San Francisco Parties for Return of Runaway Sea Lions (and one of few marine mammal success stories)

Sea lions being admired, courtesy of Pier 39

San Francisco is having a party today to celebrate the return of the best urban marine mammal attractions in the country. The city appreciates its sea lions and is just saying, thank goodness they've come home. When they disappeared from Pier 39 last fall the whole world was worried. (Well, except for those who said that they tend to come and go. Which, it turns out, was right.)

Salty The Sea Lion mascot will be "available for hugs and photos," a press release says. The Pier is also celebrating 20 years of having hundreds of 600-pound predators in a major city. They started showing up after a 1989 earthquake. Instead of getting ousted from valuable real estate, they city enjoyed them as a natural wonder--and created a major tourist attraction.

This could have gone down differently.  The sea lions took over expensive boat docks. Sure, the Marine Mammal Protection Act covers them. But the government is always willing to make exceptions. Oregon fishermen got permission to kill sea lions that hang out at a dam where salmon congregate.

Last year when 1,700 sea lions showed up, they tested San Francisco's tolerance. The harbor drew up plans to keep them away from the nearby Hyde Street Pier.

The population numbers go up and down with weather, currents and food availability, so maybe they won't need to be pushed out. The sea lions' movements are still inscrutable, but the best going theory is that it was good food that brought them in such numbers last year and then herring that took them to the Oregon's Sea Lion Cave over the winter (they usually go south to the Channel Islands).


The California sea lion is making a huge comeback--too big for some. It's one of the few marine mammals whose numbers are healthy and increasing. Of seven sea lion species in the world, only two are not extinct, endangered or threatened, according to the IUCN Red List. The California sea lion is the only one whose population is increasing. Of about 355,000 animals, 238,000 live in California. Even if the disappearance of this crowd was media hysteria over a non-event, that's still something to celebrate.

Where to go to See Seals and Sea Lions 
See the Pier 39 Sea Lion Webcam
Here's where you can see wildlife out West

Meditteranean Gray Whale: Explorer or Lone Lost Soul

Gray whale from Israel Marine Mammal Research and Assistance Center

A lone gray whale showed up in the Mediterranean Sea this week. Biologists are baffled. Gray whales haven't been seen on this side of the Atlantic for centuries. Is this bad news--just a lone whale hundreds of miles off track? Or good news--a lone explorer, trying out a new migration oute--or, really, an ancient one?

The Israel Marine Mammal Research and Assistance Center verified it as definitely a gray whale. Biologist are betting on the lone lost soul explanation. NOAA's Phillip Clapham of  told Discovery that either "there has been a relict population in the North Atlantic that no one has noticed (virtually impossible), or (more likely) that this whale came down through the ice-free Northwest Passage and is now hopelessly lost."

I'd like to think there's a third possibility: the whale is forging a new route. Maybe in response to the whaling pressure it still faces in Asia. Migration routes aren't stagnant. Animal populations are constantly changing, usually led by a lone male branching out looking for a mate. Marine biologists used to think the manatees that migrate up the east coast were lost, so they'd catch them and haul them down to Florida. Now they realize it's just what they do.

There used to be four populations of gray whales, Jim Darling notes. Two--the ones one the east and west shores of the North Atlantic--are dead.

Two populations survive--on the east and west of the Pacific. The one that hugs the North American coast has been protected since 1947 and now is about 20,000. They thrive, delighting whale watchers with their friendly overtures towards boaters. Gray whales used to roam Florida to New England. Imagine the kind of animal tourism attraction we're missing. Right in Florida we'd probably have the same magical, close-up whale watching experience people now trek to Baja to get.

The Asian population is anemic--only 100 to 200. Even though nobody is supposed to be hunting it. And no one is sure if the two populations touch.


Where to Go to See Whales

Wildlife Rescuers in Gulf Overwhelmed--By Volunteers, Not Patients

Oiled gull in CA in 2007 by Ingrid Taylar. Not many oiled birds seen yet in the gulf.

So far only a single bird, a Northern Gannett, has shown up oiled from the massive Deepwater Horizon spill. Wildlife rescuers and nonetheless overwhelmed--by all the untrained human volunteers.

As the potential for the spill gets bigger, the big wildlife groups are contemplating holding training classes to equip the would-be volunteers, says Kai Williams, executive director of the International Wildlife Rehabilitation Council.


Right now several groups are taking in information from potential volunteers.  The National Wildlife Federation is directing people to sign up with the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana.

 "If you have the ability to restain an animal, that's going to be huge, just the basic ability to hold an animal," says Williams. "They're getting a lot of untrained people, not wildlife rehabilitators, people who have never picked up a bird."

What makes planning the response so hard is no one knows how big this still-developing catastrophe is going to be or when and where a rush of injured animals will show up. Some contemplate that the Gulf Stream could wrap it around Florida. Some worry the spill could end up bigger than Valdez. Williams notes that fewer birds live in Valdez, but there are also turtles and marine mammals to worry about.

The northern gannet is being bathed, fed electrolytes and pepto bismal, but rough weather this weekend prevented picking up more patients. A caretaker told the AP that the bird came in brown, but should be white at its current age.


Nationally, three groups are known for their training in helping animals that have gotten coated in oil.

