Brian Skerry: Can powerful images save our oceans?

We are kicking off the season with the unstoppable Brian Skerry.  Brian is a world renown photojournalist and film producer specializing in marine wildlife and underwater environments. He has won the prestigious Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition no less than ELEVEN TIMES. He is a National Geographic Society Storytelling Fellow and author of a dozen books.Brian’s 2021 book, Secrets of the Whales, was released by National Geographic as part of a multi-platform project that included an Emmy Award winning 4-part documentary film series directed by none other than James Cameron. 

In this episode we discuss:

• Why were you drawn to the ocean as a subject?
• Tell me about your entrepreneurial journey frpm entepreneurial journey from kid wiht a camera to getting his first photo published in his 30s to the meteoric rise to become National Geographic phtographer.  
• When did you pivot to focus from showing us the cool animals - to showing us the changes in their environment and becoming a voice for them. 
  Why is telling the story of the sea such an important mission - and why now?
• How has the ocean environment changed since you started? Are these changes statistics or are they palpable and if so in what ways.
• Tell me one of the most beautiful underwater creatures you’ve seen - and how is it affected by changes.
  Have you ever had a scary underwater experience? 
  How do the sea creatures react to you? - There are increasing numbers of people in the ocean as well as on it. How do we balance the desire for people to explore and become champions of the ocean through experience with the desire to protect the ocean?
• How has technology impacted way you work?
• There are so many issues facing the ocean right now. We talk about pollution, overfishing, carbon emissions, biodiversity, warming water etc. What do you think is the most vital issue facing the ocean? What should entrepreneurs be focusing on?
• There is growing attention on the water - do you think we are focused on the right issues? How do you

Transcript

Brian Skerry

[00:00:00] Abigail: Hey, everybody. Welcome to the second season of happy planet, where we speak with entrepreneurs, investors, and thought leaders on the cutting edge of nature forward innovation. I am your host, Abigail Carroll. We've made a few changes to how we work. We have a new producer and editor, Josie, Holtzman and podcasts will now be dropped every other week 

[00:00:20] we're going to work especially hard this season to get our podcast in front of new ears and eyes. So if you like what we're doing, please proselytize. Finally, I'd like to give you a heartfelt thank you for being part of this journey.

[00:00:32] We are kicking off the season with the unstoppable Brian Skerry and how lucky are we to have him on the show? Brian is a world renowned photo journalist and film producer, specializing in Marine, wildlife and underwater environments. He has won the prestigious wildlife photographer of the year competition. 

[00:00:50] No less than 11 times. He has a national geographic society, storytelling fellow and author of a dozen books. Brian's 2021 book secrets of the whales was released by national geographic as part of a multi-platform project that included an Emmy award winning for part documentary film series directed by none other than James Cameron. 

[00:01:14] Brian's accolades could take up all of our time here. So I'm going to just stop there, but I will add the, he lives in nearby York, Maine, and we share a common friend in bill Kurt singer. Bill was one of the early trailblazers and Marine photography and he kicked off our last season. You will hear him mention more than once in this podcast. But let's hear it from Brian.

[00:01:37] (music out) 

[00:01:37] Abigail: Welcome to the podcast Brian

[00:01:39] Brian Skerry: My pleasure to be here. Thanks so much.

[00:01:42] Abigail: Well, I'm so it's such an honor to have you here You went from a kid with a camera to now you're a world renowned underwater photographer And, I'd love 

[00:01:55] to hear a little bit more about that journey. It took a while to, to get a first, photograph published. And I think the entrepreneurs listening would really love to hear about that.

[00:02:05] Brian Skerry: Yeah. it sure did take a while, Abigail. It took me a long time to kind of realize my dream, but the dream started out, when I was a little boy, you know, I grew up in a little working class town, uh, an old textile mill town in sort of central Massachusetts.

[00:02:24] And, my parents would take me to the beaches of new England, you know, so I was going to the beaches in Rhode Island and Cape Cod and New Hampshire as a, as a child and. I fell in love with the sea. I think from those very early days, you know, I, I often think back and remember riding in my parents station wagon back from the beach, all sunburned and salty and having this sort of mix of feelings, , inside my mind.

[00:02:50] On one level, I was like, very much at peace and just, you know, had a total blissful day. But on the other side of my brain, my mind was racing, wondering what was out beneath those waves. I think I was always drawn to wanting to do something adventurous, you know, exploration. I remember reading National Geographic magazine as a kid and watching documentaries from Jacques Cousteau and so forth.

[00:03:15] And even though I wanted to do many, I think, adventurous things. There was something special about the ocean. So I began scuba diving when I was about 15 years old. And initially that was kind of all I thought I wanted to do was be a, an explorer, ocean diver explorer. But within a year or two, I attended a diving show in Boston. It's the longest running dive show in the world. And it'll be going on, in March. Again, this year and, um, I sat in that audience as a teenager and watched underwater photographers and filmmakers present their work.

[00:03:52] And I often describe that as an epiphany where a light went on in my head that said, that's how I want to explore the ocean with a camera in my hand. I think I was always a very visual person. I liked movies and books and magazines. I looked, looking at images and the notion of being able to, explore the planet underwater.

[00:04:11] Make pictures about the things I was seeing, learning, and then share it with others really appealed to me. But you know, I didn't come from,, any money. I didn't have, the resources to travel or buy expensive equipment. And looking back, it was a bit of a, a billion and one chance, I think, that I was able to actually realize that dream.

[00:04:30] But finally got that first image, as you mentioned.

[00:04:32] I first, first was published in the Boston Globe newspaper. I was doing a lot of shipwreck diving. In the early part of my career, because I could dive here in New England and that was interesting to me. There were a lot of unexplored wrecks with good histories. So I did a few of those shipwreck stories for the Boston Globe and then I started working for diving magazines and, trying to.

[00:04:53] Sort of, uh, diversify my portfolio, I was doing some speaking engagements, I wrote some books about diving and photography, uh, worked for other magazines, sold stock photography to Sports Illustrated or Esquire or Men's Journal or whatever. But eventually got that first assignment, um, in 1998, thanks to one of my idols, uh, a veteran underwater photographer who had been at National Geographic for over 30 years at that point.

