Behind the Mic: Exploring Shark Conservation with Mark Packer

0:00 This is a bonus episode here on the Beyond Jaws podcast as we bring you every once in a while when we see some pretty cool people doing some pretty cool things, we like to have them on and talk to them. And although we may not be able to get them for an entire hour like we normally do and dive into their career just yet, we wanna highlight some of the things that they've been able to accomplish so quickly in their career and a particular project or a report. In this case, This is a podcast on podcasting. We're gonna be talking to Mark Packer from the Shark Trust, who they just launched a podcast. They just finished up their first series of the Shark Trust podcast, talking about everything that Shark Trust does, and it's an amazing podcast, and we wanted to have him on to be able to talk about why it started, why they're doing it, how they're doing it, how it's going, and when their next series starts. So we're gonna talk about that on this episode of the Beyond Us podcast. Let's start the show. Hey, everybody, welcome back to another exciting episode of the Beyond Jaws podcast. This is a bonus episode, and we're going to be talking to Mark Packer of the Shark Trust, talking about their podcast, the Shark Trust podcast. And I'm here, I'm your co-host, Andrew Lewin, and I'm here with my co-host, Dr. David Ebert.

1:13 Absolutely. I love, I love when these podcasts come out like this. And of course, you know, people, Paul Cox, Allie Hood, and Kat Gordon are all, you know, good friends of the show here. And, uh, I saw this podcast popped up. I thought we got to have, we got to have Mark on here to talk about, talk about podcasting. Cause it's like our favorite topic to talk about. And, uh, it's another, it's another wonderful show they have out another, another terrific podcast. And, uh, uh, it was, uh, it was a terrific interview and, uh, uh, Mark had a lot to say. And so we're hoping everybody will enjoy this, uh, this bonus episode, getting it, doing a bit of dive into Absolutely. This is going to be a lovely one. I hope that you guys are going to enjoy it. So here's the interview with Mark Packer from the Shark Trust talking about the Shark Truck podcast, Shark Trust podcast. Sorry.

2:02 Enjoy the interview and we'll talk to you after. Hey, Mark. Welcome to the Beyond Jaws podcast. Are you ready to talk about sharks and podcasting? Right on. Well, welcome. Welcome, everyone, to a special bonus episode of the Beyond Jaws podcast. Today we have Mark Packer, who's the host of the Shark Trust podcast. It's a new podcast that was recently launched in May of this year, and it delves behind the scenes of shark and ray conservation. Mark is a marine conservation and a qualified nurse specializing in mental health, which those of us in the field could use a lot of mental health help here. But he has a huge passion for the natural world with a focus on the marine environment and sharks in particular. Mark received his MSc in marine conservation from the University of Plymouth in 2021. And he started with the Shark Trust in 2022, covering a number of different roles from fundraising to engagement and science communication. And most recently now, the new Shark Trust podcast. And Mark has an aim to drive positive change at the intersection of environmental and mental well-being, benefiting both people and the sharks. And So how, I have to ask you though, how did you get interested in, in marine conservation and sharks in particular? How'd Um, I think probably quite, um, similar to a lot of people who, who work in natural sciences. Um, my kind of passion came from childhood.

3:35 So when I was a kid, um, I was watching Steve Irwin, Steve Baxall on TV and I kind of loved the natural world. I always had a sister who would like take us out in the garden, looking for like newts and frogs and slow worms. So I kind of always had it in my mind as something I was really interested in. Um, but then when it came to studying and at school, it wasn't necessarily something that was on my radar cause I was like. I'm probably not smart enough to do that. There's no, I grew up in a little village in the countryside, like there's no sharks or sea near me. So I was like, I'm not gonna be doing that. So instead I went into nursing. um worked in that for a number of years um and i did absolutely love it um and then i was running a half marathon and i saw a guy who was also running it he ran for the shark trust he's now my boss we know him a bit yeah so i kind of learned a bit more about sharks i started following the shark trust um Learn more and more about it and I was like they are so cool. Like I always liked shots when I was a kid I had a book that I'd read Weekly, so I was kind of obsessed. I just didn't really know that they were in the trouble that they are in So kind of learning about that. I then became a bit more passionate about it and then I Yeah. In 2021, I think it's just after like working as a nurse during COVID and