• International Bird Rescue Research Center, based in California, started when after 1971 spill by the Golden Gate Bridge killed 96% of birds collected. 
• Tri-State Bird is based in Delaware and handles spills up and down the east coast. They offers training for general bird care and oil spills. Tri-State started after a 1976 spill in the Delaware River.
• Oiled Wildlife Care Network would help manage the turtles and marine mammals potentially hurt by the spill. Also based in California, the center has posted channels for volunteers in different states.

Where to Go to See Wildlife
Where to Go See Wildlife Down South

How Will the Gulf's Dead Zone Impact the Oil Spill?

The Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico may collide with an area already bedeviled by environmental catastrophe, the infamous Dead Zone--an area of essentially no life or oxygen. So what happens when an inexorable oil slick meets and an undead patch of water?

The Gulf's Dead Zone is about 6,000 to 7,000 square miles, one of the biggest in the world, Microbial Life Educational Resources of Carleton College says. It's caused by fertilizer run-off in the Mississippi overfeeding algae. Phytoplankton gobble up the algae--and all the oxygen. Scientists call the areas hypoxia--or low oxygen. They can't support life.

The oil spill so far is smaller, about 1,800 square miles. So far.

Right now the dead zone is west of the Mississippi and the oil spill is east of it. The dead zone is mainly at the bottom, which is littered with phytoplankton carcasses. The oil is on top.

But Nancy N. Rabalais, Ph.D., executive director of Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium thinks they're likely to meet.

"If the winds continue from the southeast as is common this time of year, then the surface manifestation may move to the west of the Mississippi River delta and become a surface feature of the Louisiana area of hypoxia," says

Some seem to have fantasized that the oil burn off will end up cleaning up the dead zone. Not so, says Rabalais. "The burn would reduce the more volatile and toxic components," [in the oil] she says, but not burn off the algae.

The algae isn't going to slow the oil down, she says, but the oil may slow down the production of algae:

"The movement of the oil would not be affected by where the area of low oxygen may be. Algal production if the oil were to come into the low oxygen would probably be reduced in productivity because of the proximity of the oil."


The dead zone won't necessarily have cleared out the wildlife; it's too soon to tell, she says. While the dead zone is indeed dead to most sea life like plants and fish, birds and marine mammals pass through: "The area of low oxygen does not affect birds and marine mammals because they are air breathers and the marine mammals and turtles can reach the surface of the water for atmospheric air."

The impact she expects is the oil will calm that waters of the dead zone. There will be less oxygen transfer from surface air into surface waters. The waters will stratify. The oil would cut back on the production of phytoplankton at the surface. And the oil and dead zone could pinch in on organisms caught between the top and bottom.


Perhaps the biggest impact is that the oil spill may decimate the wetlands--the wetlands the government had been building up in hopes of filtering water of fertilizers to short-circuit the dead zone. So much for that.

Several Manatees Swimming Toward Danger and the Oil Spill; Mobile May Release Dammed Waters

Biologists know that a handful of manatees are in the Gulf of Mexico and swimming westward--toward the massive Deepwater Horizon oil spill, but so far they have decided not to try to intervene. Mobile Bay officials may release dammed waters to push the oil away from the bay, a local scientist says.

A female manatee that spends the summer in Mobile Bay is now in Appalachicola Bay, FL, says Ruth H. Carmichael, senior marine scientist at the Dauphin Island Sea Lab, which is bracing for the oil slick.  Appalachicola Bay is roughly 250 miles from Mobile--if you take the shore route. They can swim up to 45 miles a day, but 5-15 is more likely.

"I hope she finds a nice location to wait for a while," Carmichael says. "The USGS also has a few tagged manatees they know are moving this way.  We are doing nothing to move or disturb the animals.  Right now the oil is offshore and the manatees are in shore.  We need to trust them to take care of themselves for now."

Manatees spend the winter near hot springs or power plants in Florida, but as their population has recovered, they are swimming further in the summer. A few now regularly visit Alabama and every few years a young male makes it up to New England.  

"Mobile Bay is trying to arrange for discharge of dammed waters , if needed, to force water out of the Bay and keep it westward off shore," Carmichael says. "Mississippi may be in greater danger.. but it is difficult to predict what will happen.  This is a terrible event. Discovering a third leak was tragic."

Where to Go to See Animals Down South

Where to See Manatees

Killer Whale Tilly Father to One-Quarter Captive Orcas

Shamu Rocks, at Orlando SeaWorld
courtesy of Miss Quarel.

The horrific killing trainer Dawn Brancheau at Sea World by the orca Tilikum, or Tilly, prompted Sea World to indefinitely close its killer whale shows. But the Tilly problem is a long-term one. He fathered 10 of the current 42 other captive orcas around the world--nearly one-quarter of the stock.

Many blame the attack on the whole practice of holding these huge, sociable whales captive to entertain us. Jennifer Viegas at Discovery reports that Tilly, a stud whale, may have had high testosterone levels or swings. That's what made him the most successful male killer whale captive breeder, siring a record 17 calves, 10 of which are still alive, Viegas says. His offspring include Unna, Sumar, Tuar, Tekoa, Nakai,, Kohana, Ikaika , Skyla,  Malia and Ky, who attacked a trainer in San Antonio in 2004. Plus, he has at least one grandchild.

