Conferencing in 2022 requirements = scientist, graphic designer and video editor

After a delay to the 2021 Society of Marine Mammalogy (SMM) conference - next week kicks off one of the biggest dates in the marine mammal calendar, the SMM conference.

The last time the worlds marine mammal scientists gathered in person was in a pre covid world in Barcelona in 2019. This years conference is a delay from last year and set to be a hybrid event. In Barcelona I had just enrolled on my PhD and presented work on behalf of the SouSA Consortium. My first ever conference saw me presenting to over 2000 people in person, in front of many of my peers and childhood idols. It was a sink or swim moment and set the bar high right at the start of my PhD career. Luckily I somehow pulled it off and didn't bottle it - I ended up winning the Judges Discretionary award for my presentation which is still a highlight of my career to date.

Three years later and I'm presenting work on my first chapter. Whistling behaviour of humpback dolphins in South Africa, the first stepping stone to our SWORD project and setting the ground work for all future work.

The conference this year is in Florida and due to a very very busy schedule here in SA the Sea Search team will be joining virtually, with the SA hub tuning in for the morning plenaries next week (at a much more agreeable time of 2pm!) with lots of coffee and pastries on hand.

My poster is below and this year they have also asked for an accompanying video to emulate our 3 min in person poster presentations. So I've been dusting off my graphic design skills, as well as my video editing skills to present the culmination of the first part of my project to the marine mammal world.

I hope you enjoy reading all about the work I've been up to over the last few years and I'm looking forward to the next stage - using this whistling information to monitor individual humpback dolphins throughout their South African range. Watch this space!