[00:05:21] A guy named Bill Curtsinger, who I know has been on, on the podcast as well, and Bill, um, and I had become friends at that point and, we traveled together, did some diving in various places, and he called me one day and he said, look, I've got two stories from National Geographic, that I'm working on, one that I want to do and one that I don't want to do, and the one he wasn't interested in doing was a shipwreck story that he had been to the site, I think, the previous year, and And he said, you know, Brian, the visibility is absolutely zero there, it's terrible conditions, and there's nothing to see.

[00:05:54] You know, this thing went down in the 1700s, it's all buried under 30 feet of sand. I don't think that it's worth doing. And he was working on another project that was, you know, much more compelling to him. So he said, but they're going to send somebody if I, if I pass on this. So I can recommend you if you want.

[00:06:10] But he said, bear in mind two things. One, That with National Geographic, you're only ever going to get one chance and with this story, I think you've got a 98 percent chance of failure. So I said, well, sign me up. Um, but so with his recommendation and a brief portfolio at the time, uh, I was given the assignment and pretty much everything Bill said was true, but they were excavating the site.

[00:06:38] They were finding some treasures, Spanish doubloons. It was an old pirate shipwreck on Cape Cod. Um, And, um, I figured out ways to make pictures. I was doing macro photos of the coins and the artifacts. I brought in movie lights, uh, so that the divers that were working would have illumination around them instead of me trying to use a strobe that would light up all that stuff in the water.

[00:06:59] So I used negative film instead of slide film, which gave me a little more latitude. Anyway, long story short. Uh, National Geographic loved what I did, and um, they made a decision to develop me, as they said, as one of their regular shooters, and 26 years later, I'm in the middle of layout on my 33rd story, I think, so it's um, it's been great.

[00:07:22] Abigail: What kind of turned your attention from the diving world and focusing on that and shipwrecks to finally getting to animals?

[00:07:31] Brian Skerry: Yes, 

[00:07:31] So I was first given an assignment. To live on the bottom of the ocean, and it was in 2001. It was just after 9 11, actually, and I went down to Key Largo, Florida. It was the world's only saturation facility for scientists and with a team of scientists. I saturated I lived on the bottom of the ocean for 7 days. Which meant we could do as much diving as we wanted during the day.

[00:07:56] We would sleep in this little habitat that was about the size of a school bus. I think it was 43 feet long. It was at a depth of 60 feet. Um, so we could do that all day long. And it was, to me, it was a bit of a hybrid story. It was kind of like a shipwreck because there was this big metal submarine that didn't move that I was living in.

[00:08:15] But I was able to go out on the coral reef and shoot animals and the science and so forth. So that was a bit of a crossover story for me. And, um, that was published in 2003, but just before it became published, I proposed my very first story, which was a story about harp seals, little white pups up in Canada that were still being hunted, but were also, facing issues of climate change, the decline of sea ice. And it was actually a story that Bill Curtsinger had done. I think back in the late 70s or

[00:08:48] Abigail: I remember.

[00:08:49] Brian Skerry: I wanted to, you know, kind of update readers on what was happening with harp seals and I was inspired by Bill's work. So, um, I got that story approved. It became a cover story in 2004 at National Geographic. And it was also the first story that allowed me to use a natural history coverage to talk about more environmental issues.

[00:09:11] Abigail: So it was basically as soon as you started talking about animals, really, you ended up in the climate discussion because it's that important in that present. Bill's story came out, what, 20 years earlier?

[00:09:24] Brian Skerry: Yeah, probably, uh, at least 20 years earlier. Yep.

[00:09:28] Abigail: And was that, I mean, when, when Bill came on the podcast, he talked about, his early dives in the sixties in the Arctic, in Antarctica, there were already microparticles of plastic, but in his articles about the harp seal, where there was. Was he already leaning into the environmental conversation or is that something new that you were able to do 20 years later?

[00:09:49] Brian Skerry: Yeah, I don't believe that he was, um, because, you know, if you go back even 20 or 30 years ago, the ice in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, where these animals migrate to from the high Arctic for a few weeks each year to engage in courtship mating and pupping, those waters in the wintertime were pretty much frozen solid. You had eight meter thick ice, 25 foot thick ice. For as far as the eye could see, but in just those 20 years or 30 years since Bill did his story, the ice was declining rapidly and I was seeing and hearing from researchers that the pup mortality rate was increasing. On those years when the ice was thin, so just for some context, harp seals have the second fastest weaning in the animal kingdom.

[00:10:35] They go from being completely helpless on day one to being completely weaned and on their own at about 14 days, two weeks later. But during those two weeks, they need a stable platform of ice to nurse from their mom to put on all that weight. But what was happening is the ice was thin or nonexistent.

[00:10:53] The pups were falling into the ocean. I made the very first photos of, you know, five day old pups with the umbilical cord still on their belly, falling through that slushy ice and being frantically pushed back up to, you know, stable, purchased by their moms to breathe and to get back out of the water. So, um, yeah, in just a few decades, we had already seen this massive decline of ice and pup mortality rate increasing to 100 percent on some of those years.

[00:11:22] Abigail: So as you as you transition to you know To dealing with the taking photos of animals and telling these environmental stories Did you have a particular shooting philosophy that was helping you sort of Express those like why are you doing films now with James Cameron and somebody else isn't? What makes your photography special?

[00:11:48] Brian Skerry: Well, you know, that's probably a, a question that could be answered in a number of ways, but, but let me just talk maybe a little bit about that evolution and, and it might help answer some of that question. So was. When I started out, I, I, I think it was very self serving, right? I just wanted to do adventurous and cool things.

[00:12:10] And I was inspired by guys like Bill, uh, and other photographers that were just traveling around the world and, you know, in tropical coral reefs or the poles or diving in an article like Bill was doing and doing really cool things. And as a teenage boy or teenager in general, that just really appealed to me.

[00:12:29] I wanted to do what those people were doing. Once I started working for National Geographic and was doing that very thing, traveling around the world and, and seeing things, um, some, some things became quite evident to me, and that was that the ocean was suffering from many problems. Uh, after the harp seal story, which became sort of my first big environmental story, uh, I was, I read a scientific paper in the British journal Nature.

[00:12:59] That came out, I think, in 2005, and it stated that 90 percent of the big fish in the ocean have been taken because of, uh, been taken because of commercial industrialized overfishing. And when I read that paper, I was blown away, and I also thought it would be headline news in pretty much every media outlet, but it didn't get much coverage.

