{"id":109708,"date":"2018-04-23T12:00:11","date_gmt":"2018-04-23T11:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=109708"},"modified":"2018-04-22T11:52:02","modified_gmt":"2018-04-22T10:52:02","slug":"these-whales-will-be-extinct-in-25-years-scientists-say-unless-we-act-now-to-save-them","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2018\/04\/these-whales-will-be-extinct-in-25-years-scientists-say-unless-we-act-now-to-save-them\/","title":{"rendered":"These Whales Will Be Extinct in 25 Years, Scientists Say \u2014 Unless We Act Now to Save Them"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Christy Hudak keeps a lookout for critically endangered North Atlantic right whales in Cape Cod Bay off Massachusetts.
(Jamie Cotten\/For The Washington Post)<\/p><\/div>\n

20 Apr 2018<\/em> \u2014 The crew of the research vessel Shearwater has been out on the water for six frigid hours with almost nothing to show for it.<\/p>\n

On deck, two coverall-clad observers brace themselves against the biting wind and snow, alert for the white plume of a spout or the fleeting wave of a tail.<\/p>\n

On the bridge, marine biologist Charles \u201cStormy\u201d Mayo searches, too, his brow furrowed in a deepening frown. It is early April, and these plankton-rich waters should be full of hungry animals. But all he can see are dark gray waves and dull, cloudy sky.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere the hell are the whales?\u201d he demands.<\/p>\n

For years, spring has signaled the return of North Atlantic right whales \u2014 one of Earth\u2019s most endangered species \u2014 to Cape Cod Bay.<\/p>\n

But lately the imperiled animals have acted in strange and disturbing ways. Females are having fewer calves; not a single newborn was seen this year. The whales are skipping favored feeding grounds and showing up in unusual places. And in the past 11 months, 18 whales have been found floating, dead \u2014 the worst mortality event since scientists began keeping records decades ago.<\/p>\n

In an era when species are vanishing 100 times faster than usual<\/a>, \u201cthe whales are a metaphor for what we have done to the planet,\u201d Mayo says.<\/p>\n

A century ago, humans had slaughtered nearly every right whale in the Atlantic. Now climate change seems to be shifting the animals\u2019 food source. Their habitat has been polluted with sewage and made noisy by construction and seismic tests. Speeding ships and tangles of hard-to-break fishing rope pose deadly threats.<\/p>\n

New technology and tightened regulations could protect the whales from some of the biggest hazards. Yet political efforts have stalled, lawsuits linger unresolved, and fishermen fear what potential remedies might cost them.<\/p>\n

Fewer than 450 North Atlantic right whales remain<\/a>, including just over 100 breeding females. With so many dying and so few being born, it is thought that the population will no longer be viable in 25 years unless something changes.<\/p>\n

For the first time in his career, Mayo, 74, is using a word he had long avoided: \u201cExtinction.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Christy Hudak, left, and Lauri Leach scan for a whale spout or fluke. (Jamie Cotten\/For The Washington Post)<\/p><\/div>\n

North Atlantic right whales are so strange-looking that early sailors sometimes took them for sea monsters. They are massive animals \u2014 up to 50 feet long \u2014 with broad black bodies and powerful tails. Their long arching mouths, which begin above their eyes, can open wide enough for an adult human to stand inside. But these whales eat mostly plankton, which they filter out of the seawater with long curtains of baleen. Distinctive patches of raised, roughened skin cover each right whale\u2019s head \u2014 allowing researchers to identify individual animals<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The species gets its common name from whalers, who considered the docile, oil-rich creatures the \u201cright\u201d whale to hunt. In the fishery\u2019s heyday in the 16th and 17th centuries, crews setting out from Massachusetts and New York caught as many as 100 per year. One account <\/a>describes the death of 29 right whales in Cape Cod Bay on a single day in 1700. By 1935, only about 60 remained.<\/p>\n

In subsequent decades, they gained the protection of the Endangered Species Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act, which helped boost their numbers to a peak of 482 in 2010.<\/p>\n

But then something changed, and the population started to decline again. By 2016, the last year for which reliable data <\/a>is available, it had dropped to 451.<\/p>\n

And then disaster struck.<\/p>\n

Since last June, 12 whales have been found dead in Canadian waters and six in U.S. waters<\/a>. At least three had been entangled in fishing gear and four showed blunt force trauma, most likely from being struck by ships. Some of the deaths may be consequences of the whales\u2019 unexpected appearance in the Gulf of St. Lawrence last summer. Because whales are usually rare there, Canada had few protections in place.<\/p>\n

Now it seems almost certain that the right whale population has fallen into the 430s \u2014 lower than it has been in a decade.<\/p>\n

And that does not take into account whales that may have died far out at sea, without ever being noticed by humans, said Heather Pettis, executive administrator for the North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s what scares us,\u201d she said. \u201cWe think we could only be seeing half to a third of all mortalities.\u201d<\/p>\n

If researchers have seen 18 deaths in the past 11 months, \u201cyou can\u2019t even let your mind go there,\u201d she said. \u201cIt does not take very long for irreversible damage to be done to a very small population.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

A right whale known as \u201cKleenex\u201d is entangled in fishing gear.
(Lisa Sette\/Center for Coastal Studies\/AP)<\/p><\/div>\n

On a rainy morning in a dreary conference room near the Providence, R.I., airport, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration assembled its \u201cTake Reduction Team<\/a>\u201d \u2014 a group scientists, government officials and fishery representatives \u2014 to figure out how to save the species.<\/p>\n

