2011 Annual Report

MARE
About MARE
Fisheries around the world are in danger of collapse.
According to a Pew Oceans Commission Report, our oceans are “in crisis.” The U.S. Commission on Ocean
Policy asserts that our failure to properly manage our oceans is “putting our future at risk.”
To address and reverse this alarming situation, policy makers and fisheries managers need consistent, reliable
marine species, habitat and ecosystem data on an ongoing basis. They need to be able to track changes in fish
populations over time, as well as the effects of conservation measures, including marine protected area (MPA)
designations. This, in turn, requires the ability to see and work in underwater environments—which, beyond
diver depths, means enlisting technology and engineering support.
MARINE APPLIED RESEARCH AND EXPLORATION
Illuminating the Oceans’ Unknowns
Marine Applied Research and Exploration (MARE) provides just such deepwater engineering and offshore operations expertise. Founded as a nonprofit, 501c3 organization in 2003, our mission is to help protect and restore the ocean’s invaluable, yet threatened resources by enabling science-based marine conservation efforts.
Thank you supporters!
St atement of Ac t i v i t i e s , C al e n d ar Year 201 1
UNAUDITED
EXPENSES
5%
18%
77%
Programs
General & Administrative
Fundraising & Development
total: $1,009,600
INCOME
8%
7%
85%
Contracts
Foundations
Gifts & In-Kind Contributions
total: $998,166
MARE
1230 Brickyard Cove
Road, #101
Richmond, CA 94801
Tel: 510-232-1541
www.maregroup.org
Board of Directors
Dirk Rosen, Executive Director & Founder
Don Disraeli, Ph.D.
John Hubenthal
Jeff Ludlow, Secretary
Ed Ueber, Treasurer
Karen Weber, Chair
2011 Funders, Donors & Partners
California Department of Fish and Game
California Ocean Protection Council
California Sea Grant
California State University Monterey Bay, Institute
for Applied Marine Ecology
The Campbell Foundation
Deep Ocean Engineering
F/V Donna Kathleen & the Maricich Family
The Farallon Islands Foundation
The Firedoll Foundation
Larry L. Hillblom Foundation
The Hobson Family Foundation
The Dirk and Charlene Kabcenell Foundation
Marisla Foundation
Martin Lawrence Rosen Fund
MECCO, Inc.
Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary
Monterey Bay Sanctuary Foundation
The Nature Conservancy
National Oceanographic & Atmospheric Administration
National Park Service
Resource Renewal Institute
Gregg & Lisa Bemis
Kerry Davidson
Don Disraeli, Ph.D.
Claudia Duncan
Sarah Givens & Fred Brechtel
Mary Gleason
John Hubenthal
Michael Ingerman
Bob Lea
David Jeffrey & Rose Levinson, Ph.D.
Marc & Trish Lopata
Jeff and Mia Ludlow
Nancy & Robert Praetzel
Dale Roberts & Katharine Harps
Ann & Richard Hoyer
Pam Rich & Dirk Rosen
Dick & Shirley Rosseau
Roger Ruegg
Jeanette & Ed Ueber
Karen & Pete Weber
Message from the Executive Director
In May, I was honored and humbled to be named one
of Oceana’s “Ocean Hero” finalists. “Heroic” is not
a word I would use to describe my work, or MARE’s.
Yet preparing the map on the following page and
reflecting on our work over the past eight years, I
realize that MARE has become an important player in
West Coast ocean conservation efforts.
An increasing number of scientist and resource
managers are seeking our services. We are one of
few good options for getting visual deepwater species
and habitat data—data that is difficult to obtain but
crucial to understanding and protecting coastal
ecosystems. MARE’s expertise is needed!
In the coming year, we plan to build on this success
with further survey work and the design and build
of a new survey vehicle—a Rapid Assessment Tow
Fish (RATFish). The RATFish has the potential to
supply data that will improve management of rocky
habitat species, as well as dramatically lower visual
survey costs generally. We see this project as critical.
Until there are better, less expensive methods for
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seeing beneath the surface of the ocean, we simply
won’t know enough to manage ocean resources
sustainably.
I am pleased to report that, during our 2011 cruises,
we found cause for hope. We saw Cow Cod at Point
Sur, large numbers of Canary Rockfish along the
North Central Coast, and large concentrations of
Yelloweye Rockfish at Point Arena and Point Reyes.
These are the three threatened rockfish that limit the
West Coast bottom fishery.
We thank our wonderful partners, funders and
donors—the people and institutions who have made
our work possible so far. In my view, all of these
people and institutions are “Ocean Heroes,” and we
invite you to join them in 2012.
Sincerely,
Dirk Rosen
MARE Executive Director and Founder
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Marine Debris Removal
Monitoring California’s New MPAs
Working with our science partners at Cal State
University Monterey Bay’s Institute for Applied
Marine Ecology, The Nature Conservancy, and
fisherman Tim Maricich aboard his F/V Donna
Kathleen, MARE collected baseline data in two
of California’s newly established marine protected area (MPA) networks—the North Central
Coast MPAs and the South Coast MPAs. These
data document fish and invertebrate populations at the time of MPA establishment, providing a reference point critical to future assessments of MPA effectiveness and future MPA
management decisions.