5:06 I was like, I just want to do something that I enjoy and something that I'm really passionate about. Uh, and yeah, I went back to university, studied marine conservation and, uh, And so, and this all came from like, you were out doing a half marathon. You, you yeah yeah yeah and then um i went to fundraise for the shark trust a couple years later uh and i'm quite competitive like young guy i was like oh i'm gonna do really well at here and i still remember at mile 10 when paul and his wife overtook me and i was just like like no like i'm not saying paul's old but he's older than me i was like i was like trying to catch up with him trying to talk to him to So did you guys like did you guys hatch the plan right there? It's like I'm gonna go back to school and when I come out Yeah, you got a job at the shark just how We kind of kept in touch a little bit like we've followed him on social media I'd message every now and again and then I The shark, so the marine conservation course at the University of Plymouth, they have like a, like almost like a dragon's den bit at the end. So people from different organizations will come in. You have to create like a fake NGO basically, like with other people in your cohort and then people who lead actual NGOs come in like and assess it.

6:36 So the course has kind of helped partly designed by people who are already in the industry so you're being taught what is needed. Paul came and gave a couple of talks during that. And the moment I saw him come in, I was like, hey, Paul, do you remember me? It's Mark. I want a job at the end of this. And then, funnily enough, so I was still nursing during the master's. I was still working full time as a nurse, just because you got to work to kind of- Yeah, for sure. Yeah, you got to work, yeah. But the course is like full-time during the week, so I was working night shifts and then in Paul's workshops and I've just been like, I want a job here at the end of it.

7:22 I fell asleep in both of his. Oh no! But luckily, the bits where I was awake, I showed enough passion and dedication that he was like, yeah, I still want you on my team. You know joining a joining a team like the shark trust, you know, it's a it's a great nonprofit organization You know you coming out with this this masters in in marine conservation Did you just be like was there jobs available or did you kind of go in and be like hey I want to work with you and and you know Paul had the idea or you know people at the shark trust had an idea of a position that they were thinking about had that had it all work out and My kind of end goal was going to be the shark trust like that's always kind of where When I came onto the course, that's where I wanted to be. So I kind of thought If I get there in like five years ten years time, yeah Long-term plan i'm quite happy with that. Um, and when we come to the end of the course, you know You start looking at jobs because you're like, oh i'm gonna need a job in three six months time i'll start looking around yeah i was looking around all these various ones uh and a job actually came up as a fundraising assistant at the chart trust and i was like it might not be my ideal end goal i was like but i'm already working there i'll be learning stuff and then that might set me up in the future to apply for another job within the chart trust uh that can't be more suited to what i wanted in the future And that's basically what happened. I joined and then my job is

8:54 slowly kind of adapted. So I still kind of have that fundraising element, which kind of gives me a lot of skills for the future anyway. I've kind of, I never realized how important fundraising and all the financial planning that, I mean, Paul's doing a CEO, how important that is for a charity and conservation work. So kind of seeing how that works, learning those skills, I think it's been really helpful. And then I've kind of gone into this more kind of outreach engagement and science communication added into that. I For sure. Well, now, and obviously, too, like when you do communication, there is fundraising involved. It's part of the fundraising aspect. I've seen a lot of jobs that come up and it's like, you know, fundraising and communications coordinator or managers, things like that. I mean, it's pretty related, especially when you look at a nonprofit organization, right?

9:44 yeah yeah and i think when so i'd only known paul and i knew of ali from i'd seen her on twitter um at the shark trust so when i applied like i thought the shark trust was like 200 odd people i thought it was this like huge Big organization, like I'm always seen on Twitter. I'm always Seeing like all the things that I do and I thought there were loads of them and then when I joined I was like there's only ten of you like and then you look at everyone's job roles and everyone's doing so much work bits of everything like Yes, I mean it was amazing really but it kind of benefits me a bit So it means I can do a bit of everything and learn all these new skills from everyone, right?

