Elizabeth Burgess, Postdoctoral Researcher, New England Aquarium

Christopher Columbus believed he was looking at a mermaid when he saw his first manatee. However, it is the dugong that is the more likely suspect of most mermaid stories. Closely related to portly manatees, the dugong is an unusual marine mammal. It has a vast global range that spans the Indo-Pacific region, but it relies on inshore habitats, which places it in close proximity to humans — and their associated impacts.

Elizabeth Burgess will take you on a trip to Australia — the dugong’s last stronghold. She will focus on the need to obtain vital reproductive information on populations surviving along a heavily impacted urban coastline. Dugongs are notoriously difficult to study; dugong research in the past had been obtained through carcass analysis from incidental drownings and indigenous harvests. The research that Elizabeth will present took on the challenge of using a hands-on approach to study live dugongs, which has allowed for a better understanding of pregnancy, seasonality, reproductive strategies and stress responses in a free-ranging population. Join us for a talk on this unique marine species and novel research approaches.