sea cucumber doesn’t get around much. Most species appear to spend their entire adult lives on the same patch of sea floor. But recent research […]
HOST Damond Benningfield
DISCUSSION
We Americans love our shrimp, salmon, and canned tuna — we eat more of those than any other type of seafood. Overall, in 2017 we consumed about 16 pounds of […]
HOST Damond Benningfield
DISCUSSION
Fishing just isn’t what it used to be — commercial fishing, that is. For much of the last century, the world’s fleets brought in more fish and shellfish every decade. […]
HOST Damond Benningfield
DISCUSSION
It’s probably not surprising that a critter known as a toadfish can be a bit rude. A couple of studies in recent years have found that male toadfish “grunt” when […]
HOST Damond Benningfield
DISCUSSION
A few strands of kelp washing up on a beach usually isn’t much cause for alarm. But when two clumps of southern bull kelp were found in Antarctica in early […]