Page 28 - aruba-today-24dec-2016

A28 SCIENCE
Saturday 24 december 2016
Mexico plans to catch, protect last few vaquita porpoises

MARK STEVENSON group of experts in acous- thousands of dollars ille- also a sort of admission of 28 active totoaba nets and
Associated Press tic monitoring, porpoise gally catching the totoaba defeat for Mexico’s efforts removed dozens of other
MEXICO CITY (AP) — So few capture, veterinary medi- fish, whose swim bladder is to save the vaquita in its abandoned “ghost” nets
of Mexico’s vaquita por- cine and other specialties a prized delicacy in China, natural habit, which includ- that keep catching and
poises remain that the inter- to carry out the effort. have chafed at the restric- ed banning gillnets and killing fish and other marine
national committee to pro- “The team is the best that tions and Navy patrols that compensating fishermen in life.
tect the endangered spe- can be put together in limit their fishing to protect much of the upper gulf. “Ghost nets are a clear
cies is preparing to catch the world. It is the ‘dream the vaquita. If the porpoise “The navy is carrying out and present danger to the
and enclose as many as it team,’” he said. is gone, fishermen may de- heroic efforts” to patrol rapidly dwindling vaquita
can in a last-ditch effort to Mexico’s environment scend in droves and finish the area and prevent fish- population,” Vidal wrote.
save them from extinction, department said a re- off the totoaba and other ermen from setting out il- “We are doing all we can,
experts said Thursday.
It will be a risky effort, be-
cause the species has nev-
er been held successfully in
captivity.
According to rough esti-
mates, only about three
dozen of the world’s small-
est porpoise remain in the
upper Gulf of California,
the only place it lives. With
population numbers falling
by 40 percent annually —
there were 60 alive a year
ago — there could now be
as few as eight breeding
females left.
Fishermen lured by Chi-
nese demand for a fish that
swims in the same waters
have apparently defeated
Mexico’s efforts to protect
the vaquita in its natural
habitat. Lorenzo Rojas-Bra-
cho, chairman of the Inter- search team had been dis- species. “The species is at legal nets, Rojas-Bracho as fast as we can, to re-
national Committee for the patched in October to find risk, but so is the whole eco- said. “But the fishermen move these abandoned
Recovery of the Vaquita, appropriate sites for the en- system,” Rojas-Bracho said. have used every trick in nets and give this tiniest of
said an international team closure and had identified For those reasons, some the book,” laying out nets all porpoises a chance to
is being formed to launch two such sites. experts such as Omar Vi- at night, disguising them or survive.”
the capture program in But catch-and-enclose is dal, Mexico director of the leaving them submerged However, all that has not
the spring. “It would involve risky; the few remaining World Wildlife Fund, oppose and hard to detect. been effective, in part be-
locating them, capturing females could die during the capture plan. Vidal Also Thursday, Mexico’s cause of allegations of cor-
them and putting them capture, dooming the spe- says capture is “not a desir- federal environmental ruption or inefficiency in
in some kind of protec- cies. Breeding in captivity able or practical option for prosecutor’s office an- the fishermen compensa-
tive area,” Rojas-Bracho has successfully saved spe- the vaquita. We must strive nounced the seizure of tion program, and in part
said, adding that the cur- cies such as the red wolf to save this porpoise where eight small boats whose because of the very high
rent plan envisions putting and California condor. But it belongs: in a healthy Up- occupants were allegedly payoff: a totoaba bladder
them in a floating enclo- the vaquita has only been per Gulf of California.” fishing illegally in protect- can sell for $5,000 in the
sure or pen in a protected scientifically described Besides threatening the ed waters of the vaquita’s United States and double
bay where they would not since the 1950s and has few remaining vaquitas, habitat in the upper Gulf that in Asia. While it is un-
be endangered by fishing never been bred or even capture “will divert the ef- of California. Authorities known whether drug car-
nets. “Locating them, cap- held in captivity. forts needed to save this impounded shrimp, clams tels are involved in totoaba
turing them, there is an in- Experts also worry about porpoise, ensure long-term and fishing nets. The World trafficking, Rojas-Bracho
herent risk to everything,” what will happen if the sustainable livelihoods to Wildlife Fund, Sea Shep- notes that stopping it pres-
he said, noting “we have to flagship protected species local fishermen and their herd Conservation Society, ents some of the same
do something, as an emer- of the Gulf of California — families, and conserve the the Mexican government challenges as anti-drug ef-
gency measure.” also known as the Sea of unique Upper Gulf ecosys- and other allied groups forts. “It is a fight something
Rojas-Bracho said the com- Cortez — is removed. Local tem.” said that on recent patrols like that against drugs,” he
mittee is establishing a fishermen who can earn The capture program is they found and removed said.q