Erich Hoyt is Research Fellow with WDCS, the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society in the UK, and Head of WDCS’s Global Campaign for Marine Protected Areas. For the past decade, he has jointly directed the Far East Russia Orca Project, the first killer whale (orca) study in Russia as well as the more recent Russian Cetacean Habitat Project, both international collaborations with Russian scientists. In 2007 Erich began working with the nonprofit marinebio.org site as director of Marine Mammals.

Erich is the author of 18 books published in 25 languages, both popular as well as academic titles, written for adults and children. Twice a James Thurber Writer-in-Residence, and a Vannevar Bush Fellow at MIT and Harvard in 1985-86, he has 15 magazine and book awards including the Outstanding Book of the Year Award from the American Society of Journalists & Authors, Inc., in New York (2002) for Creatures of the Deep.

Erich has researched and written numerous conservation and scientific reports as a consultant and advisor for international conservation groups and governments and is considered an authority on whales and dolphins, marine protected areas, ocean conservation, whale watching and ecotourism. He has lectured and worked on conservation and scientific projects in Japan, Russia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Iceland, Mexico, Chile, Suriname, and the Caribbean. He has also taught as a visiting lecturer at the Ohio State University, the University of Edinburgh and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Erich’s magazine and newspaper credits include: National Geographic, New Scientist, Canadian Geographic, The Sunday Times (London), The Guardian, Defenders and The New York Times. Three of his adult nonfiction books, Orca: The Whale Called Killer (Dutton; Firefly), The Earth Dwellers (Simon & Schuster; Touchstone; Kadokawa, Tokyo) and Insect Lives (Wiley; Harvard University Press), have been optioned for feature films. He lives in North Berwick, Scotland with his family.