[00:13:21] You know, we were killing a hundred million sharks every single year. We had taken all the tuna and the billfish, and the oceans were empty now because we had gotten so good at Commercial industrialized overfishing. We were using these massive per se nets and satellite technology and, you know, looking at where the warm eddies met the cold water and those were the dynamic zones and they could target this so precisely that the fish didn't have a chance.

[00:13:48] So I was seeing that. I was seeing that, you know, coral reefs, we had lost 50 percent of the world's coral reefs in the last 50 or 60 years. Um, and those that remain are largely degraded. I realized that we were dumping 18 billion pounds of plastic into the ocean every single year. That we were facing the greatest, uh, extinction event.

[00:14:13] Um, on ever in history that we were at the sixth extinction and so many of these animals. So, so I, as a journalist, I felt a sense of Uh, responsibility and a sense of urgency to begin turning my cameras towards those issues to tell a more complete story and to look for solutions. You know, bear in mind, these were not the stories I dreamed about doing.

[00:14:37] I didn't want to make pictures of dead sharks and, you know, shrimp bycatch raining down under a shrimp boat, you know, for every week. pound of shrimp we eat, we might be killing 15 pounds of other animals that have no commercial value and will be thrown back into the sea as trash. You know, I wanted to do the, the sexy stuff, the fun stuff, the exciting stuff, but, but I couldn't do that.

[00:14:56] You know, I have two daughters at home and I care about the future. And I felt like, You know, this, this little kid from a, a blue collar, uh, family, you know, my mother didn't graduate high school, you know, I was, I was somehow the universe accelerated me to this place to be able to, to do these interesting things.

[00:15:16] And I felt that I was given a chance to tell stories that, you know, even National Geographic wasn't really telling in those days. And I also was inspired by my terrestrial counterparts. There were photographers. At the magazine who were doing stories about the environment in Africa and other places and I was seeing what they were doing and I said, well, we need to be doing that in the ocean.

[00:15:38] We live on an ocean planet, you know, 98 percent of Earth's biosphere where life can exist is ocean. Every other breath. that we take comes from the sea. So we need to understand the ocean and we need to protect it. And, you know, I, I maintain that with good science and good visual storytelling, people will maybe move in the right direction.

[00:15:59] So I think that's why. And then, you know, as a storyteller, I find myself revisiting a lot of the issues that I began with, but trying to find a new angle. So I might've done that cover story in 2007 about Uh, you know, 100 million sharks being killed and 90 percent of the big fish out of the ocean. It was much doom and gloom.

[00:16:21] But 10 years later, in 2017, I was publishing four consecutive stories, 2016, in National Geographic. To celebrate sharks, I was looking at the most, quote, dangerous top predatory species and showing why they need to be saved, giving sharks a makeover. In that 2007 cover story about global fisheries, I also did a story on solutions about the value of marine protected areas that, you know, there are economic papers that show that if you protect places in your EEZ, in your exclusive economic zone, they will spill over and fishermen will do better and your economy will do better and tourism will benefit.

[00:17:00] So I did a story on New Zealand's marine protected areas. Ten years later, you know, I was Swimming with President Obama as he just created the world's largest marine protected area in the Northwest Hawaiian Islands and created the very first one in the Atlantic Ocean. So, you know, I go back and find ways to revisit these issues because they unfortunately haven't gone away.

[00:17:20] We haven't solved the problems, but we need to keep beating that drum and maybe find more creative ways. 

[00:17:27] So lastly, I would just say. The reason I'm working with James Cameron on my last project, Secrets of the Whales, is because I wanted to do a story about the latest and greatest science that was revealing that whales have cultures much like humans, that they have ancestral traditions.

[00:17:46] This is what science was revealing. So although it was not overtly a conservation story, My secret hope was that it would have that dividend, that it would get people to fall in love with the ocean in a new way because of these families, these mom calf relationships and these ancestral traditions, grandmothers and mothers.

[00:18:06] And as a result, people would want to protect the ocean because now they understand that there are these families in there that are not so different than their own.

[00:18:16] Abigail: You express yourself through images. There's so much backstory to each of these images. What makes just cutting image that, that translates through visual all that you're, you're telling me right now through words?

[00:18:37] Brian Skerry: Right. It's a really great question. Um, you know, I always go back to the. Sort of foundational understanding, the foundational understanding that photography is not objective. It is, it is subjective. So what you like might not be what I like and what I like might not be what you like. And, you know, but at its elemental level, there are certainly certain principles that we at least have to understand, whether it's composition or light or, um, the rule of thirds, you know, not placing every subject dead center in the middle, but then understanding those rules, you can break them as well.

[00:19:20] I, I have always believed that if I shoot 50 frames, 50 still photos of a, of a given subject, and I've Dialed in my light and it's consistent and my composition is good. The reason that one picture gets published instead of the other 49, it comes down to, as the French would say, a certain je a certain something, a certain grace.

[00:19:54] Or gesture that the other ones don't have. So if it's a person, you know, you could be shooting in a, in a, to keep with the French, the, in a Paris cafe, you could be walking down the streets of the Champs Elysees and stop at a cafe and you're photographing people. And, you know, you're making nice frames.

[00:20:10] The light is beautiful. It's late day and you've got some reflections in the glass or whatever, but the person drinking a glass of wine or a cup of coffee just moves their hand a certain way. Or they have a certain smile, or the light catches their eye, and That's the one. All the other ones could be great.

[00:20:28] And if you didn't see that one, maybe those would get published. But if you have a magic frame, that's the thing. So with animals, you know, I'm trying to do that as well. I mean my, my first monograph, which came out in 2011, a coffee table book called Ocean Soul. I came up with that name. Um, kind of as a, as an answer to the question that people would ask me, well, what is it that you most like to photograph?

[00:20:55] And you know, there were photographers who like to work in tropical reefs, and there are those who like cold water, and there are those who like to photograph macro animals or big charismatic megafauna. The truth is, I love it all. I'm interested by everything in nature and in the ocean. And what I'm really trying to capture is what I call the ocean's soul. That certain life force that exudes from animals or places that You just sort of see and feel if, if I can, you know, capture that spirit in a portrait or in their behavior, then I'm on to something and it doesn't happen all the time. It doesn't happen even frequently, but that's really what I'm going for.