That means nearly one-quarter of the killer whales held in captivity around the world and nearly half the 22 held by SeaWorld are related to a killer whale with high testosterone and high aggression. Even if he weren't a flawed individual, that's a terribly inbred population. But now that he's been very publicly involved in three attacks on people, it highlights how misguided these breeding programs might be. Would you keep breeding the dog that attacks and kills people? 


But breeders probably had little choice but to rely on Tilly. No other male was anywhere near that productive. Killer whales are the biggest animal bred in captivity and one of the most difficult. Yet public uproar and conservation laws have all but prevented the capture of more orcas since 1989 (with the exception of 10 captured in Taiji, Japan, the notorious home of The Cove of dolphin slaughter and capture, the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society says). A live, captive orca would fetch about $600,000, they say in their report Captive Orcas: Dying to Entertain You.

Tilly was born in about 1981 and captured two years later off Iceland. By then SeaWorld had worn out its welcome capturing killer whales in the Pacific Northwest. If he were wild, he would still be living in his mother's pod, but he's mainly been kept in isolation. Like many captive orcas, his dorsal fin flops to the side from too much swimming in circles.

Tilly is going to be hugely influential in the killer whale captive population. He may just be the one that convinced people to set them free.

Where to See Whales in the Wild

The Cute Seal Video NOAA Doesn't Want You to See

This is just the sort of video that the folks at NOAA, who enforce the Marine Mammal Protection Act, don't want you to see. Here's a woman snuggling with an elephant seal, who is clearly nuzzling back. She's off on the remote South Georgia Island (where Shackleton sought rescue), between Argentina and Antarctica.

These uninhabited island have become like little Galapagos, with animals that are now not so scared of people. (They probably were more wary when it was the base for seal-hunting and whaling operations). Wildlife officials always remind you that seals will bite.

The woman seems to follow the standard procedure for interacting with most wild animals: sit still and wait for the animal to come to you. The seal keeps sniffing her face and even climbs over her. (And, no, he didn't have designs on her; elephant seal mating is much more violent.)

One guide near Canterbury, England, Wildlife Sailing, even offers a tour to a sandbank where you can swim with seals. "No need to swim to them they swim to us!" they say. Who knows what seals would do with human visitors if hunting them stopped completely?

Chinese Workers Save Ice-Blocked Harbor Seals

Animal-watching must be catching on in China. Government workers broke the ice to free 60 resident harbor seals trapped by a cold spell, then fed them fish.  Xinhuanet describes the rescuers as "workers of the scenic area."

Even the big Chinese news agency views the animals plight with sympathy. "Poor Harbor Seals Trapped by Ice," read the headline of their adorable slideshow.

Zinhuanet says the rescuers work at "ecological seal bay near Yantai City." I think they're talking about this giant tourist project, the Great Nanshan Ecological Park. Whatever the place is, they seem to realize how much people like to watch animals. Or maybe they're just suckers for a cute, whiskered face.

429 Dead Manatees found Last Year out of Population of 4,000; Only 37 Called Natural Deaths

A record 429 manatees were found dead off Florida last year out of a delicate population of just about 4,000. Could it be good news, reflecting a growing population? After all the the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission counted a record 3,807 manatees in their aerial surveys last year.


Not so fast, says the FWC:  "The situation is not that simple. Both the carcass totals and the annual counts from statewide aerial surveys are considered minimum numbers only, and they cannot be used to calculate long-term population trends." In other words, both the 400 and 4,000 are wild-ass guesses (WAG)--though maybe scientific wild-ass guess (SWAG).

Last year was really cold, so the manatees crowded the power plants and springs like never before, making for stunning pictures (like the one here by  Tom Reinert) and high counts. But that's not a complete or accurate count. The cold was a big factor: 56 died from cold stress, more than double the five-year average.

But there were record deaths from other factors, too. The data show only 37 were found to have died of natural causes. That doesn't mean people killed all the rest. Humans were directly tied to 97 from boats, 5 from locks and gates and 7 from other human-related causes. The rest are somewhat a mystery and manatee advocates think humans are tied to many more. 114 were described as "perinatal," just meaning they were very young, and they believe many are really tied to people.

What are we doing to stop killing manatees? The Fish and Wildlife Service is thinking about expanding manatee protection areas. Predictably speed boaters hate that and so does the U.S. Navy. FWS spokesman Chuck Underwood intimated to the LA Times that any big expansion is more or less dead in the water.

Where can you can see manatees?

Where can you see more wildlife down south?

More Manatee News

Will the FWS protect manatees from annoying tourists? 

Meet the Manatee profiler

Manatee Tours that Won't Bother the Manatees

Crystal River 2009, Kevin provides a belly rub (dogs of the sea) ,
originally uploaded by Kevin King.

Other marine mammals have etiquette standards. The Whale Sense or Dolphin Smart programs give tourists list of operators that play nice. But who's smart about the 3,000 manatees left in the U.S.?

As an endangered species and marine mammal, manatees area already supposed to be protected, but go on YouTube and search "manatee harassment." You'll find videos of tourists coralling and chasing manatees, separating the mom and calf and even trying to ride or kick them. It's like Crystal River, FL, tour operators live in a 1950s world where they feel entitled to sell the experience of touching, petting and scratching manatees. Do they then drive home without seatbelts into a house lined with asbestos and eat canned soup casserole for dinner? Haven't they heard that's not how you treat wild animals?


"It's this culture of everybody that come to Crystal River," says manatee advocate Tracy Colson. "It's well-advertised that this is the only place where you can touch a manatee. It's the only place in the world where you can interact with an endangered species."