10:26 Yeah. And of course, Paul, he was on the show a while, about a year and a half or so ago, when they had the Sharks International. And he comes from a banking background, actually. And now he's running the Shark Trust. So that had to have been, I think that may have, do you think that may have helped at all? The fact that he didn't go through certainly a traditional trajectory from, to marine conservation, to science, you know, he came from a very different background. Similar to you, but he basically got into following his passion And when I Think so, I think Maybe having that like pool has the outlook. It's not Do you know everything in the world about shots? It's what are your skills? What would that bring to the team right and how can we kind of use it as a whole team? So I think kind of him understanding that I mean, my skills, although I've got a self-taught knowledge of sharks, like I don't have a background in marine biology. or marine sciences, but my skills in mental health nursing is, is how to talk to people. Um, like that was, that was my job for eight years. That's kind of what I specialize in. And he was like, well, if you want to end up in science communication, those are the skills we're going to use. And then he would help develop, help me develop that into science communication, opposed to like therapy and stuff like that. So yeah, I think having those pool, having that different background helped as well. Cause it's kind of like a, figurehead

12:00 like kind of to look up to and you're like if he can do it so can other people and that's actually kind of gone through the shark trust because there's quite a few of us who have now got different backgrounds like whether it's languages or journalism and stuff like that. Yeah, I've said that for years, though. It really helps when you have people from different professional backgrounds come together, especially with a non-profit organization. I mean, having someone as the CEO of a non-profit organization that used to be in banking obviously understands money and understands how to run a business. And I think that's really important. So it'll be important when other people come from different backgrounds and share the same passion when it comes to the Shark Trust and sharks. So I think that's really great to see. So that's definitely an I think something you said too, Mark, and I know we stress a lot of times when we interview guests on here, particularly younger people listening that are getting started in that, learn skills.

13:00 Because the more skills you have, like I have graduate students come into the program, like at Moss Landing, And I'm like, I can teach you all about sharks. Don't worry about that. I don't care if you don't know anything about sharks when you come in here. What I'm more focused on, and most people will tell you, is what skills do you have? Are you a diver? Can you run a boat? What kind of analytical skills do you have? And even things that you may not think about in the field that just other things that may not seem not relevant to what you're doing, but they actually could have some potential, they could be applicable to the field. So what you said about having skill, I think is really an important point.

13:43 And people listen to this, something to hope they pick up on, like just whatever skills you can learn would be really helpful. And then they can teach about sharks. Speaking of which, have you picked up a lot about sharks since you've been there? More than, I assume you so much so much what i thought the shark world and shark conservation world was was like it was literally like a tip of an iceberg and then there's i mean i still think i'm still on the tip if i'm honest i don't There's a lot to learn. There's definitely a lot to learn. I was the same way. I was not a shark person. I love sharks, but obviously I wasn't specialized in sharks like a lot of the people we've had on this podcast, and of course Dave.

14:31 But you start to learn. You start to pick up a lot, and you learn a lot about different sharks as you go along, even just the amount of different sharks. I mean, talking to this guy who's like the lost shark guy and hearing all the different species that he discovered and knows So you got into your role there with the Shark Trust. How'd How'd that all come about? So, I mean, I've always absolutely loved podcasts. I listen to them constantly, whether it's educational or I could just listen to fictional ones. So I'm like a quite a big podcast kind of lover anyway. When I joined the Shark Trust, I kind of had this view of what marine conservation or shark conservation was. And I thought I knew quite a lot about it, because I thought I was quite informed like on anything like a charity or an organization's releasing, like I'll read their press release, I'll then go and read some like backing papers and stuff they've done. I'm like, I've got the hang of this, like I'm very informed and then when I joined here and just kind of talking to Ali Hood who's been working here like 20 odd years, this huge background and she'll start explaining stuff to me and I'm just like, oh my god, like the depth and complexities of how shark conservation actually works.

