Name: Sharks, skates and rays: consume, conserve, consider?
Start: 2024-11-07T18:30:00+00:00
End: 2024-11-07T20:00:00+00:00
Location: Booth Lecture Theatre, St Andrews University Campus

Dive into the world of sharks, skates, and rays with this year’s Buckland Professor, Sophy McCully Phillips and guest Dr James Thorburn.
About this Event

Sharks, skates and rays: consume, conserve, consider?

Welcome to our event focusing on these fascinating creatures, as we discover and discuss the nature of sharks, skates and rays (collectively known as elasmobranchs) as charismatic marine creatures of conservation concern, but also a sustainable source of food. The event will be led by this year's Buckland Professor, Dr Sophy McCully Phillips, whose 19 years of experience researching sharks and advising the UK government on their sustainable exploitation in fisheries will be to the fore. Sophy will be joined by Dr James Thorburn, an associate professor of marine ecology at Edinburgh Napier University, who specialises in tracking sharks with electronic tags. Let's talk about how we can consume elasmobranchs responsibly, the measures we can take to help conserve them and consider your role in protecting our marine environment for future generations.

What is the Buckland Foundation?

The Buckland Foundation is a charity endowed from the estate of Victorian naturalist Frank Buckland (1826 - 1880). He was famous for the lectures and public information that helped Londoners and wider society learn about better nutrition, the importance of sustainable fishing, and the potential for aquaculture to provide valuable and affordable protein. On his death, Buckland bequeathed a sum of money in his will to support the public communication of fisheries science, leading to the establishment of the Buckland Foundation in 1926. The trust of the charity is made up of representatives of the fishing industry, as well as representatives from the national fisheries laboratories.

Each year since 1926, the Trustees have appointed a ‘Buckland Professor’ to give public talks at locations in the United Kingdom and Ireland on matters of current interest in commercial fisheries, aquaculture and the marine environment.