[00:21:37] Or it could be, you know, a very, um, as I say, a gruesome picture, you know, in that, that cover story on the global fisheries crisis, I went out to work in the shark fishing industry. World where back then and still today, we're killing 100 million sharks every year or more and I wrestled with the notion of how do I make a photo of a dead shark that will resonate with readers.

[00:22:00] There's still a lot of people who think sharks are villains or bad or they should all be eradicated. So, I made a number of images that were technically fine, but it was this one morning, I jumped in the water in, in the Sea of Cortez in Mexico, and I was swimming along a gill net, this large net that's put out to just capture anything that comes along, and I, I saw a dead thresher shark.

[00:22:23] Now, a thresher shark is a pelagic animal, it has these big, wing like pectoral fins so it can glide through the open ocean, and it had just recently died, so its eye was still open. And as I framed that, scene in my camera's viewfinder, it struck me as a crucifixion. So I sort of positioned myself to really make it look like a crucifixion.

[00:22:44] It ended up being the lead picture in that cover story. And it's gone on to be used by a number of NGOs for, shark finning programs, try to stem that, that problem of shark finning. It wasn't a happy picture by any means, but I was trying to create empathy, uh, for this statistic of so many sharks being killed.

[00:23:02] Abigail: I saw those photos and they were incredibly moving. The bycatch one was just horrific to think of how much quote unquote waste, in Iceland, and here in Maine, we're talking about a hundred percent usage of fish and, and there you're just throwing out all this stuff that frankly could have a purpose, you know, you shouldn't kill for no reason.

[00:23:23] I was wondering how you got the people on the ship. To cooperate with your photography that day because you're basically, critical of what they're doing. How did you maneuver that?

[00:23:35] Brian Skerry: Yeah, that's a really good point. I'm glad you brought that up. Um, you know, the first thing that should be noted is that what they were doing was completely legal. There was

[00:23:46] Abigail: Oh, I understand. Yeah.

[00:23:48] Brian Skerry: illegal about it. And they understood, you know, like when it came to shark fishermen, some of the photos I made for that story back then, right?

[00:23:58] You know, there was a, whatever, a 500 pound mako shark on the beach that they were thinning. It actually had blood dripping down from its eye. It looked like it was crying bloody tears. But I made this photo, uh, I think we published that one as well, of this guy reaching over and cutting off the fin. And In Mexico at that time, again, this was completely legal, they were, there was a certain machismo, they were proud that they had caught this big fish and that they were, you know, making money, that they were being, um, lucrative about this, that that was okay.

[00:24:31] I made no, um, I hid nothing about what I was doing. I was on an assignment for National Geographic Magazine doing a story on the problems of overfishing. And many of these guys that I talked to, mostly guys, they actually said to me that they wished that Mexico at that time would put in some regulations because, they knew that it would be in their best interest to have sharks and other things to catch in the future.

[00:24:57] It was somewhat the tragedy of the commons where if there, if, if it doesn't belong to anyone, then everyone will go out and take and take and take to get theirs. Before they're all gone or before somebody else gets it. But if there were regulations and seasons, but there weren't, these shark fishing camps that I visited, I could go along the, coast of Baja on the West coast or the East coast.

[00:25:18] And there were these, all these little fishing camps and they would be somewhat migratory. They'd move around and go to different places at different times of the year. But there was no season, there was no regulation. You could do this year round. And, , they sort of lamented, they understood that that was the case.

[00:25:33] So it was the same everywhere I went, uh, in only a few cases in my life, have I photographed people who didn't want me there? One was when I went back to do. Another piece on the harp seal hunting and had been given a permit from the Canadian government to observe and photograph the hunt But you know this time I was landing with helicopters out on those ice flows and those hunters that were killing the seals Didn't obviously want me to photograph them So they you know threatened my life and were chasing me down over the ice flows That was it was pretty dicey stuff.

[00:26:03] But but all the other stuff, you know In these countries that I worked in it was never, um, never a problem. They, they welcomed me in. Yeah, kind of surprisingly, but they did.

[00:26:15] Abigail: And do the animals welcome you in?

[00:26:18] Brian Skerry: Huh. Well, that all depends. Um, you know, you tend to remember the most magic moments and I've had more than I can remember. Honestly, I often think of my career as just this long string of extraordinary wildlife encounters, but no, they don't always. Uh, I think. As with anything in nature, you, you have to give it time.

[00:26:41] You have to be very patient. Um, one of the things that National Geographic has given me over the last few decades has been that gift of time, uh, to be able to go and spend weeks or months in a place and sort of acclimate, learn the underwater ecosystem. And. Inevitably, usually, if I spend enough time in a place, animals do warm up to you.

[00:27:08] Um, some places faster than others. You know, the, the most frightening days have always been, um, when I wake up after the most happy day of getting the assignment approved. I write a proposal if it gets approved, um, um, elated that day, but then you wake up the next day and you realize you have to do it. It's daunting when you think about I'm going to travel to some place maybe I've never been before. I'm going to, get off the plane after a day of travel and then I have to get on a boat, go somewhere, jump in the ocean and make National Geographic quality images. And there's only so much I can control.

[00:27:45] I can't control the weather. I can't control the visibility. I can't control the animals. If they are not there or don't interact with me or come close enough, I won't make photographs. I, I have to get usually within a meter. Of animals to make a good photo and in underwater photography, the water is never that clear where you could use a telephoto lens.

[00:28:06] So the animals have to let you into their world and I've been very blessed over these years that if I spend enough time, usually that happens.

[00:28:18] Abigail: Is there an animal in particular that you're attached to?

[00:28:23] Other than your dog.

[00:28:24] Brian Skerry: Yeah, right. My dog Hooper in my chocolate lab. Yeah. Uh, that's for sure. I, I'm, I'm enamored and I get excited and jazzed about everything. I could be out Off the coast of Portsmouth, New Hampshire here, or in Maine, photographing a little nudibranch, uh, and, and just get lost in that world and see this beautiful little sea slug without a shell crawling over a field of what looks like poppies, little pink hydroids, and just be so excited about that. But I, like a lot of people, I guess, am certainly attracted to bigger animals. I love sharks, but having spent a fair amount of time with whales, I think that that's like a whole different level. There's a level of cognition, a level of, uh, curiosity and understanding that really transcends. Many of my other experiences.