15:59 It's ridiculous. And she'll talk to me for hours, she'll be like drawing me diagraphs of how it works, trying to help me understand it. And I was like, if I thought I knew how it worked, and I very clearly didn't, there's probably loads of other people that do as well. And I was like, if we want people to kind of support campaigns, support us in protecting sharks, We can give them more information through the use of podcasts because podcasts can be a lot longer. You can go into a lot more depth and people, if they've had enough, they could click pause and stuff like that. Um, so I was like, this is kind of. More kind of focus for people who want to know more about shark conservation and then they can look at how it actually works behind the scenes and then how they can get more involved. Um, so kind of using. the Shark Trust and the work that they've done to kind of explain how international fisheries work, how you get like a catch limit on a shark, and then how the governments process that, how they agree that, what an exception ends up for another country, how they all work, and how different programs get set up, how we all work together. So the podcast is kind of a way to kind of go into all And so when you have when you have so when you have people what kind of topics do When you have people on like yeah, is it kind of vary or I keep talking about

17:31 some of the different topics You've had so far in some of your episodes So so kind of the first series we kind of did this Kind of focus on the sharp trust so I kind of spoke to each person here about their roles maybe the program that they're focusing on how it works just so they can kind of give us that a that top layer of it and then in the later series we can go kind of more and more in deep detail giving kind of live updates of things that are happening. So like the first episode we're meeting with Paul Cox the CEO who was on here before and he kind of gives this kind of massive overview of the world of shark conservation, how the shark trust works, and kind of the threats that sharks are facing. And then the next episode we kind of go for like this deep dive into international fisheries and policy with Ali Hood, our Director of Conservation. as she's she's got the kind of brain that you want to like plug a usb into and just kind of download it all i just hope that you can get it because when she talks to you you know you're only getting like two percent of of what's in there or probably not even that um and like her episode we actually had to We had to stop it because the cameras were going to run out of battery. You don't want it to stop because she's saying so much stuff and you're just like, give me more, give me more. So we're going to do a couple more episodes and that's still just skimming the surface. so

19:03 many amazing things she talks about in international fisheries and how working with companies to get different protections in kind of works and that's all stuff that you don't necessarily see from the kind of public facing side of shark conservation. And then in episode 3 I talked to Jack Rennick He's kind of our fisheries officer and that kind of goes straight into UK fisheries Kind of like more localized. So Ali's kind of more the international level and the Jets kind of comes on to this kind of regional Level with the UK and then also the EU and looking at the other complexities and organizations in that because I think Ali's focus kind of like on like the countries yeah and then when you go to jack's one suddenly you're looking at uh different organizations yep because obviously it's just the uk but yeah for sure you're looking at you know the government ones whether it's the marine management organization defra then you're looking at other stakeholders like anglers and it's just this kind of whole host and it shows that like It looks really complex from the start and then when you get in, you're like, oh, this is even more, Yeah. We also don't hear a lot about the UK fisheries internationally, right? I'm sure that it's talked about within the UK, but, you know, for someone living in Canada or for Dave living in the US, you know, you don't hear a lot being spoken about, about the UK fisheries. I discovered a little bit more just during, during my other podcast, how to protect the ocean, but. It's

20:36 nice to hear people from within just kind of talk about it frankly and just be like, this is where we're at. This is the basics and how it's kind of divided up and here are the NGOs that work within it and some of the government departments. It's nice to have that ability to be able to talk about that and get the basics in it right yeah and i think i think being able to talk about it and then like in the future i'd love to be able to go and talk to people in other countries organizations that organizations in other countries that manage it there like we've got um partners all around the world that work in shark conservation i'll be like well how does it work there how's that different from the uk um what can we do to kind of work together to to make them all kind of Come together and kind of sing sing from the same hymn sheet so that we can get Yeah, that would be that would be great Yeah now with that said No, go ahead with that said, you know, you're looking at expanding it.

21:38 This is a you just finished up the first series um You know and and I think it's it's a great first series um what's the plan in the future? And then I guess with this first series, as an organization, you're trying to say, put out this podcast, let's see how it does, let's see if it's a benefit. I've done it from an independent point of view, on my own, as a passion, Dave and I, we do this, we have certain goals that we want to be able to accomplish, but we're also not affiliated necessarily with any organization. And then the podcast, this podcast, is not affiliated necessarily with any organization. For, for the shark dress podcast, how is it like Um, I think, I think there's like different aspects to kind of look at it. Cause there's kind of like the, you can look at it like from the metric side, you know, how many downloads that had, how much engagement.

