Tilen Genov

Tilen Genov

About

47
Publications
26,366
Reads
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1,656
Citations
Introduction
Marine conservation biologist, working primarily on cetaceans. Research includes photo-ID, estimating population abundance and dynamics, spatial modelling of habitat use, social network analysis, fishery interactions, satellite telemetry, biopsy sampling and others. Particularly interested in quantitative ecology and in using science to assess the status of populations, identify important habitats and evaluate threats, and in translating that knowledge into effective marine conservation.
Additional affiliations
March 2019 - present
IUCN Cetacean Specialist Group
Position
  • Member
November 2021 - December 2022
Consortium for the Conservation of the Atlantic Humpback Dolphin
Position
  • Researcher
May 2014 - November 2022
University of St Andrews
Position
  • PhD Researcher
Education
May 2014 - December 2017
University of St Andrews (School of Biology & Sea Mammal Research Unit)
Field of study
  • Marine Biology
September 2011 - September 2012
University of St Andrews, UK
Field of study
  • Marine Mammal Science
October 2003 - September 2011
University of Ljubljana, Slovenia
Field of study
  • Biology

Publications

Publications (47)
Article
Full-text available
Information on movements and connectivity among populations of animals is important for the delineation of units to conserve, so that demographic parameters, such as abundance, fecundity and mortality, can be placed in an appropriate population and conservation context. Common bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) are often considered relatively...
Article
Full-text available
Complex social structure is a prominent feature in several mammal species. Such structure may lead to behavioural diversity not only among populations, but also within a single population, where different subsets of a population may exhibit different types of behaviour. As a consequence, understanding social structure is not only interesting biolog...
Article
Full-text available
Marine top predators, including marine mammals, are known to bio-accumulate persistent pollutants such as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), a serious conservation concern for these species. Although PCBs declined in European seas since the 1970s–1980s ban, considerable levels still persist in European and Mediterranean waters. In cetaceans, strande...
Article
Full-text available
Individual identification plays a major role in our understanding of the biology, ecology and behavior in cetaceans. Being able to tell individuals apart can provide invaluable insight into basic biological and scientific questions, but is also highly relevant to science-based conservation. Given the importance of individual identification, it appe...
Article
Full-text available
1. The Mediterranean common dolphin (Delphinus delphis), considered to have been very common in the past, had undergone a dramatic decline across most of the basin by the end of 1970s. In the northern Adriatic Sea, one of the regions with most available historical information, the common dolphin is thought to have been the most common and abundant...
Article
Full-text available
An out of habitat (OOH) marine mammal is an individual found outside of their natural range, e.g., an Atlantic walrus (Odobenus rosmarus rosmarus) along the coastline of mainland Europe, or an individual within their natural range in habitat that is not optimal for their health or survival due to a lack of suitable conditions and/or because of pote...
Article
Full-text available
Studying the sympatric ecology of closely related marine top predator species is of interest both from an ecological and conservation standpoint, because it provides insights into ecosystem functioning, how such species avoid competitive exclusion, and how human stressors may impact these patterns. In this study, we examine the isotopic niche of th...
Article
Full-text available
The Adriatic Sea is one of the Mediterranean areas most exposed to cumulative human stressors. This semi-enclosed and largely shallow basin has been subjected to intensive exploitation and destructive fishing practices for decades, resulting in biodiversity decline and poor ecosystem health. Diversity of cetaceans is lower than in other parts of th...
Article
Full-text available
Accurate description of population structure and genetic connectivity is essential for efficient conservation efforts. Along the European coastline, Tursiops truncatus typically shows high site fidelity to relatively small areas, often semi-enclosed waters, but patterns of genetic connectivity among such areas are often poorly understood. In this s...
Article
Full-text available
Researchers can investigate many aspects of animal ecology through noninvasive photo–identification. Photo–identification is becoming more efficient as matching individuals between photos is increasingly automated. However, the convolutional neural network models that have facilitated this change need many training images to generalize well. As a r...
Preprint
Full-text available