[00:29:17] I readily admit that I think all animals have personality. I think a little goby and a little, shrimp or I think all animals have properties and personality and things that we do not understand. I think that's going to be the future of wildlife biology if we survive to study it. But, being in the presence of an orca, being in the presence of an orca.

[00:29:39] Or a sperm whale that is choosing to interact with you, that's looking you in the eye and, and, you know, swimming with you in the middle of the ocean, they could, with two kicks of their tail, leave you in the dust, but they, when they don't, when they actually interact with you, you know, in, in Secrets of the Whales, I had this female orca, um, feeding on stingrays in New Zealand for her family.

[00:30:01] They normally food share, but she came over to me and dropped it in front of me. And then, you know, looked at me as if to say, you know, I'm inviting you to dinner. Aren't you going to eat that, that stingray? I mean, those are moments that are really hard to convey to other people. I mean, I got a picture and the cameraman that was with me filmed me doing it.

[00:30:18] Thank goodness, because it would almost be like a dream otherwise. But I think those, those transcend anything else that I've experienced.

[00:30:28] We're going to take a short break to hear a word from our sponsors.

[00:30:31] Marin skincare 

[00:30:32] Listeners may remember Patrick Breeding, who was on our show last year to talk about Marin Skin Care and its clinically proven formula that uses glycoproteins from Maine lobsters to treat eczema and dry damaged skin. skin.

[00:30:46] This company has since become wildly successful with this lobster lotion and Patrick is inviting listeners to a 20 percent discount on their products by using the coupon code HAPPYPLANET on their website marinskincare. com. I use this product myself and I highly recommend it.

[00:31:04] Oceanovation

[00:31:05] Hey, and I want to give a quick shout out to all of the Blue Economy folks out there. Do not miss the Oceanovation Festival on June 19th and 20th in The Hague, Netherlands. Join over 450 global innovators, investors, and experts transforming the Blue Economy for a healthier ocean. For more information, visit their website oceanovation. 

[00:31:29] //

[00:31:29]  Welcome back to Happy Planet. My guest today is Brian Skerry.

[00:31:33] What a treat to have Brian on our show. As an entrepreneur, I think Brian's story speaks to the power of focus and patience. His fascination with the ocean and diving led unexpectedly to a career in photography. And yet, he didn't actually get a photo published until he was in his thirties.

[00:31:49] You might not know right away how to serve the market you're addressing, but with focus and patience, you can pivot or evolve to find that sweet spot. Sometimes that takes time. Brian also set the stage for our discussion about environmental innovation this season. I thought Brian's highlighting carbon as the most pressing problem to solve was interesting and spoke to the macro issue of ocean acidification, which affects all of the marine and ultimately terrestrial world.

[00:32:19] Brian's proposal for significantly more marine protection areas was also balanced by his pragmatism. Brian's vision includes a future for fishing and other activities so long as they are excluded from these marine protected zones. If you'd like to learn more about Brian, you can join his almost 1 million followers on Instagram, or check out his website at brianscary.

[00:32:40] com. We'll have more information as well in our show notes. 

[00:32:45] Abigail: Is there one image or story that you think most epitomizes the crisis that we're facing right now on the planet?

[00:32:52] Brian Skerry: Hmm. Well, that's a good one. Um, I think that. That Global Fisheries story back in 2007 was focused just on overfishing. So there, for me, there is no one story. Um, because that one, as best that we could, I spent two years in the field working on that. And I had a friend of mine, another colleague, Randy Olson, who did a lot of the surface photography in different locations.

[00:33:23] So, you know, the combined effort really produced a um, A pretty thorough story on a lot of these issues, but you're never going to get them all. I've done other stories on endangered species from, you know, North Atlantic right whales to, um, leatherback sea turtles and other animals. I've looked at plastics, I've looked at coral reef, uh, destruction, I've gone to some of the most remote places in the world to show what the most pristine reefs that still remain on earth look like, but I don't think there's a single story that sort of encapsulates all of these things, you know.

[00:33:59] The ocean, sadly, is dying a death from more than a thousand cuts. There are so many things that we are doing. And, you know, you could do volumes on the destruction, um, that's occurring. So, you know, in a magazine story, you're, you're never going to be able to address that many. It would be exhausting, I think, for readers to, to try to get through that.

[00:34:24] Abigail: So You know, we speak to a lot of entrepreneurs in this and through my work outside of this podcast, I work with a lot of climate driven entrepreneurs and, and I'm interested are, from your perspective, do you think that there is. There are priorities that we should be addressing, like, you know, we've got pollution, we've got carbon issues, we've got overfishing, we've got biodiversity issues, we've got warming water issues, I mean, we've got it all.

[00:34:56] Brian Skerry: Right.

[00:34:58] Abigail: Do you think, from your perspective, the animals that you're seeing, what are the most immediate threats?

[00:35:05] Brian Skerry: Hmm. Well, you framed that really nicely. And you're right. They're all urgent. And if it weren't for. So many, any one would be the priority, but I have come to the belief that, that climate and carbon is the most urgent. Um, you know, I mentioned earlier that, that we live on an ocean planet. If you look at it from space, we can see that about 72 percent of earth's surface is water, is ocean, 98 percent of the biosphere. Where life can exist is ocean and every other breath that we take comes from the sea regardless of where you live. That's because the ocean is the greatest carbon sink on the planet. It takes in carbon and it gives us back oxygen. We know that rainforests and trees do this, but the ocean does it on a much grander scale simply because this is an ocean planet.

[00:36:08] Our weather, our currents, and economies, and commerce, and Ecotourism and everything. Um, so many things are directly tied to the ocean. So if you live in the middle of Nebraska, the middle of the Sahara Desert, you are tied directly to the ocean. Yet we have expelled so much carbon, largely from the burning of fossil fuels, that we are literally changing the ocean's chemistry.

[00:36:39] We It is absorbed so much carbon that it is becoming higher in pH. It is becoming acidic. There is a thing called ocean acidification, which means that the pH, pH levels are rising in seawater. And what that means is that it is, the seawater is now eroding so many things that live in the ocean, particularly things that are made of calcium or anything similar to calcium.