Tracy, a local, started volunteering with the Crystal River Wildlife Refuge by going out to guide manatee tourists to be respectful and was so upset with what she saw she started her own company, Nature Coast Kayak Tours.  In 2007 Save the Manatee named Tracy and Steve Kingery manatee heroes for documenting manatee harassment, which kicked off a controversy and push the Fish and Wildlife Service to crack down. (Manatee advocates don't want to stop all manatee tours, just ones that annoy manatees and drive them out of the warm waters they need in the winter.)

"There's something to the swim with- programs that would be a great help to the mantee," says Colson. "If you have that magical experience, it's going to make you a strong advocate." I get as excited as anyone seeing a wild animal, so it's easy to see how some one could become over eager to make a manatee connection. But, like most animal tourists I know, I don't want to do anything that hurts the animal. So I asked Tracy to give out-of-towners some tips so we don't unwittingly help the bad guys. It can be hard to pick out a good tour because many go through the motions.

The programs that reign in whale and dolphin tours amount to this: don't bother the animals or make it look like you do in your ads. You stand still and if the animal wants to come close, it will.

TIPS ON FINDING A RESPONSIBLE TOUR

* Ask them if you're allowed to touch or approach a manatee.

* Is their website all about party and adventure?

* Do they show pictures of people petting, kissing, tickling, riding or otherwise molesting manatees?

* Look for a small operation and small boat. While it's better for whales if everyone is on one big boat, it's better for manatees if there are small boats and small groups, where the mob mentality hasn't taken over.

SOME GREAT TOURS

Manatees in Paradise
Husband and wife, Captain Mike and Stacy Dunn, help with manatee rescue and bay clean up. Their pontoon boat only holds up to six. $25 per person, plus wet suit rental. 1223 North Crystal Drive, Crystal River, FL
352-563-0865 cell 352-601-5520

Nature's Connection
Capt. Hank rides with up to 12 on 3 1/2 hour tours.
$50 including wet suit.
267 N.W. 3Rd. St. Crystal River, Fl. 34429
capthankstours@yahoo.com 352-697-0220

Aardvark’s Florida Kayak Company

Save the Manatees works with wildlife biologist 707 N Citrus Avenue, Crystal River, FL
(352) 795-5650 info@FloridaKayakCompany.com

Native Vacations comes highly recommended by Passport Magazine and manatee fans. Dedicated manatee lover Traci Wood offers private 6-hour snorkel tours ($400 for up to 4 people) or $35 (plus equipment fees) 3-hour tour.


Nature Coast Kayak Tours
Tracy Colson volunteers to clean out the waterway, rescue manatees and document manatee harassment. Her 3 1/2 hour tours are $40, including all equipment.
(352) 795-9877 or 888-795-9877 toll free
Adventure Outpost
Lars Andersen, who writes guides on paddling and the area, leads kayak tours of many waterways. $39
386-454-0611


Wild Florida Adventures
Brack Barker used to be a parks ranger and enforcement officer.

Williston, FL (352) 528-3984 Tours@wild-florida.com


 

Ilya the Manatee Recovering, Impressing Ladies with His Sweetness

Ilya, the Florida manatee rescued from New York harbor two weeks ago, should be well enough to be released in the Florida Keys in about a month, says Dr. Maya Rodriguez, the veterinarian at the Miami Seaquarium, which supplied the picture of Ilya (left) swimming with his poolmate.

"We expect him to get a clean medical mill in next couple weeks," says Dr. Rodriguez. Identified by his mangled tail and white scar on his forehead, Ilya at least didn't pick up any new distinguishing scars on his journey up to Cape Cod that perplexed marine biologists. 

Stuck in the cold water of New York harbor, Ilya initially suffered cold stress, which can shut down manatees' long digestive track and immune system. He lost about 100 of his 1,200 pounds, had low blood sugar and was having trouble digesting, Dr. Rodriguez says. A video (below) of the event shows him getting wrapped in mylar survival blankets and getting spritzed with water to keep moist.

Ilya is recuperating in a 82 degree saltwater pool at the Seaquarium with an orphaned, female,  18-month-old manatee picked up in the Everglades and named Glade. Normally Dr. Rodriguez would be reluctant to put such a big male in with her but Ilya has been very gentle. "He's just a really docile manatee," Dr. Rodriguez says. 

Ilya is unusual among manatees, which normally handle food just with their prehensible lips, because he grabs with his flippers. "He's all flippers," says Dr. Rodriguez. Ilya, who touches noses with Glade, has even taught his new companion to pick up lettuce with flippers.

Since the water in Florida is still warm, Dr. Rodriguez will wait a bit to release him so he isn't tempted to head north again. Manatees need to stay in Florida (often by the warm water of hot springs or power plant outflows) over the winter but migrate in all directions away in the summer. Ilya was caught on the third attempt near the outflow of the Conoco-Phillips in the Arthur Kill, which separates New Jersey from Staten Island. 

Ilya kept coming back for the 75 degree water even though it was in a heavily industrialized area; the rest of the harbor was in the 50s. Plant workers kept a close eye out for him and alerted rescuers when he returned. The video shows the rescue workers lining up and splashing the water to goad him towards the giant net. A huge team of oil workers, volunteers from the Marine Mammal Stranding Center, local EMT divers and federal wildlife agencies pitched in to save the endangered manatee.