MARE in the News
In September, KQED’s QUEST TV program joined MARE
on one of our marine protected area (MPA) data collection cruises. Link to the video at our website (www.
maregroup.org) and experience our
offshore operations in action—without
having to go to sea!
The North Coast MPAs stretch from Montara/
Pillar Point near Half Moon Bay up to Pt. Arena
in Mendocino, including areas around the Farallon Islands and Point Reyes. The South Coast
MPAs stretch from the Mexican border to Point
Conception just north of Santa Barbara. In both
of these networks we are collecting data at the
same sites in two consecutive years, including
sites inside the MPAs and matched comparison
sites outside the MPA boundaries.
Thanks to funding from the National Parks
Service, we are also collecting data using
two protocols—those of our science partner,
which focus on biodiversity data, and those of
the California Department of Fish and Game,
which focus on developing density measures
for fish of commercial and recreational importance. Collecting data using both protocols at
the same sites will enable us to compare the
results of the two methods and develop recommendations for future surveys and may lead to
development of a hybrid method that would allow simultaneous collection of biodiversity and
fish density data.
From 2003 to 2009, MARE also collected
data in the Channel Islands MPAs, which have
become part of the newly established South
Coast MPAs.
MARE conducted its first environmental impact assessment survey in September. Using our Phantom
ROV, we gathered data on fish populations at a proposed wave power sites in Oregon and Washington.
MARE looks forward to providing assessment data
for other proposed renewable energy sites as a
means of broadening our work portfolio.
In February, MARE co-convened a marine technology workshop titled “Comparative Assessment of
Visual Survey Tools.” The workshop was held at
the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute and
pooled the expertise of 42 international scientists,
engineers and resource managers.
RATFish: New Survey Vehicle Gaining Interest
Background map from
Google Earth.
MARE Begins Wave Power
Assessment Work
Marine Technology Workshop
A Success
In May, we were featured on the front
page of The San Francisco Chronicle.
Link to the article from the “MARE in
the News” page of our website.
MARE is growing.
Our underwater
survey and marine
debris removal
work now spans
locations in
California, Oregon
and Washington.
MARE again provided ROV operations support for
marine debris removal efforts. This year, we helped
retrieve a crab trap, two shrimp pots, and one large
nylon gill net from Soquel Canyon in the Cordell
Bank National Marine Sanctuary. The team also
revisited a large trawl net that was discovered in
2010. The net was still there and floating in the
water column. Sanctuary staff hope to be able to
remove the net but, due to its large size and heavy
steel cables and doors, it will require multiple
boats and a cutter on the ROV that can cut through
the half inch steel cables.
The Campbell Foundation has awarded
MARE a generous $50,000 grant to begin
development of a new underwater survey
vehicle—a Rapid Assessment TowFish or
RATFish.
The RATFish was conceived by MARE Executive Director and Founder Dirk Rosen and
Senior Electronics Engineer David Jeffrey
with the goal of decreasing the cost of
gathering species and habitat data beyond
conventional diver depths.
A winged vehicle, the RATFish will be towed
behind a boat and maneuvered using
airplane-like control surfaces instead of
propulsion motors, which means that it will
be much smaller, simpler, and lighter weight
than an ROV. It will require only small boats
that can be found in any harbor, smaller
crews, and much lower mobilization costs.
Total RATFish operation costs will be approximately two-thirds less than our ROV operations. Yet the vehicle will maneuver with
precision, allowing it to bring back state-ofthe-art data similar to our ROV data.
The California Fisheries Fund has also offered a loan to jump start the development
of this money-saving vehicle, and we are
currently seeking additional funders.
In September, MARE
Executive Director &
Founder Dirk Rosen traveled to Savannah, GA
to present the RATFish
as one of 10 finalists
in the Savannah Ocean
Exchange’s Ocean Solutions competition—a national competition that
seeks solutions with potential for “Shaping the
Future of Our Coasts.”
While the RATFish didn’t
win the $100K prize,
we were pleased to see
the incredible interest it
generated.
Over two days, participants examined the capabilities, limitations, operational considerations, and
cost of tools available for visual surveys of benthic
communities—all with the goal of defining the most
appropriate uses for existing tools and technologies
and the tradeoffs among them, as well as gaps
where new tools and technologies could reduce
costs and/or improve data gathering capabilities.
We are now working to synthesize the information gleaned during the workshop and will seek to
publish this synthesis in a NOAA Technical Bulletin,
which will make the results widely available to anyone working in the field.
MARE Board Member Ed Ueber conceived the
workshop. It was co-chaired by Dirk Rosen, MARE;
Jennifer Reynolds, University of Alaska Fairbanks
and NOAA West Coast & Polar Regions Undersea
Research Center; and Mary Yoklavich, NOAA/NMFS
Southwest Fisheries Science Center.
Inside photos, from left to right: North Central Coast MPA data collection
team, including team members from MARE, CSUMB and the Maricich
family; Bat stars and Starry rockfish near Catalina Island. Cover photos:
California scorpionfish and Pacific electric ray, also near Catalina Island.