ACS Conservation Committee Report

ACS Conservation Reports are selected summaries of current news articles on whales, dolphins, porpoises, and their environment. These reports are offered to you under the fair use provisions of U.S. copyright law.

 Dolphin Stranded by Tsunami Rescued...   On January 6, soldiers cornered the trapped dolphins stranded in a lagoon in Thailand by the tsunami and caught it up in a net. It was then moved in a stretcher to the sea, treated with antibiotics and released. She was reported to have swum away strongly. Originally it was thought that there were two dolphins trapped, but Reports from researchers in Thailand now suggest that there may have only ever been one dolphin in the lagoon. Due to the distinctive different colors on each side of its body, it had been presumed there must be two dolphins.

Another trapped marine mammal was also reported released when local fishermen freed a dugong - a tropical sea mammal that lives along the shores of the Indian Ocean - from another lagoon in Phang Nga province.     Anchorage Daily News

 Sperm whales suffer the bends...  Natural bone damage highlights need to protect whales from military sonar. -- Sperm whales get the bends, suggests a study of their skeletons. And environmentalists fear that this could put them at risk if their diving patterns are disrupted by sonar testing.

Zoologists had previously assumed that these mammals do not suffer from this disease, which can cripple human deep-sea divers. But Michael Moore and Greg Early of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts have discovered progressive bone damage in whale carcasses retrieved from the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

The wear and tear seems to be a hallmark of osteonecrosis, a chronic disease that can be caused in long-term scuba-divers by the nitrogen bubbles that form in the body when surfacing too rapidly.

The whales' pitted, eroded bones show that they may suffer from osteonecrosis over the course of their lives. Moore and Early studied 16 whale skeletons spanning a period of 111 years. They report in the journal Science1 that they found cavities up to 2 centimeters across in a range of bones. The larger skeletons (belonging to older whales) showed the worst damage

The most likely cause is the repeated change in pressure caused by diving to catch prey and then returning to the surface for air, says Moore. "The only stressor known to cause this kind of bone damage is the bends," he says.

This implies that the whales stave off the effects of the bends not through some in-built physiological mechanism, but rather by carefully managing their diving patterns much as scuba-divers do. Surface too fast, and they could risk more severe damage.

Disrupted diving seems to be what caused a group of beaked whales to wash up on the Canary Islands in 2002 after a military sonar test in the area. The prevailing theory is that they surfaced too fast after being scared or disoriented by the cacophony of noise.

"Noise is one example of something that could disturb [whales'] behaviour," comments Paul Jepson of London's Institute of Zoology, who advanced this theory in a paper in Nature last year. "Nobody doubts that there's a causal link, we just don't know the mechanism yet."

Some of the carcasses studied by Moore and Early date from before the advent of military sonar, showing that the damage they suffered is likely to be natural. But if whales do routinely suffer the bends, the potential for them to be disturbed by military exercises could be even greater than environmentalists had feared.     news at nature.com, article by Michael Hopkin, published 23 Dec 2004

 Human Impacts on North Atlantic Right Whales...  The NOAA Fisheries Service acknowledges that if a single North Atlantic right whale is killed by anthropogenic causes each year, the entire species may go extinct.

In 2004 alone, at least four right whales were found dead, including two full-term, pregnant right whales that were killed by ship strikes.

The tragic loss of these six animals does not even take into consideration the number of right whales that may have been struck and lost at sea, or entangled in fishing gear. In fact, there were confirmed sightings of at least five entangled right whales just this past year. While the NOAA Fisheries Service has drafted a plan to reduce the number of ship strikes, it is only in draft form and there is no time frame set as to when it may go into effect, if ever. Furthermore, the proposed plan provides immunity to sovereign vessels, like the Navy vessel that struck and killed the pregnant female last month. At the same time, the Service has once again delayed their plan to reduce the risk of right whales becoming entangled.

While the primary concern is for critically endangered right whales, other endangered whales are facing these same dangers. In 2004, six endangered humpback whales, three endangered finback whales, and one protected minke were reported as entangled. Again, this represents only a fraction of the animals that are actually entangled. According to a 2001 study by the Center for Coastal Studies, at least 88% of the humpbacks in the Gulf of Maine bear entanglement scars.

Only a thorough necropsy (a dissection of the body of the animal) can determine the cause of death. Unfortunately, researchers were not able to fully necropsy Beacon, a six- year old humpback whale that recently stranded on Cape Cod, as the necessary heavy equipment was not allowed on the beach. Groucho's fate remains unknown as well. Grouch was an adult male humpback found floating offshore this past week. A necropsy is planned, however, for the juvenile humpback that stranded on a beach in Delaware last Saturday.     Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society

 Antigua and Barbuda - Dolphin Discovery Forced to Leave...  Dolphin Discovery, a Mexican company that runs captive dolphin facilities in Mexico and the Caribbean has been forced to leave the Caribbean nation of Antigua and Barbuda. This follows a controversy surrounding the flooding of local businesses and residences due to a blocked drain at their sea pen facility at Marina Bay.