[00:37:08] So What's made of calcium? Well, coral reefs are made of calcium. So coral reefs are being eroded by the ocean itself now because, you know, it's in, in many cases, it's like a sponge that has become saturated with water, it can take on no more. Well, if it, we're putting so much carbon in there. It's elevating that, that acidity level.

[00:37:31] Uh, all the little animals like krill or copepods, many of these are baseline sources of protein for everything that lives in the ocean, from, you know, larval lobsters that spend the first 30 days of their life here in the Gulf of Maine swirling around in the water column before they settle. The thing that they like to eat most These are Callinus copepods and giant whales, the right whales eat them and blue whales eat krill and all of these things, but all of those things have a little exoskeleton that is very fragile.

[00:38:04] So those little baby lobsters those little larvae lobsters now are being eroded by the sea itself they're they're released by their mothers and immediately their fragile little shells are being attacked by ocean acidification so I think that. Um. The most urgent problem then would be trying to lower our emissions, lower the amount of carbon that we're putting out there and, and simultaneously protecting more places in the ocean so that they have the ability and resilience to To process that carbon and fight back.

[00:38:46] We know it has been proven scientifically that climate stability can be achieved through marine conservation. Scientists told us long ago that we need to protect somewhere between 30 and 40 percent of the most dynamic places in the ocean. to have a healthy future, to have air to breathe and food to eat.

[00:39:06] Yet today, depending how you look at it, we might be at less than 5 percent of the ocean that has been protected. So, you know, we still have another 25 or 35 percent to go. And these places are disappearing because of carbon and because of overfishing and because of plastics and extraction and mining and drilling and all of these things.

[00:39:31] We're losing. We need to create investment banks in the ocean, places that are locked up and no extraction is allowed. You're not allowed to fish there. You're not allowed to You know, mine there, you're not allowed to drill there, but these places will pay dividends. It's been proven. There are scientific papers that show the economic value.

[00:39:52] If you create a marine protected area. Um, the animals don't know where the boundaries are and they will spill over the lobsters, the fish, the old females will produce more eggs and have more babies and you know that spills over so the fishermen will benefit, but you're also processing carbon you're processing climate, you know, your, your sequence, you're creating carbon sequestration, the kelp forest will return they will come back and and do what they do and you know it's it's a fine balanced.

[00:40:24] Transcribed engine, a machine that we have removed all the pieces from and can no longer function.

[00:40:32] Abigail: So on the subject of carbon, because it's a big one on this podcast, we had a lot of, a lot of innovation in the carbon market, like, you know, people are trying to sink seaweed in the name of, of, sequestering carbon, but we don't really know what the long term effects, effects of deep sea carbon sinking is, you know, we're drilling for more lithium in, you know, in this C for car batteries.

[00:40:57] So we don't, you know, have more, more, uh, CO2 emissions. I mean, it seems like we want to save the ocean, um, from carbon, but we are also using it as a way to save it. It by means we're not that may or may not help or actually make the problem worse. How do

[00:41:17] Brian Skerry: Yeah. It is a

[00:41:18] conundrum, isn't it? I mean, you know. We are. Yeah, we collectively humans are trying to move in those more, um, less carbon emitting devices and electric cars and so forth. But they they come with huge costs as well. Um, you know, leave that part to the engineers. I guess it's a little bit out of my wheelhouse, but I will say that at a minimum, we need to get to 30%.

[00:41:47] Of marine protected areas in the ocean. If we do that. I mean, it's like a human body. Uh, if you get a get the flu virus, uh, and your body is healthy. Otherwise, you have the resiliency to fight that to combat it. And, you know, you'll come out. Okay. Most most times, but in in the ocean, it's the same way. You know, if the if the ecosystem is healthy, And it starts to get more frequent and more severe climate heating waves and so forth up to a point, it can fight those infections.

[00:42:22] If they're on a coral reef, if there are predators, if there are planktivores, if there are herbivores, if there are all these different things that work in harmony with each other. the ecosystem can fight off. It's when you've taken all the sharks and the grouper and the snapper, and now it starts getting choked by algae and the herbivores aren't there to control it and so forth.

[00:42:44] Now you're running into problems. So the best thing we can do, uh, as we move forward and immediately is to protect 30 percent of the ocean. And I would argue for no take marine reserves, places that are fully no take, not Places where you can, you know, fish most of the year, maybe not just at spawning season or something.

[00:43:06] I think we need fully no take marine reserves, and we need at least 30 percent of the ocean. And if today we're at 4 or 3 or 5%, Clearly that is not enough. If then we have to do other things in the ocean. Um, I am not a proponent of ocean mining, but if that's what we need to do to pick up some nodules here and there, maybe we can do that in a in a, you know, good way.

[00:43:31] That's not overly damaging again. A lot of debate about that. A

[00:43:35] Abigail: Yeah. No, no, no. Okay. I get it.

[00:43:36] Brian Skerry: So, you know, I think the first step in our multi step program here is to protect it. All that remains healthy till we get to 30%. Good ecosystems, kelp forests, you know, places here in the Gulf of Maine, Cache's Ledge. It's, it's this beautiful, uh, kelp forest, 90 miles off, 80 miles off the coast of Maine that is like a little oasis.

[00:43:58] It still has It still has kelp. It still has codfish. It still has pollock and herring. Puffins feed there. Whales feed there. And it, it is not protected permanently. So we need permanent protection for that place so that it can help control climate and spill over and give us more things. So that's the first thing.

[00:44:16] Then, you know, figure out how we approach everything that's not protected in terms of extraction or whatever we need to do. I mean, I'd like to think that We get to a point where we, we don't need to drill in the ocean for oil or lithium or whatever it might be. Um, but you know, again, that, that's, that's a, maybe a heavier lift at the moment.

[00:44:39] Abigail: So, you know, I was a, an oyster farmer for over a decade here in Maine, and, and Most of our pollution closures came from land.

[00:44:52] Brian Skerry: Hmm.

[00:44:53] Abigail: Can we have these marine closure protection areas without, are they far enough from land? I mean, can we get to that number without addressing what we're doing on land that's coming right down into the ocean?

[00:45:09] Brian Skerry: Yeah, boy, that's a really good, good point. I don't know. I mean, I I'm aware of those things and I certainly know that there are, uh, Nitrogen credit programs, you, you're probably well aware of that with oysters, where there are companies who have oyster beds here in Maine and, um, are selling nitrogen credits to municipalities when they have runoff, uh, that I was told that the EPA finds municipalities that Appreciate it.