Wanna see a manatee at one of the places they huddle to keep warm this winter? Try these hotspots.

PEER to Sue for More Manatee Sanctuaries after Disturbing Videos of Manatee Harassment

About two years ago some local Florida manatee lovers took some disturbing video of tourists and tour guides pestering manatees. Tracy Colson and Steve Kingry posted shots on YouTube of tour guides holding manatees so that tourists could touch them. Some tourists also kicked them and tried to sit on the sea cows. Finally, about two years later, something might actually be done to protect this endangered species whose population has dwindled to about 3,000 from Florida hooligans.

Spurred on by the videos, this summer the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) officially asked the Fish and Wildlife Service to ban "Swim with Manatee" programs. Tourists aren't supposed to get within 50 yards of dolphins or 100 yards of whales in NOAA's (voluntary) guidelines for those tour operators. But at least there is some enforcement for whale boats. NOAA also won't let tour operators show ads that have people interacting with, chasing, petting or riding whale or dolphins in the Dolphin Sense and Whale Smart programs. So how can tours advertise swimming with the far more endangered manatee?



Before I had heard about any of this going on in Florida, I saw ads online for sleazy outfits around Cancun that advertised Swim With Manatees programs. Yuck, I thought. Don't people know that manatees (or any animals) don't want to be forced to swim with them. But I had no idea there were plenty of places in Florida getting away with it, too. Then I read an incredible story travel writer Andrew Mersmann did for Passport Magazine last year about Florida manatee tours that end up harassing manatees.

Mersmann says people in the industry know exactly which are the bad ones. He went on both to see what was really going on. The captain of one tour told the groups: “It’s a good day if you see a manatee, but it’s not a great day unless you touch one.”  You are, of course, not supposed to pet the manatees any more than you're supposed to cuddle a polar bear. The difference is manatees can't fight back. And even when they try to get away, videos posted on YouTube show, the tour guides restrain them so the tourists can play.

What's wrong with swimming with manatees? Morally, if you bother manatees, they stop what they're doing. Manatees don't have frivolous hobbies; whatever they're doing, they need to do it to survive. They're an endangered species. They need to eat grass, nurse from their mothers, sleep, come up to the surface to breathe.



Legally pestering, holding, riding, kicking manatees--again, all documented--is a violation of Florida state law, the Endangered Species and the Marine Mammal Protection Act, which bans "taking" a manatee. Taking is defined doing anything on purpose or by negligence "to harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture, or collect, or to attempt to engage in any such conduct." It goes on to clarify that it includes "the restraint or detention of a marine mammal, no matter how temporary...causing disruption of behavioral patterns, including, but not limited to migration, breathing, nursing, breeding, feeding, or sheltering."

The Marine Mammal Commission has recommended not allowing people to approach within 10 feet of manatees. (If they come to you, that's fine. And that's exactly what skilled manatee watchers say will happend if people would just be patient.) The manatees, Mersmann writes often leave lagoons as soon as the tour boats show up.

In August the Fish and Wildlife Service basically said no to the request to ban the programs, reasoning, more or less, that harassing manatees was already illegal. And that they could only provide some protections to threatened animals and since manatees are already endangered--a notch worse--they're out of luck.

"They saw that harasment of mantees is illegal," says PEER staff attorney Christine Erickson. "What they're allowing people to do is causing harassment." So PEER is going to take the FWS to court. They want to get more sanctuaries set up and ban the swim with programs in the winter, which the manatees need to be in the warm shallow water to survive. The sanctuaries are small areas with the warmest water where manatees can go and people can't. The manatees know that and retreat there when they get tired of people. Let's hope this

Let's hope this finally means the manatees will get a break.

Ilya the Manatee May Be Going Wrong Way--Back to NYC

Ilya, the missing manatee, may be headed the wrong way--back up to New York City, instead of down south to Florida and the warm water he needs to survive. Someone saw what they thought was a manatee near Bayonne, NJ, but by the time rescuers came out, there was no animal, says Bob Schoelkopf, founding director of Brigantine's Marine Mammal Stranding Center, which would rescue Ilya if they could just find and catch him.

FWC photo by Tom Reinert

Ilya, who is 16 and known for his missing tail chunk and a white scar on his head, befuddled scientists by swimming from his native Miami all the way up to Cape Cod this summer. Now he needs to get to waters at least 68 degrees--the Carolinas at this time of year--or he could die.

The last time anyone definitely saw Ilya was when he ate a crate of lettuce from biologists outside the Conoco Phillips refinery in Linden, NJ, last Friday. Then he disappeared into the dark, cold waters of the Arthur Kill, the 10-mile tidal estuary between New Jersey and Staten Island. If that was him near Bayonne, that puts him in the Kill Van Kull, a shorter passage that's a few miles closer to the Statue of Liberty, Manhattan and the heavy traffic of the Port of Newark.

But rescuers are dubious it really was Ilya. It's not so much that they think there's a second manatee up here--though one did spend the summer in Raritan Bay. Schoelkopf says he didn't get the spotter's name (and manatee identification credentials) and the call came in eight hours after the supposed encounter. Marine creatures can just be hard to ID. "I've had Coast Guard people tell me there's a whale and calf trying to get up a waterfall and we get there and it's two logs," he says. Manatees are such a rare sight, people--especially northerners--could easily get it wrong. When seals turn up in winter, Schoelkopf says, he gets calls about "sea lions, walruses, anything."