The Antiguan Daily Observer on 27th November reported on this situation, stating: "More controversy has arisen at Marina Bay as the owners of Dolphin Discovery yesterday blocked a government backhoe that supposedly went to the area to clear the backed-up drain that has caused extensive flooding in the area... Many irate persons who have been monitoring the area have become increasingly disgruntled over what they perceive as the facility owners' continuous disrespect for government orders. The situation reached a high point yesterday when the police had to be called in to keep the peace." A further article from 30th November reported: "The owners of the Marina Bay property which housed Dolphin Discovery has claimed that the operators of the business ransacked and stole personal items from his property... Wexelman said he found his property in a mess. "When I came, I saw that generators were missing, the freezer room was ransacked and the building was left in a terrible state," he said. "They went into the freezer room where all the fish were kept and dumped all the frozen dead fish into the pond where the dolphins were. That water is now contaminated. It's disgusting,"

While Antigua remains captive dolphin free, at least for now, the nine dolphins have been transferred to a Dolphin Discovery facility on Tortola in the British Virgin islands, reported to already be overcrowded and with its own environmental problems.   Antigua Daily Observer

 Renewed Trade in Orcas...  Plans are underway for the first import of orcas (killer whales) into the European Union for more than ten years. As Loro Parque in Tenerife prepares to import up to four orcas from SeaWorld's parks in the USA, WDCS is calling for the European Union to disallow the trade on the grounds that it would violate current legislation and put wild populations further at risk.

Cathy Williamson, WDCS's Anti Captivity Campaigner said "Should the import go ahead, it would not only lead to the further suffering of these individuals, but may also increase the demand for orcas from other parts of the world, putting added pressure on wild orca populations. In addition, WDCS believes the EU and the Spanish Government would be in violation of EU CITES legislation, which bans trade in cetaceans for primarily commercial purposes."

There are only 46 orcas currently held in captivity in five different countries world-wide, but many people, unaware of the suffering caused by confining these animals, continue to pay see them. With a survival rate of only 41 percent for captive born orcas and an average survival time in captivity of less than six years for wild-caught orcas, demand for these animals remains greater than supply, bumping up the price tag for a wild orca to one million dollars.

Orcas suffer extreme emotional and physical distress in captivity, shown in high rates of infant mortality, shorter life expectancy and aggressive behavior. This year alone, six orcas, including two very young calves, have died in captivity. Since 1961, at least 135 orcas have been taken from the wild for entertainment or display purposes. Over 80 percent of these animals are now dead.

"We're deeply disappointed that the Spanish authorities are permitting the construction of a new aquarium to house orcas when these animals are so clearly unsuitable for captivity," continued Cathy Williamson. "Increasing numbers of people are opposing the practice of keeping whales and dolphins in captivity, but to end the suffering and to help secure wild populations, we need to see an end to captures and trade."

WDCS is also very concerned about the impact of the long distance transfer on the orcas to be imported from the USA. Scientific evidence suggests that dolphin species experience difficulties in adapting to new captive situations and that mortality rates are often high following transfer.     WDCS

 Solomon Islands Bans Dolphin Exports...  In a joint statement, Fisheries Minister Paul Maenu and Conservation Minister David Holosivi said the ban would take effect immediately, saying it was brought in to address international concerns, the Australian Associate Press reported from the capital Honiara.

"As a responsible member of the international community Solomon Islands has a duty to ensure concerns regarding its conduct are given due consideration," the ministers said.

"The new policy banning further live dolphin exports would not affect traditional use of dolphins."

There has been controversy for several years over live dolphin exports from the Pacific island nation, which is not a signatory to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).

In July 2003, a shipment of 28 bottlenose dolphins to Mexico coincided with the arrival in the country of an Australian-led international intervention force to end years of civil unrest.

The row provoked by the resulting publicity, as dozens of journalists there to cover the deployment picked up the story, prompted Australia and New Zealand to urge the Solomon Islands to ban dolphin exports.

Local company the Solomon Islands Marine Mammal Education Centre (SIMMEC), which arranged the shipment to Mexico, has been criticized by animal welfare activists for the conditions in which it kept the dolphins.     Australian Associated Press

 Cleanup Continues for N.C. Beached Whales...  Dozens of whales beached themselves early Saturday along a five-mile stretch of coastline near Oregon Inlet, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said.

Scientists and National Park Service workers were working January 16 to collect samples and clean up whale carcasses after 33 of the marine mammals beached themselves between Buxton and Corolla. Seventeen died, including five that were euthanized because they were suffering.

A single minke whale was found dead in Corolla, the Virginian-Pilot reported. Two more whales turned up Sunday morning near Buxton — one already dead, and one so sick that it also had to be euthanized, NOAA Fisheries biologist Barbie Byrd said.

"We're hoping that this is all of them," she said.

Byrd said scientists with state and local governments and with universities in the region will take "any kind of sample you can think of" from the whales' remains, including skulls, stomachs, blood, urine and tissues.

Byrd said teams hoped to finish retrieving samples and burying what's left of the whales by Sunday or Monday evening, depending on the tides.

The samples will be used to see whether individual animals were ill and for a variety of research, including investigations into why healthy whales beach themselves and studies of migration patterns.

"We're going to look for everything we can possibly think of," Byrd said.

The whales were a mix of juvenile and adult pilot whales. Neither pilot whales nor minke whales are endangered or threatened species.     Associated Press