By Michael MilsteinFebruary 2016 (Northwest Fisheries Science Center) – Toxins from harmful algae are present in Alaskan marine food webs in high enough concentrations to be detected in marine mammals from Southeast Alaska to the Arctic Ocean, including whales, walruses, sea lions, seals, porpoises and sea otters, according to new research published today [Prevalence of […]
21 January 2016 (Business Insider Australia) – More than 30 of the world’s top whale scientists have called on Japan to stop its so-called scientific whaling program. In the correspondence section of the international journal Nature, the experts write a letter to the editor under the headline “Japan’s whaling is unscientific”. The experts are mostly […]
By Rachael Bale10 January 2016 (National Geographic) – Just last week, a friend at the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) emailed me to ask if I’ve ever written about the trafficking of totoaba swim bladders, adding that she’s been working on vaquita conservation in the Gulf of California. Totoaba? Vaquitas? These were […]
By Jed Kim30 December 2015 (KPCC) – Malnourished and dying California sea lion pups are likely to be seen again in high numbers on California beaches this winter and spring. Scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have been monitoring sea lion rookeries on the Channel Islands and have found the lowest weights in […]
25 November 2015 (SSCS) – A pod of pilot whales driven into the infamous killing cove on Nov. 19 (Japan time) was traumatized and held without food or shelter for three days; one was later taken captive, the remainder were killed or dumped at sea. Sea Shepherd Conservation Society’s Cove Guardian volunteers have captured extremely […]
By Paul Gallagher28 November 2015 (The Guardian) – Japan is set to resume whaling early next year, after a break of more than 12 months, in defiance of an international court of justice ruling that it cease the practice. The Japanese government says it has taken into account the court ruling and its “scientific” whaling […]
By Olga Gertcyk9 October 2015 (Siberian Times) – The controversial demand to end a total ban on hunting Baikal’s indigenous seals came from Arnold Tulokhonov, who both senator for the Republic of Buryatia in the upper house of the Russian parliament and director of the Baikal Institute of Natural Resources. The seals need to be […]
By Michael Casey 29 September 2015 (CBS News) – Federal officials are trying to understand what is behind a sharp rise in the stranding and deaths of threatened fur seals, with dozens washing up along the California coast this year. Designating it an Unusual Mortality Event, NOAA Fisheries said that as many as 80 Guadalupe […]
By Joel Connelly15 September 2015 (Seattle PI) – Poaching and slaughter of wild creatures, from Africa’s great elephants to manta rays in the Pacific Ocean, has become the Earth’s fourth-largest illegal criminal activity, creating what conservationists call an “extinction economy.” As one watches the new film, Racing Extinction, by Academy Award-winning documentary maker Louie Psihoyos, […]
[cf. Starving polar bears observed killing and eating dolphins that were forced north by global warming and Status of polar bear populations for 2014. As of the beginning of 2015, the Polar Bear Specialist Group lists the Barents Sea population as “data deficient”, so the status of this population officially is unknown. –Des] By Lorenzo […]