[00:45:42] Cannot process wastewater when there's a rain event, and all of that stuff flows out into the sea, you know, a city like Portland, perhaps that just doesn't have the land or resources to build a big waste water treatment or treatment water plant. That they end up paying fines, but again, I don't know all the the economics of this, but that the EPA finds it there.

[00:46:05] There's some sort of fund. I was told, um, but that, you know, entrepreneurs now or are growing oysters that help process as filter feeders that nitrogen and they can. Um, be paid, you know, sell credits for that if they put them right near shore to process that nitrogen. Um, so that's sounds great. I, again, I don't know the science of, of all of that and how much gets processed and how many oysters it would take and how much rainfall and outfall, you know, I think there's a lot of devil in the details there.

[00:46:39] Um, and then like you say, how far out what, you know, if the, even if you do have all these oyster beds or. Mollusks that are processing some of that, are they getting it all? You know, if you go a mile out, is there's still evidence? I, I would have to think there probably is, but you know, again, I, I don't know the science on that.

[00:46:57] I just know that, um, it's, it's allegedly being addressed and I don't know, uh, to what degree.

[00:47:06] Abigail: Thank you. Thank you for your, um, for sharing these. I know these are hard things to discuss and, and there's, it's really hard to find a right answer. I'm gonna change direction here a little bit. If you weren't a photographer of the ocean, what would you be taking, photos of? Or would you be a photographer at all?

[00:47:25] Brian Skerry: Ah, yeah. You know, um, don't know that I've ever really thought about that, but. I'm not sure I would be a photographer at all. Um, you know, my inspiration was to be an ocean explorer. I was a diver before I was a photographer. I just wanted to, to explore the ocean and then discovered photography was the way that, um, I wanted to do that.

[00:47:52] So, Had it not been for diving, I'm not sure that I would have. You know, I wasn't a kid that wanted a camera for my sixth birthday. Uh, you know, I wanted a snorkel, uh, and a mask so I could pretend I was Jacques Cousteau in the backyard swimming pool. Um, so maybe not. But that being said, you know, having been shooting pictures for over 40 years and underwater mostly, um, I have.

[00:48:21] I've become in love with photography. I, I marvel at my colleagues who street photography or terrestrial wildlife and so forth. And I see myself gravitating to some of those things, you know, I've, I've lived in Maine now for over six years. I love Maine. I'm fascinated by terrestrial wildlife here as much as I am in the ocean.

[00:48:45] Almost exactly one week ago today. It was a week ago. Yesterday, actually, I get up in the morning. My dog was barking. I thought, you know, he was looking out the window at some deer, which we often have, but I came down to see a bobcat walking across my backyard. And it was, I've always wanted to see a bobcat and never had until then.

[00:49:05] And it was just this beautiful animal very proud and strong just kind of trotting across my backyard and You know, in the days since, I'm, I'm inundated with work, but in the evening, you know, late, I'm, I'm looking on YouTube for bobcat videos from Maine or, or lynxes and so forth. And I can imagine myself, you know, taking some time and doing these projects about the animals here in Maine or in New England.

[00:49:31] Uh, or, you know, I've been, I've, I've got colleagues all over the world, in Africa and so forth, doing stuff in these places that I dream about doing. So I think. My photography, um, is certainly expanding. I, I will always be an ocean photographer as long as I can and will continue because, you know, I've built, um, and learned so much on the years past and I want to continue that because every time I go in the water I, I see something new and I think there's endless stories and important stories to be told.

[00:50:02] But for, for my other interests, um, I'd love to be doing other kinds of photography.

[00:50:08] Abigail: Nice. So what do you have on the works that we should be keeping an eye out for?

[00:50:12] Brian Skerry: Hmm. Well, um, you know, by pure serendipity, uh, just prior to COVID in 2019, I finally proposed the story to National Geographic about the Gulf of Maine, my native waters where I began diving, you know, 46 years ago. And I'd long wanted to do a story on the Gulf of Maine, but always kind of put it on the back burner.

[00:50:34] I was doing all these other stories and ones we talked about. But finally In, you know, I forget what year it was exactly, maybe 17. I read this paper by Andy Pershing at the Gulf of Maine Research Institute that stated that the Gulf of Maine was the epicenter of global ocean climate change, that it is warming 99 percent faster than the rest of the global ocean.

[00:50:59] And. Uh, that things were changing rapidly because of that that, you know, many of the iconic species that we have come to know and love like lobster might not be here in the time ahead. So I talked to my photo editor at the time and I said, you know, I think the time is right to finally do, uh, that story on the Gulf of Maine.

[00:51:19] And I think it should really be centered as a climate change story. I said, I want to still photograph all the animals that still remain and, and show the beauty and the diversity that exists in this, this place. But I think we should also give visual context to how it's changing because of this anthropogenic climate change that we're seeing.

[00:51:40] And then look at, you know, coastal communities and how they might be pivoting to mitigate the economic damage, whether that's aquaculture or harvesting invasive species or whatever. So for the last four years, I've been able to work locally. Um, you know, I got myself a little boat and here in York and I, you know, go out when I can, and I've been chipping away at it.

[00:52:01] I've been up and down the coast. And of course, the Gulf of Maine is not just Maine. It, it extends from Cape Cod, Massachusetts, up through Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, in Canada, it crosses two countries, many states, but it is New a body of water that in many ways is unique in the world. Um, it, it is influenced by a mix of currents as, as if you were building this perfect cake and you needed all the right ingredients and you needed upwellings from the deep ocean with nutrients and you needed the Gulf Stream and the Labrador and a counter clockwise.

[00:52:36] coastal main current, and then you needed seasonal stratification that comes from being in a temperate location, and you needed a watershed with all these rivers flowing in, and you mix all these ingredients, you shake and bake it just right, and you end up with this proliferation of life that in no small way fostered the colonization of America with the Basques and the Portuguese coming over in the 14th and 15th century that built these codfish aristocracies in New England.

[00:53:04] But today We're at 1 percent of codfish levels. We've wiped out 99 percent of them. And now we've got climate that is literally. changing ecosystems before my eyes. We're losing kelp forests. We're seeing invasive species. We're, we're seeing all these animals that I hope to photograph. We're far and few between.