22:35 but I think Kind of our vision of the podcast is to to talk about how our work works And that's not necessarily just for the benefit of us. Of course, you know, we've got uh supporters who who donate to us every month we've got um We might have major donors who will come and come and talk to us to to help support our work And the podcast is just one kind of way that we can talk about what we work we can we can tell them what the money that they've donated and they've given us is supporting in kind of that that kind of detail opposed to us sending them a an email which might be 400 words or like an infographic being like this is what we've done this year we could be like This is the detailed work of what we've done this year in a digestible Way discussing kind of complexities so that you know what you've helped achieve. Yeah, and I Think the the beauty of podcasts is that you can use them for more than more than one thing Like it's not just a podcast. It's multi-purposed first in use episodes of the podcast and As presentations we can use it for our social media. We can use it to help with getting grants helping apply for other things So it's having this kind of multi-purposed Kind of tool almost the benefits not only us but everyone who wants to support us or learn about shark conservation And

24:07 Yeah, no, I love that. I think that's the way to do it. You know, you get to know, you know, as a listener, I get to know the people who work within the Shark Trust, which is a lot of fun for me. But to hear the in detail, and sort of like a raw fashion too, right? Like it's not a BBC podcast. It's not, it's like these are two people having a frank conversation, like a fun conversation about the work that they do and I love that because you can hear the passion in Paul's, you know, in Paul's voice. You hear the passion in Ali's voice. You hear that just, I think you just had Rachel on and I think you mentioned, sorry, who was it? Jack. You know, when you hear their voice, you hear the passion in their voices of how they're talking about how much they know. All of a sudden, if you decide to gonna donate to anywhere, if you're listening to that podcast on a regular basis, you'd be like, well, I'm hearing what they're saying. Like I'm hearing what the Shark Trust does each and every episode.

25:01 So this is kind of giving my update. I don't need an email, which I probably won't read anyway. And you're not gonna give as much detail in. I'm gonna put in the podcast. Obviously, I'm a huge advocate of this way of doing it for an organization. And I think this is the way, I just think that this is the way to go forward, you know, and to get more information out there about the work that you do, because the Shark Trust does a lot of work, just not only on with the, was it 10 people you said that work with, that work just directly for it, but then you have partners and collaborators that work as well that you can feature and be able to discuss that type of information. So I love that. Yeah, that's the way it should be done. That's the way it should be done. Sorry, Dave, I think No, no, I was just gonna say, yeah, I think these, I mean, I really got into the whole podcast thing. How I got into it is Andrew invited me on his podcast about, what was it, about seven years ago now or so? I'd never done a podcast. I came on and him and I just, we just hit it off like amazing.

26:03 We ended up speaking longer off air than we did on air. And I was totally hooked after that. And then I just, He kept inviting me back on to where it's like, hey, why don't we actually start our own podcast? Is kind of how he got into doing the whole, doing our whole story. That's literally how it got. I never had any idea I'd ever done a podcast. I really didn't know much about him. And now I'm totally into it and I'm totally hooked on it. And I think, as Andrew was saying, the whole communication part of it is just, I think it's great. It's like now we can have a conversation to learn more about what you're doing about the shark trust and get with our show. We like to get to know the people behind doing the program.

26:43 You know, like yourself, like, like how do you obviously you said you're really into the podcast realm anyway. And so it was a nice opportunity for you to get in and actually be able to host a host or show on your individual shows. Mark, do you have like about how long do they go? Like they sort of like whatever, yeah yeah so i'd say like most episodes are going to be between 30 and 40 minutes because we do video versions as well and so we're limited by battery as well of cameras so it means ours ours are usually between 30 and 45 and then We, some colleagues of mine, so me, Louis, he does all of our content creation, so making our videos, doing a lot of our social media stuff. And then Caroline, who's our marketing manager. We went out to go diving, which is like a dive show in Coventry. We went out there and a lot of our patrons where they're giving talks and we're like We can we're about to start a podcast. I was like we can talk to them we can get get them on our podcast and they have like Limited time because they are giving talks on stage to those people and we're like if you can give us 10 minutes Come on, talk to us about your favorite diving experience because we're kind of looking at the different audiences that that there are in shark conservation different ones that you'd want to target and i'm always like i've always got paul's voice in the back of my head and

