Environment
A lot on their plate: Sea’s custodians must do more
South Africa has proclaimed 20 new marine protected areas, mirroring worldwide efforts to conserve more marine areas. But a lack of funding and management mean most remain ‘Parks on Paper’.
Of rashes and threshers: How dermal denticles make the apex predator even harder to handle
Surfer and sometimes shark researcher Sean Kelly takes a salty look at shark skin, a marvel of evolution.
Swimming against the tide of sewage: Standerton sanfus stir up action
An intrepid band of activist-athletes are drawing attention to a pressing pollution problem, with their latest target the Vaal River that flows through the Mpumalanga town of Standerton. Laura du Toit reports
Bycatch threat to apex predators
Shark and ray numbers are dwindling. Bottom trawling and a lack of government monitoring are adding to the problem, writes Katie Biggar
Heads up for rookie environmental writers
Keen to write a few environmental wrongs? Do you have a conservation story that needs to be told, but are not sure how to go about it?
Hooked on safety – the price of keeping KZN’s bathers safe from sharks
The KwaZulu-Natal Sharks Board has a mandate to protect bathers against shark attacks while minimising the environmental impact. It insists its move to using baited drumlines rather than nets is
Fikile Ntshangase opposed a mine extension. Now she has been murdered
Violence on border of iMfolozi-Hluhluwe Game Park linked to fears of mass retrenchments Fikile Ntshangase, a vocal opponent of plans to extend the Somkhele coal mine, was murdered in her
Spotted!
How a surfer’s project turned the tide on shark fears
A brush with his own mortality stoked big wave rider and adventurer Greg Bertish into launching Shark Spotters – an internationally acclaimed bathing safety project that’s also doing wonders for
Trad medicine matters:
WHO woos in Africa’s Covid cure search
Where Covid-19 treatments have divided the world and brought opprobrium to Donald Trump, a controversial African medicine has helped forge some common purpose, writes Fatima Khan
