Swirling Currents: Controversy, Compromise, and Dynamic Coastal Change

Swirling Currents tells the story behind the headlines. Sharks chasing seals chasing fish. Highly endangered right whales getting closer to their demise. Hundreds of cold-stunned sea turtles on frigid Cape Cod beaches. Fishing industry reduced to harvest by quotas as shellfish aquaculture skyrockets. The Gulf Stream, driving the world’s climate, slowing down and the Gulf of Maine heating up faster than predicted with potentially grave global consequences. Swirling Currents describes what led to controversies, compromises and hope for the future as we live with dynamic coastal change.

Sandy Macfarlane has lived her entire life by the sea. Like many kids, she grew up loving the water and her curiosity about all things marine, begun in youth, continues. Aided by forty years of hands-on experience in resource evaluation, policy and management and decades of recreational rowing in a fixed-seat skiff, she learned about the biological and physical world around her. In the process, she also gained insight into the social, political and economic landscape of coastal communities. She is past-president of the New England Estuarine Research Society and a member of numerous professional societies and community outreach organizations. Swirling Currents is her third book.