Ilya was drawn to Linden by the plant's warm water discharge, so Schoelkopf called four power plants on the Jersey Shore to ask them to look out for Ilya. In Florida, power plants have become such a popular hang-out in the winter, biologists from Florida's Fish and Wildlife Commission use the gathering to take a census. The New Jersey plants area already on the look-out for stranded sea turtles, who are also drawn to their warm water, Schoelkopf explains. (A rare and endangered Green Sea Turtle recently turned up in Rumson with cold shock, he says.) In northern New Jersey, the Linden plant is the only one.

If anyone does see the manatee, the stranding network is ready to go with a net at a moment's notice. They have a salt water they put on the ideal manatee temperature of 74 this week just for Ilya. If they can catch him, they'll bring him to Brigantine and warm him up for a few days before getting him to Florida, probably by an awaiting Coast Guard cargo plane.

If you see the manatee, call the Marine Mammal Stranding Center's 24-hour number: (609) 266-0538. Try to take a picture and email it to mmsc@verizon.net

Wanna see a manatee not in danger? Try these places.

Ilya the Travelling Manattee Missing Again

Ilya, the manatee that reappeared off Staten Island Thursday--way too far north for his safety--has gone missing again, thwarting any attempt to rescue him from the cold waters. Ilya ate a whole case of lettuce "and was last seen going back into the river," says Chuck Underwood, a spokesman for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. "This was late yesterday afternoon, and there's been no sighting of the animal since then."

Ilya, a 16-year-old manatee distinguished by his boat scars (a white one on his head and a missing chunk of tail), surprised biologists this summer by migrating all the way up to Cape Cod from his Florida home. Now he's racing the cold weather--and seems to have been entranced by the false promise of warmth from the warm water run-off of an oil refinery in Elizabeth, NJ. The spot that he's at is warm enough, says Underwood, but the rest of the Arthur Kill tidal estuary dips below his requisite 68 degrees. That means he should be in North Carolina by now, according to NOAA's water temperature map. That's about 200 miles, or three or four days manatee travel.

Biologists figured Ilya was safely headed to warmer waters after he wasn't seen since an appearance in Milford, CT, on September  26. Then he showed up in a heavily industrial area. Underwood won't say exactly where--but it's guarded private property anyway.

The Brigantine Marine Mammal Stranding Station has plans to rescue him--if they can find him and catch him. Rescuers typically keep manatees at risk in place by offering them food and the fresh water they crave. But that sometimes has the effect of buoying their spirits so much they take off. The rescuers were put off by the bad weather Saturday--and had other rescues to do.


Want to See a Manatee in the Wild? Check out this map and list of places.

Cape Cod Shark Update: Look Further Up the Coast, Captain Says

Yesterday we reported on how the Great White Sharks that are closing beaches on Cape Cod are also drawing shark tourists. Today another seal boat captain tells us they're looking in the wrong spot.

Captain Keith Lincoln of Monomoy Island Ferry says that people are mistakenly hanging around Chatham Lighthouse since that's where the shark was first sighted by kayakers a eating a seal in August. "That is all due to the misleading information given by the media," says Captain Keith. "Massachusetts Department of Fisheries page shows all the taggings being done three miles south of the lighthouse near the area where South Beach and South Monomoy Island attached in 2006."

Looking at the Fisheries map here, he's totally right. Excellent tip, Captain Keith. (Though they do also show pictures of sharks offshore of the lighthouse.) He also warns that even if you're in the right place, the odds of seeing a shark are pretty impossible. The tagging teams use spotters on planes and perches 35 feet out of the water.
Captain Keith reports he's "calls about seeing the sharks, which is nearly impossible to guarantee." I think the seal tourists of Cape Cod have gotten spoiled; the tour boats can guarantee sightings because they're dealing with the east coast's biggest colony of gray seals, which is somewhere around 10,000. Normally wildlife watching is no sure thing.

Captain Keith, a 20-year veteran of the seal tours, says the sharks (and attendant media frenzy) come every year. "I think this year is a little different in that the sharks showed up in a large number all at once." The seal cruises have been popular since 1991 and continue to get more popular with a new tour company starting this year, amid the recession, Captain Keith says. "So that alone tells you people are interested in the seals." He doesn't anticipate any shark frenzy curbing enthusiasm for the seals. A bigger threat to the tours are the shifting sandbars and regulations about where they can dock, he says.

Seeing sharks is pretty iffy, but if you go out this fall, you can see lots of shorebirds like oystercatchers and sea ducks like eiders, scoters, and buffleheads. And in June, Monomoy is the Cape's best spot to see mating horseshoe crabs pile on the beach. Overall their populations are down about 90% on Cape Cod in the last few decades, but researchers have shown that Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge has some of the highest densities left

Meanwhile, if you really want to see a shark off Cape Cod, check out this guy at Nantucket Shark Dives, who does shark dives with chum 30 miles off Nantucket and gets to see lots of blue sharks.
Where to See Seals (and maybe sharks). The tours often require a minimum group to make it worth their while to go out as their business tapers off in the fall.
Monomoy Island Ferry
Usually runs April - December
90-minute cruise
Adults $30, Kids 15 and under $25
Look for signs for the Rip Ryder Monomoy Island Ferry and USFWS Headquarters.

