Saving the Ocean

Lionfish are beautiful, colorful reef fish found throughout the Indian and Pacific oceans — that’s the good news. The bad news is they’re now found all over the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic coasts of North and South America as well. Alien to those waters, lionfish are the perfect invasive species — aggressive, without predators, prolific breeders and tolerant of a wide range of conditions.

In the rich fishing grounds of New England and Canada, it seemed as if cod would never run out — until they did. Fishing communities from Newfoundland to Massachusetts fell apart. Widespread closures in the 1990s aimed to let the cod recover, but it’s been a long wait. Carl Safina goes fishing to find some of the first signs that the famous codfish just might, indeed, be coming back.

After local leaders launched a crusade to end the slaughter of Trinidad’s thousand-pound leatherback turtles, the turtles were transformed from shark bait to tourist attraction. Now Trinidad’s beaches support 80 percent of the entire Caribbean’s leatherbacks and nearby villages make a great living catering to the visitors.

The conclusion of this two-part episode examines the huge project now restoring the Nisqually River, from its source on Mount Rainier to the estuary in Puget Sound. Led by the Nisqually Indian tribe, the restoration aims to fill the river once again with abundant, magnificent wild salmon.

This two-parter examines the huge project now restoring the Nisqually River, from its source on Mount Rainier to the estuary in Puget Sound. Led by the Nisqually Indian tribe, the restoration aims to fill the river once again with abundant, magnificent wild salmon.

In the second part of this two-part special, Carl Safina goes to sea with some of the last remaining swordfish harpooners to experience firsthand one of the world’s most sustainable fisheries and to find out why swordfish are the world’s best big-fish comeback story.

In a two-part special, Carl Safina goes to sea with some of the last remaining swordfish harpooners to experience firsthand one of the world’s most sustainable fisheries and to find out why swordfish are the world’s best big-fish comeback story.

This is the remarkable story of how local fishing people in Baja California, Mexico, stopped hunting “devil-fish” - actually gray whales - and instead developed a whale-watching co-op that now caters to tourists from all over the world. They’re also getting rich by setting fishing rules for themselves that are stricter than the government regulations.

"The Sacred Island" takes viewers to Zanzibar, off the East African coast, where local villagers fought a resort development in their pristine reefs and lagoons through a combination of activism, education, and regulation.

Shark Reef profiles innovative efforts to protect sharks from the devastating effects of the global shark fin trade.