My first first-authored paper is OUT TODAY in @ScienceAdvances titled ‘Overfishing and habitat loss drives range contraction of iconic marine fishes to near extinction’ https://bit.ly/GreatSawfishSearch 1/n

Sawfishes are among the most threatened families of marine fishes in the world: 3 species are listed as Critically Endangered and 2 are Endangered on the @IUCNRedList #ProtectSawfish #extinction PC: @spottedcatshark 2/n

Following the publication of the Global Sawfish Conservation Strategy in 2014 by @IUCNShark ( https://bit.ly/3tNqHez ), a collaborative international effort to study sawfishes took-off from 2014-2019 #GreatSawfishSearch 3/n

These activities included ongoing research efforts and targeted sawfish searches to determine the current status of sawfish occurrence in each nation. In total, we documented 251 activities from 64 nations #GreatSawfishSearch 4/n

Historically, sawfishes were found in 90 nations. We found that they are now #extinct in 46 of these nations (=51%). 5/n

We used a suite of modelling approaches grounded in dynamic geography theory to predict the probability of #extinction in the 42 data-deficient nations. To do this, we used indicators of fishing pressure, management capacity, and ecological carrying capacity. 6/n

We found that fishing pressure strongly decreased the probability that sawfishes were present, despite the fact that habitat availability was high. Thus, #overfishing and habitat loss are driving sawfish populations toward #extinction 7/n

On top of the 46 nations where sawfishes are confirmed to be extinct, we predict that they are also extinct in 9 additional nations, meaning that sawfishes are extinct in 60% of their former range 8/n

But it’s not all bad news! At least one species is still present in 38 nations. We predict that they are also present in eight data-deficient nations, which we highlight as priorities for research and protections. #ProtectSawfish 9/n

The protection of sawfishes in the 38 nations where they are present + 8 suggested nations would amount to the protection of more than 70% of their historical distribution #ProtectSawfish 10/n

Reducing sawfish fishing mortality could reduce the global extinction risk by up to 21%. We need national bans on killing & retaining sawfishes, programs to prevent catches, max. post-release survival, and to protect habitats to bring them back from the brink of #extinction 11/n

We couldn’t have done this work without the support of local, small-scale fishers @IUCNShark @SharkRayFund @GeorgiaAquarium @officialdwazoo @NSERC_CRSNG @SFU_Science & others, for which we are eternally grateful 12/n

TLDR: check out the press release in English, French, and Spanish here: http://bit.ly/PR_GreatSawfishSearch 13/13

Sawfishes are in the @nytimes! @ljevanso does an excellent job covering our paper, referring to sawfishes as 'hedge trimmers with fins'! #ProtectSawfish #GreatSawfishSearch https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/10/science/sawfish-extinction-conservation.html

And of course celebratory CHAMPAGNE (not my usual go-to fizzy wine) courtesy of my mentor through this project @NickDulvy