BeachcomberChatham's Municipal Fish Pier on Shore Rd.
(508) 945-5265
Adults $27, Seniors $25, Kids 3 -15 $23, Kids under 3 are free.
Blue Claw Boat Tours
Orleans
Adults $25, Kids 12 and under $20
(508) 240-5783

From Nantucket (year-round)
Shearwater Excursions
(508) 228-7037
2.5 hours to Muskeget Island
Town Pier in downtown Nantucket.
$90 Adults, $70 Children under 12

• Where to See Seals in the U.S. and Canada
• Where to See Sharks
• More Places to See Wildlife in the Northeast

Sharks (& The East Coast's Biggest Seal Colony) Draw Tourists

When news got out that Chatham, MA's, gray seal colony--the biggest on the east coast--was drawing sharks that closed beaches, a funny thing happened. Or didn't happen. Instead of running away scared, more tourists came to this little town on Cape Cod's elbow to see some sharks, hoping for a picture, or at least a glimpse.

"It's a big draw," says Lisa Franz, executive director of the Chatham Chamber of Commerce. "We have traffic jams... People are still walking in today and saying 'Where can we see them?'"

Tony LaCasse, a former veteran Boston TV newsman, says years ago local TV news would've been filled with scared would-be swimmers. But that was before years of education that drilled home how very unlikely it is to be bitten, let alone eaten, by a great white shark in New England. (Last fatal attack: 1936) Now we get shark tourists. "It's a long way from Jaws," says LaCasse, where the premise was they couldn't possibly close the beach on the Fourth of July.

The sharks are coming because the water is (briefly) warm and because the seal population has grown unchecked--well, that is, until the sharks showed up. Seal populations were kept artificially low for decades--maybe centuries. Until the 1960s, Massachusetts even paid a bounty for each seal ("a nickel a nose" in the early 1900s). Now seals are making a comeback. Cape has the biggest population on the American east coast, with roughly 10,000 (no one's done a formal count since 1999, when it was 5,600), according to the National Marine Fisheries Service 2008 report on gray seals. A few hundred live on the islands off Maine. but the U.S. population of gray seals is dwarfed by the Canadian one: More than 200,000 on Sable Island, Nova Scotia and 20,000 on the St. Lawrence.

In August kayakers spotted a great white shark munching on a seal near Chatham Lighthouse. Five sharks were seen close enough to the shore that cautious to the shore and surfers to close beaches over Labor Day. Mind you, beaches closed two weekends earlier for strong waves and that didn't make the evening news.

So far, however, the sharks are hard to see off Cape Cod. (Though plenty of places elsewhere cater to shark tourists.) Paula St. Pierre, who has run the Beachcomber tours out of Chatham for 11 years, says she hasn't seen any of the characteristic dorsal fins herself. "I don't want to see any," she says, at least not chasing the seals. "I saw one seal out there yesterday that had a big chunk taken out and shortly afterwards expired."

If you're looking for sharks, go to their meal, the seals. Some people go to the beach by Chatham Lighthouse (where seals hang out) to try to see some fins in the water, but the best bet for seeing the most seals or maybe even a dorsal fin are the seal boats.

Even if you don't get to see a great white, you'll get surprisingly close to the seals, which often approach the tour boats, St. Pierre says. "Seals come right up to the boat," she says. "They're as curious about us as we are about them. Not only can you see them, you can smell them." When sharks appeared in the past, the seals have even turned to the seal tourists for help. "In years past seals have tried to climb in the boat," when they've been afraid of sharks in the water, St. Pierre says. She had to fight the urge to help them up like a dog.

Seal-watching has become its own mini-industry on the Cape, with Beachcombers taking out 200 people a day at the peak of summer. About a half dozen seal tour operators line the coast.

No one is sure what will happen if the seals continue to draw such large numbers of sharks. Will there be a movement to get the seals to leave? (Tricky, because of the Marine Mammal Protection Act and certainly controversial.) Will Chatham have to install shark nets like they have in Australia? Or will shark tours move in to boost the economy?

"Summer would be a whole different story," says Franz. "September, it's like whoo-hoo, we've got a good shoulder season." Meanwhile, seal and shark watchers can get shoulder season rates now. And come winter, when the seal population peaks with migrants from Canada, you can get an even better deal to see a huge seal colony.

Where to See Seals (and maybe sharks). The tours often require a minimum group to make it worth their while to go out as their business tapers off in the fall.

Beachcomber
Chatham's Municipal Fish Pier on Shore Rd.
(508) 945-5265
Adults $27, Seniors $25, Kids 3 -15 $23, Kids under 3 are free.

Monomoy Island Ferry
90-minute cruise
Adults $30, Kids 15 and under $25
Look for signs for the Rip Ryder Monomoy Island Ferry and USFWS Headquarters.

Blue Claw Boat Tours
Orleans
Adults $25, Kids 12 and under $20
(508) 240-5783

From Nantucket (year-round)
Shearwater Excursions
(508) 228-7037
2.5 hours to Muskeget Island
Town Pier in downtown Nantucket.
$90 Adults, $70 Children under 12

• Where to See Seals in the U.S. and Canada
• Where to See Sharks
• More Places to See Wildlife in the Northeast

The Dolphins NOAA Wouldn't Let Others Save Have Died

Last summer a pod of 16 dolphins swam up the Shrewsbury River in New Jersey. When winter came, they didn't leave. So the Marine Mammal Stranding Center wanted to shoo them out. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said no. They were worried that trying to push the dolphins one way could make them go further under the ice--which has happened before. But in a broader sense their argument against action was: let nature take its course; we can't save all the wild animals.

