How can historical documents – and historians - help manage our oceans in a sustainable way?
We need to look after the biodiversity, fish stocks, and habitats in our seas. The relatively modern scientific discipline of marine biology is fundamental to providing the evidence we need, but it can only give us a limited, decades-long perspective. Yet humans have been harvesting the seas – and recording valuable written information about marine life – for many centuries, but these sources often remain in the realm of historians, and are often overlooked by scientists. This talk will demonstrate how marine biologists and historians can work together and use historical documents to inform sustainable management and recovery of our oceans, with examples from Welsh waters.