[00:53:27] Uh, they're just not here anymore. I don't see wolffish. I don't see sea anemones, invertebrates, starfish, sea stars, just really hard to find. So

[00:53:37] Abigail: We see that on the beach.

[00:53:38] Brian Skerry: You see it on the beach, that's right. So this story will be out in the, in the June issue of, uh, National Geographic magazine. And I was also working over the last few years On a similar project for television, um, for, for PBS, uh, it'll be a three part television series, um, that'll come out on as a special series on NOVA about the Gulf of Maine.

[00:54:03] And that's, uh, the first episode is, uh, scheduled to air on July 24th. And then it'll be two subsequent issues, uh, uh, episodes, I should say. Um, so two independent projects, not related. From a business standpoint, but both about similar subjects and I, I helped create that PBS one and I served as a producer.

[00:54:24] So, um, and director for the underwater natural history. So, anyway, um, those are two stories that projects that will be upcoming and, um, and I'm in development on several more that, um, hopefully will come to fruition here.

[00:54:39] Abigail: Well, we'll be looking out for it. I have two quick questions to wrap this up. Are you optimistic about the future and our ability to stay ahead of this climate change conundrum?

[00:54:51] Brian Skerry: That is the 64, 000 question, isn't it? Um. I would say I become a little less optimistic every day. Um, but I find hope in a couple of places. One is that nature, Has many times surprised me and and I see things happening that I couldn't have predicted. And I also find hope in in people, especially young people, you know, when I lecture to universities or even schools, young people really get it.

[00:55:27] And I think if if the environment can hang on long enough for some of these next generation. People to, to take the helm and, and, you know, be in charge, then we've got a chance. I, I, I think I'm Pessimistic about preserving it all. I think what we'll end up with are probably pockets of biodiversity and places where things are kind of like they used to be.

[00:55:54] But, you know, I think sea level rise is a real thing. I think we're going to see that in big

[00:55:59] Abigail: Oh, yeah,

[00:56:00] Brian Skerry: uh, in the, in the time ahead, uh, coastal destruction, climate refugees, uh,

[00:56:05] Abigail: we just all live through it where we live.

[00:56:07] Brian Skerry: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think, you know, there's a lot of, um, problems that are on our doorstep right now. We're already experiencing them.

[00:56:15] They will probably continue to happen. Um, but, you know, I decided long ago, we have two choices. We can either, crawl up in the fetal position in the corner and give up or we can fight. And I choose to fight. Uh, with science and with visual storytelling and with like minded people and trying to spread that word to everyone, uh, not in a preachy way, but with evidence.

[00:56:41] And maybe, you know, if enough of us band together, we, we will have hope for the future.

[00:56:49] Abigail: beautiful. And do you have any pearls of wisdom for entrepreneurs that are really focused on the environment today?

[00:56:56] Brian Skerry: Well, I do think, that it's a real opportunity. I think there are. Great opportunities for people to be entrepreneurial. You mentioned a company that's, you know, sequestering carbon in, kelp that they're bringing these buoys out and, and letting them grow and then sink again, we need to, you know, due diligence, I suppose we the world on, on the, the science of all of that, but assuming that works, that could be a really Absolutely.

[00:57:22] Great game changer. I've got a neighbor of mine who we feature both in the story and the documentary series. He was the high school marine biology teacher in in my town here and he, he left his job to be an entrepreneur to start a green crab business green crabs and invasive species that has been in the Gulf of Maine and New England, since the 1800s came over in the bilge water of ships long ago but was kept relatively in check because of cold winters.

[00:57:51] Now we don't have those cold winters. So these are, you know, populating like crazy. They're very destructive. They destroy estuaries and seagrass. They eat little clams. So the second biggest fishery in Maine is clams and they're destroying that. But he figured out a way with some scientists to predict when they molt.

[00:58:10] These are a big delicacy in Venice, Italy, where they serve soft shell green crabs, but nobody had been able to figure it out here. He's onto it. He's doing this. He's working with a 26 year old, like, fifth generation lobsterman here in Maine, and they started a green crab business. So they're just in the early stages, but, you know, I look at these things and I say, You know, humans find a way, they, they find a way to, to, to be profitable and that's the only thing that's probably ever saved us is that if there's money to be made and people can, you know, profit from it.

[00:58:42] But I think we have to do things differently than we did in the last century or two, and we're doing it so yeah I find hope there too.

[00:58:50] Abigail: Me too. And hence the podcast. I want to spread that hope. Thank you so much, Brian. I mean, I just, I'm so, it was so lovely to have you on. I've learned so much from you and I just think that, that, um, listeners are going to really enjoy this. 

[00:59:05] Brian Skerry: Well, it has been my pleasure. I could talk all day, but, um, but I think, I think this will be enough for the first go around. So thank you so much. Um, keep rocking and, um, I'll look forward to our next conversation.

[00:59:17] me too.

[00:59:19] Abigail_VO: What a treat to have Brian on our show as an entrepreneur, I think Brian's story speaks to the power of focus and patience. His fascination with the ocean led to a career in photography. And yet he didn't actually get a photo published until he was in his thirties. You might not know right away how to serve the market you're addressing, but with focus and patience, you can pivot or evolve to find the sweet spot.

[00:59:44] Sometimes that takes time. 

[00:59:46] Brian also set the stage for our discussion about environmental innovation, the season. I thought Brian's highlighting carbon is the most pressing problem to solve as interesting. And it speaks to the macro issue of ocean acidification, which affects all of the Marine and ultimately terrestrial world. His proposal for significantly more Marine protection areas was also balanced by his pragmatism.

[01:00:09] His vision included a future for fishing and other activities so long as they are executed in areas outside of these precious Marine protected zones. If you want to learn more about Brian, you can join his almost 1 million followers on Instagram, or check out his website@wwwbrianskerry.com. 

[01:00:29] We'll have all of this information in our show notes as well. 

[01:00:34] Thank you once again for listening, please follow happy planet wherever you tune in and leave us a rating and review it does help. New listeners discover the show happy planet was reported and hosted by me, Abigail Carroll. 

[01:00:46] I am also the executive producer, the talented Josie Holtzman as our producer and editor composer. George Brando EG. Gloss created our theme music. Learn more about my work and get in touch by visiting happy planet podcast.com.