Now the fifth dolphin has turned up dead.
In January we knew of five left, then didn't see them anymore.

So far scientists haven't been able to conclusively id one of the dead dolphins as part of that pod since its 8 1/2 foot carcass has rotted so much.

The argument against hurting the dolphins by trying to rescue them seems to have fallen apart. All that's left is the philosophical bent of NOAA. It doesn't seem fair that since the marine mammal stranding center, whose whole expertise is helping these animals in New Jersey, wanted to do its job without any taxpayer support that NOAA should have gotten in the way.

Last NJ Dolphins Escape Icy River--Maybe

The last of 16 dolphins who have been up the Shrewsbury River in New Jersey since the summer may have escaped back to the ocean. Witnesses at Bahr's Landing restaurant say they saw three to five dolphins on January 15, but haven't seen them swim back in.

Of course, it's very easy to imagine dolphins slipping by even the most diligent watchers--let alone people otherwise occupied with eating and working in a restaurant. But it's nice to think they got out. Bob Schoelkopf, co-director of the Marine Mammal Stranding Center in Brigantine says the last time he saw them they were thin and weak.

Over the summer 16 dolphins were spotted in the river--much to everyone's excitement and worry, first about boating accidents and then about the ice.

In 1993 dolphins drowned in the river after it froze; people had tried to shoo them out to sea, but they went under the ice.

So far this year three dolphins have turned up dead.

The Marine Mammal Stranding Center, alone with many dolphin watchers and lovers, wanted to try to push or lure them out to sea. But the federal officials in charge of dolphins, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, wouldn't let them. Not even if they did the rescue work on their own. They claimed that the dolphins were just trying to expand their territory and people should stand back and let them. The Chronicle Herald in Canada ran an obnoxious headline on an AP story: Group fights science to save ‘frightened’ dolphins.

It's amazing to find these Bush administration officials embracing science at all. Or evolution--they seem to be arguing that if the dolphins die it's part of some natural selection process. I can understand not wanting to spend federal money to attempt a rescue, but banning a private, highly trained rescue group is going way too far. It's debatable whether it's worthwhile, but if someone decides it's worthwhile for them, who is NOAA to stand in the way?

Saying that we can't possibly interfere with nature is ridiculous. We interfere with nature all the time. We fish, hunt, pollute, develop. We also rehabilitate wildlife in every state. I certainly hope in the Obama administration we're allowed once again to save a handful of wild animals without government interference.

Photo by Jackie, Sister72

More Than One-Third of Mammal Species In Jeopardy

International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) announced its new Red List today, showing that mammals on earth are in real trouble. We now have 5,487 mammal species. That's down 76 (or 1.3%) since 1500.
But we know that 1,141 mammal species are officially endangered and at risk of becoming extinct. That's more than 20% of our mammals. But there's another problem: we can't even find enough another 836 mammals to figure out their status. They're listed as "data deficient."
“The reality is that the number of threatened mammals could be as high as 36 percent,” says Jan Schipper, of Conservation International who wrote about the findings in the magazine Science.
About 3.4% of mammal species fall into the worst category, Critically Endangered.
They're not all charismatic megafauna. A lot of the animals in trouble are bats and mice.
But one critically endangered is the Iberian Lynx (Lynx pardinus). There's less than 200 left because it eats the European Rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus), which is also disappearing.

Best Places to See Wild Cats
Where to See Animals in Europe

Prince Edward Islanders watching seal colony for sixty years

Yesterday David, Jolly and I got to see a huge colony of grey and harbor seals living on an island wildlife sanctuary on Prince Edward Island Canada. The Captain of Marine Adventures told us he'd been doing the tours for nine years and that the tour had been running since the early 1980s. He also mentioned that he recently had a 64-year-old woman passenger who said that her father used to take her out to see the seals when she was a little girl. It's fun to think of how long people have enjoyed just going out to see the seal colony.

The captain told us that a few years ago the seals were counted and there were about 300, but he now thinks there are less, somewhere between 200 and 300. The seal pups were wiped out in recent winters because there was no ice to protect them when a storm hit.

I couldn't count how many we saw sunning themselves on a sandbar with some cormorants and gulls. Or swimming out in the water to watch us. Some kept bobbing up behind the boat like they were following us. I asked the captain whether some people threw them fish--a tactic that more than one passenger on our cruise discussed. He said, no, it was illegal to feed them, but that maybe that's what they were looking for from the boats. Fishermen would shoot them if they saw them behind their boats, he said.

Generally this wasn't one of those narrative trips. We went out saw the seals and some mussel colonies, asked whatever questions we had. Fine. We really appreciated their letting Jolly come aboard. He just laid down and was fussed over by two sweet little girls. If Jolly wasn't able to go, David would've stayed on shore to watch him. We learned from our whale watch in Campobello that when a dog barks at a seal colony, all the seals dive into the water. So, it would be understandable if the captain didn't want Jolly. But instead of just banning dogs, he asked whether Jolly would bark.

Where to See More Seals



How to See More Wildlife in Canada