Accurate description of population structure and genetic connectivity is essential for efficient conservation efforts. Along the European coastline, Tursiops truncatus typically shows high site fidelity to relatively small areas, often semi-enclosed waters, but patterns of genetic connectivity among such areas are often poorly understood. In this s...
Article
1. Group membership is a key attribute of animal societies and central to the study of social structure in several taxa. However, social structure analyses are sensitive to the way data are collected and associations defined. 2. In this study, a time–space method was used to investigate the social structure of common bottlenose dolphins Tursiops tr...
Technical Report
Full-text available
Whilst genetic studies can address a large number of issues related to cetaceans, the primary focus of these Best practices is on matters related to understanding population structure, abundance and movements in order for ACCOBAMS to meet its conservation and management objectives.
Article
Full-text available
Several populations of odontocete cetaceans, including at least 19 species, have modified their behavior and adapted to foraging in association with trawlers. We review information on odontocete interactions with different types of trawlers across 13 Food and Agriculture Organization fishing areas around the world. We also review knowledge gaps, th...
Chapter
Full-text available
https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/189865869/189865884
Chapter
The Mediterranean Sea is one of the world's seas most affected by human activities. In this region, concern for the conservation status of the common dolphin *Delphinus delphis* has been expressed since the 1990s. Systematic culling campaigns and intentional takes represented a major cause of mortality between the 1870s and the 1970s. These killing...
Article
The Gulf of Ambracia, in northwestern Greece, hosts a highly threatened community of about 150 common bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus ). Until now, information on their feeding habits was derived exclusively from fish scale samples collected during surface‐feeding events targeting small schooling epipelagic fish. The aim of this study was t...
Technical Report
Common Bottlenose Dolphin Tursiops truncatus Mediterranean subpopulation has most recently been assessed for The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species in 2021. Tursiops truncatus Mediterranean subpopulation is listed as Least Concern. (Accessed on 12 January 2023, https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/16369383/215248781)
Article
Full-text available
The conservation status of small cetaceans has significantly worsened since the 1980s, when the baiji was the only species of small cetacean listed as Endangered by IUCN. Now the baiji is almost certainly extinct and 13 other species, subspecies, or populations (hereafter units-to-conserve or units) of small cetaceans are listed as Critically Endan...
Article
Full-text available
Heterogeneous data collection in the marine environment has led to large gaps in our knowledge of marine species distributions. To fill these gaps, models calibrated on existing data may be used to predict species distributions in unsampled areas, given that available data are sufficiently representative. Our objective was to evaluate the feasibili...
Article
Full-text available
Cumulative effects assessments (CEAs) are inherently complex and seldom linked to real-world management processes • A risk-based CEA contains risk identification , risk analysis and risk evaluation, revealing the risk of exceeding thresholds • Embedding CEAs in a risk management process reduces complexity, streamlines scientific products, and incre...
Article
Full-text available
In this study we assessed microhabitat and host plant preferences of Aporia crataegi (Linne 1758) larvae in the field. The study was conducted in the submediterranean part of Slovenia, at the edge of the limestone region Kraški rob, where this species is widespread. The larvae were most abundant on blackthorn (Prunus spinosa L.) and the com-mon hawt...
Technical Report
Full-text available
Oceanomare Delphis Onlus (Italy), BICREF (Malta) and OceanCare (Switzerland), jointly organized the 1st International Workshop on short‐beaked common dolphin (Delphinus delphis, Linneaus 1758), which took place in Ischia, between the 13th and the 15th of April, in order to assess the status of the Mediterranean population, understand the major thre...
Article
Full-text available
Understanding animal movement patterns is not only important for providing insight into their biology, but is also relevant to conservation planning. However, in aquatic and wide-ranging species such as cetaceans, this is often difficult. The common bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus) is the most common cetacean in the northern and central Adri...
Article
Full-text available
Organochlorine (OC) pesticides and the more persistent polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) have well established dose-dependent toxicities to birds, fish and mammals in experimental studies, but the actual impact of OC pollutants on European marine top predators remains unknown. Here we show that several cetacean species have very high mean blubber PC...