28:15 they're like who is your target audience here yeah and then make sure you get it to them and i was like those little episodes are either for people who are really passionate about diving with sharks already that i've got hundreds and hundreds of dives in or people who have never dived before and they're contemplating it and i think once you have been in the water with a shark You're always gonna want to conserve them Like it's always something you're gonna want to do. Um so like I Kind of got into sharks and I uh, I couldn't actually swim. I was scared of the sea. Um Like this is like back in 2015 when I met paul I couldn't swim, terrified to go in the water in case I drown. And then I went in the water with sharks for the first time a couple of days ago. It's just on Friday. My girlfriend paid for her family and me to go on a blue shark snorkel trip. okay and it was the first time i've been like they've said blue sharks are inquisitive and i've said it in talks for the last two years yeah i did i did not know what that word meant like they are up in your face they're swimming around you and there's this um a code of conduct uh developed by marico um and cat uh who works here helps uh helped in developing it and Like they follow obviously this code of conduct and one of them is you cannot like do not touch the sharks, which yeah, it's obviously That's kind of I thought oh, that's obvious They get so close. You're like i'm

29:48 not touching the shark, but it's touching me Yeah, yeah, it's amazing how close they can swim to you and not touch you Yeah, they yeah, it's just absolutely incredible experience and I was like if we can get people to talk about those, those experiences that they have had and that kind of passionate way that they can get it across. People are going to want to learn more and more about sharks and then hopefully they'll listen to the other episodes, start learning about how shark conservation works, how they can get involved. Um, so yeah, those bonus mini episodes are probably about 10 minutes maximum. Um, and we've got like Monty Halls, Miranda Kristofnikov, Simon Rogerson and, um, Donovan Lewis. So amazing, amazing people. Yeah, and then you just finished your first season now Uh, yeah, so our final episodes, uh went out today so Recording it on the 23rd of july. Um, yeah went out, uh, and that was an interview of rachel brooks who's again an amazing kind of background she's a studied zoology, went and I think learned to dive and stuff in Egypt, went to the Canary Islands and then she's ended up in Scotland. She's become this wildlife artist, scientific illustrator and she was doing Bats and Sharks with Bats and Sharks Scotland and she's just got this huge amazing knowledge and then she's also

31:18 got that creative background so talking to her about about basking sharks it kind of comes out in this like really creative kind of almost poetic way. So we've just done an episode of her to kind of finish the season because basking sharks are probably the UK's most iconic species or most well known at least. So we were just like we'll end on a high of this one with Rachel and it's basking shark season right now so okay it's just Okay, good. And you said in your episodes you have episodes like one every other week and then you have your your mini episodes kind of Yeah, so we yeah, we put them out every other week. So yeah bi-weekly and then well if we have a bonus mini episode We'll chuck that in just it's like a nice little nugget of information that people can have in the middle And then we're gonna take a short break At the moment just because we've just finished series one and then go in series two where we're kind of looking More at what successful shark conservation means and then what the impacts that can have so everyone likes to talk about shark conservation in this like really positive light but i want to look at the positives and the negatives of shark conservation because if we're able to identify those yep then we're not going to take a step back because we can prepare for those negative things we're talking about like depredation where know people who spend the most amount of time by the sea you know they're angling

32:51 and stuff like that if their favorite hobby is getting ruined because the sharks are stealing their fish and they go and talk to you know here it'd be like an MP those are the people who make the decisions. So if we're able to look at these potential future issues and then make steps to mitigate them, then shark conservation can keep going forward instead of Absolutely. That's great. That's cool, Mark. Mark, I want to thank you for coming on today to talk a little bit about your new podcast. And we wish you all the best. And we're definitely going to have you come back on here. We'll do more of a focused episode on you, the Mark Packer story.

33:35 And we look forward to that. And we wish you all the best of luck on the Shark Trust podcast. And hope he does Thank you so much for being on the show Thank you so much for having me. Thank you Thank you very much mark for joining us on this episode of the beyond jaws podcast a bonus episode Really love the fact that we talked about podcasting Dave I think this is something that we would want to talk more about when with other podcasts and I think it's you know Jumping into it as I love podcasts I think it's really great that we're able to see more of these platforms and more podcasts on this platform be able to be published and so more people can listen to it. You know, a lot of people would think, oh, well, you guys already have a podcast. Don't you want anybody else to do? It's like, absolutely. Not everybody identifies with us. We have a very different mission than what the Shark Trust podcast has. And we like to support other podcasts as much as possible. So, Dave, you know, from an organizational perspective, you know, being able to launch a podcast like this, what do you think about this? Do you think this is a good idea for the Oh, yeah. No, to me, it seemed like a natural extension for those of us in the field that attended the Sharks International a year and a half ago. Actually, it was in Valencia, Spain. But the week before that, they had an online version where they interviewed people. And Paul Cox, the CEO, and Allie Hood had

35:06 people. Basically, it was run like an ongoing TV show where they'd come on, talk about the presentations that people had just seen because it was online at the time. And then the following week, when they had the in-person conference, it was the same thing. It was all virtual. You could go online if you were subscribed to the area, attended the conference and watch the pod, and watch, well it wasn't a podcast, it was a video series. And so this seemed like the natural extension to me, that they would just go from there to doing a podcast. And they'd get in, they'd talk to the different people, different aspects, like Mark talked about today. I thought it was interesting, he's, you know, was very into podcasting himself, didn't see himself ever actually hosting one, and now he is, so it was kind of cool hearing that story.

35:52 I have to say, I was kind of funny, I thought when he talked about how he met this to me, it was, I have to get into this when you have him back on here in the future about how he, we met literally, he was running a half marathon. He met Paul Cox while he was running. And, um, he commented how he was trying to beat Paul in the race and Paul ended up beating him, which is probably a good thing. Probably if he would have won, he may not be, he may not be sitting here to help him get a job. But, but I thought it was just a, it was one of the more interesting ways somebody actually connected. with someone who eventually became their boss and with an organization that he's now with, who would have thought a couple years ago what that would lead to. So I thought that was a fascinating story in itself. You never know how you end up getting in some of these different positions in the shark world. And I thought that was such an interesting story. And I think the fact that Paul also came from a non-science background, and now he runs a shark trust, probably helped him a bit. As he said in the, in the interview about getting on there, just, but it was, it was, I think the key thing was skills, all the skills that he had that really helped him get into the position he's in. And I think that's something we do emphasize with a lot of people. When we talk with Andrew, we interview is about, they'll almost always come back. Some something about learning skills, because we can teach about sharks and stuff, but if you, if you have the skills, that's, what's going to help get you in the door. for graduate school or 100%. 100%. I think that's something that needs to increase. We need to see more of these types of podcasts and need to

37:23 see more of this type of education get around. A lot of people know a lot about sharks from different episodes like Shark Week and Shark Fest, but we know those are catered towards a specific audience and there's an audience that wants to know more about conservation and wants to know about shark science and wants to know more about you know, things other than those iconic species and other sharks. And I think you'll get that with the Shark Trust, you know, and I think that's really important. So again, Mark, thank you so much. We'll put all the links to the podcast so that people can get access to it as well as the Shark Trust website. And Dave, if people Instagram, it's Lost Shark Guy, Lost Sharks on Facebook and Lost Shark Guy on X. And of course, I'm also on LinkedIn, Dave Ebert. And please go on our YouTube channel. of the Beyond Jaws podcast and subscribe and please leave comments. We'd love to hear from you and just see what we can do for the show. So thanks Absolutely. Yes. Thank you so much for joining us. And Dave, thank you. Mark, thank you very much for the podcast and for coming on ours to talk about your podcast. And we appreciate everybody for listening to this episode of the Beyond Jaws podcast. From Dave and I, we thank you so much. Have