Article
Full-text available
1. Habitat diversity plays a significant role in shaping the genetic structure of cetacean populations. However, the processes involved in defining the genetic differentiation of these highly mobile marine mammals are still largely unknown. 2. Levels of genetic differentiation and dispersal patterns of common bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus...
Article
Full-text available
The drivers of population differentiation in oceanic high dispersal organisms, have been crucial for research in evolutionary biology. Adaptation to different environments is commonly invoked as a driver of differentiation in the oceans, in alternative to geographic isolation. In this study, we investigate the population structure and phylogeograph...
Research
Full-text available
The drivers of population differentiation in oceanic dispersal organisms have been crucial for research in evolutionary biology. Adaptation to different environments is commonly invoked as an alternative to geographic isolation, as a driver of differentiation in the oceans. In this study, we investigate the population structure and phylogeography o...
Article
Full-text available
Povzetek Strmoglavec Morus bassanus je razširjen v Severnem Atlantiku in Severnem morju, predvsem pozimi pa del populacije vstopa tudi v zahodno Sredozemlje. V vzhodnem Sredozemlju je občutno redkejši, njegov status v Jadranskem morju pa ni povsem razjasnjen. V Sloveniji so bila doslej zabeležena tri opažanja. V pričujočem delu podajava dve novi op...
Book
Full-text available
Based on a recent report by MedPAN, there are today 161 marine protected areas (MPAs) declared in the Mediterranean by the region’s coastal nations, protecting 19,000 km2 of coastal marine waters, and many more are present also in the Black Sea and the Contiguous Atlantic. In principle, these could be safe havens for many cetacean species from the...
Article
Full-text available
While short-beaked common dolphins are often regarded as highly mobile animals, their movements and ranging patterns are poorly known and no long-distance movements have been documented through photo-identification of individuals. We report the long-distance movement of a naturally marked individual, encompassing a minimum of 1000 km across the Ion...
Thesis
The Chilean dolphin (Cephalorhynchus eutropia), Peale’s dolphin (Lagenorhynchus australis) and Burmeister’s porpoise (Phocoena spinipinnis) are poorly known species, endemic to South America. They face several actual or potential anthropogenic threats, many of which are poorly understood and unquantified. Habitat preference of these species in rela...
Thesis
The ecology of the bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus) in the Gulf of Trieste and adjacent waters was studied between 2002 and 2011. Surveys were carried out from vessels and land observation points. During each sighting we recorded information on the position, time, group size, presence of calves, behaviour and interactions with fisheries or b...
Article
Full-text available
The presence of tattoo skin disease (TSD) was examined in 1392 free-ranging and dead odontocetes comprising 17 species from the Americas, Europe, South Africa, New Zealand and Greenland. We investigated whether TSD prevalence varied with sex, age and health status. TSD was encountered in cetaceans from the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans as well as in...
Article
Full-text available
A report is submitted herein on the occurrence of a humpback whale in Slovenian territorial waters (Gulf of Trieste, North Adriatic Sea) in February, March and April 2009. This is the first confirmed and documented record of this species for Slovenia and the Gulf of Trieste, the second for the Adriatic Sea and the 14th for the Mediterranean Sea. Th...
Article
Full-text available
Two longitudinal studies on the ecology of bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) are being implemented in the Northern Adriatic Sea. One has been carried out since 1987 in the Kvarnerić, Croatia, the other since 2002 in Slovenian and adjacent waters. Standard photo-identification procedures enabled us to identify 238 and 55 individual dolphins,...
Article
Full-text available
A local population of bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) in Slovenian and adjacent waters (northern Adriatic Sea) was studied between 2002 and 2008. Boat-based surveys, land-based surveys and standard photo-identification procedures were carried out. A total of 120 sightings were recorded and 101 well-marked dolphins photo-identified. Resight...
Article
Full-text available
Although the striped dolphin (Stenella coeruleoalba) is occasionally reported in the Gulf of Trieste, it is not considered a regular species in the northern Adriatic Sea. Between April and October 2007, 3 different individuals were observed in the Gulf of Trieste. All three individuals were sighted in the area between April and May 2007. One of the...

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