The discussion was heated from the start. For one thing, no one \u2014 not whale researchers, not lobster fishermen \u2014 can fully explain why right whales are so frequently ensnared in the ropes that connect lobster pots on the seafloor to buoys on the surface.<\/p>\n

Whatever causes entanglements, said Amy Knowlton<\/a>, a senior scientist at the New England Aquarium, the episodes have become worse in recent years. Improvements in rope have made the cordage stronger and therefore harder for whales to escape, leading to a surge in the number of extreme cases<\/a> of entanglement. About 85\u00a0percent of all North Atlantic right whales bear entanglement scars, and the problem now causes an average of 3.25 deaths and severe injuries per year.<\/p>\n

The number of human-caused losses that can occur without threatening the future of the population, NOAA estimates<\/a>, is fewer than one per year.<\/p>\n

An entanglement can kill a whale quickly by drowning it, or over the course of many painful months. Trailing yards of rope, often with a 50- or 60-pound lobster trap still attached, slows the animal and causes it to lose weight. The lines can cut into the flesh, opening wounds that are easily infected.<\/p>\n

Females seem to be hit the hardest, Knowlton said. Only a third of female whales that experience severe entanglement survive, and those that do are less able to have calves.<\/p>\n

Fishers have tried bunching together traps on a single line to reduce the amount of rope in the water \u2014 but entanglements keep happening. Scientists have suggested ropeless traps that could be summoned to the surface electronically \u2014 but lobstermen balked at the prices involved. Color-coding gear so it can be traced might help in tracking the most dangerous places for whales, but a fishing gear manufacturer told the group his company probably would not be able to make and sell enough distinctive rope.<\/p>\n

Erica Fuller, an attorney with the Conservation Law Foundation, observed the proceedings with growing frustration.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re facing extinction,\u201d she said afterward. \u201cWe don\u2019t have time to say nothing works, or everything is too expensive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her organization is one of several conservation groups to sue the National Marine Fisheries Service<\/a> over a recent biological opinion regarding right whales. The agency is reviewing its opinion.<\/p>\n

Fuller noted that after last year\u2019s mortalities, Canada acted quickly to implement new protections, including area closures, speed restrictions and a $167\u00a0million investment in research on endangered whale species.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think there are easy solutions,\u201d she said. \u201cBut I think there are solutions.\u201d<\/p>\n

John Haviland, president of the South Shore Lobster Fishermen\u2019s Association, was at the meeting to represent the views of fishermen who would be affected by right whale protections. But he said little as the debate ping-ponged.<\/p>\n

For the past four years, Haviland\u2019s trap-fishing grounds in Cape Cod Bay have been closed<\/a> during whale season, February through April. The closure has cost him tens of thousands of dollars, he said after the meeting. \u201cIt\u2019s like going to prison three months every year of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like most of the lobstermen who operate in the North Atlantic, Haviland has never seen an animal entangled in his lines. And even as his gear sits unused in storage, whale entanglements have gone up.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou see the angst I have?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

But Haviland is a pragmatist. After reading about Knowlton\u2019s research, he got a grant from the Massachusetts Environmental Trust to develop a sleeve that could be spliced onto ropes to lower their breaking strengths. Haviland compared the hollow, braided contraption to a Chinese finger trap that would snap when a whale pulled on it.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy thinking is, the right whales have the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act in their favor,\u201d Haviland said. \u201cThey have two things protecting them. There\u2019s nothing protecting the commercial lobster fisherman.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo why not use the best available science to coexist with the right whale?\u201d he continued. \u201cWe\u2019re trying to do the right thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

But last year, when his association applied for an exemption <\/a>to use the new product in limited areas during the seasonal closure, NOAA concluded that the use of the sleeve would not offset the additional threat to whales.<\/p>\n

Haviland\u2019s request was denied.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Charles \u201cStormy\u201d Mayo holds up his phone with an app that tracks whales. (Jamie Cotten\/For The Washington Post)<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Lauren Goodwin and Mayo view a sample of plankton.
(Jamie Cotten\/For The Washington Post)<\/p><\/div>\n

By the time the Shearwater is halfway back to harbor, the sun emerges, casting a glow over the bay. But the crew has mostly given up hope after not spotting a whale all day.<\/p>\n

Mayo descends from whalers who once hunted in these waters, and he has spent the better part of his career looking for these animals. The right whale survey program at the Center for Coastal Studies, which he founded, is the oldest such program in the world.<\/p>\n

He saw several whales feeding here just last week and didn\u2019t expect them to leave so quickly.<\/p>\n

Then again, \u201cExpectations in such a rare animal are not even expectations. They\u2019re hopes.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is the frustrating reality of studying endangered species.<\/p>\n

It is spending 20 years sounding the alarm about entanglements and seeing the issue only get worse. It is battling bad weather in search of explanations for shifting migration patterns and the decline in birthrates \u2014 not knowing whether the problems can even be solved. It is watching as existing protections \u2014 like the Marine Mammal Commission, which the Trump administration has moved to defund<\/a>, and the Endangered Species Act, which some lawmakers want to \u201cinvalidate\u201d<\/a> \u2014 come under threat.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s trying to save animals that are very hard to find and struggling for existence in a system that is going to hell,\u201d Mayo says.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Lauren Goodwin waits for the go-ahead to drop a vertical tow that collects plankton samples.
(Jamie Cotten\/For The Washington Post)<\/p><\/div>\n

Suddenly, observer Lauren Goodwin\u2019s voice comes crackling over the ship\u2019s radio: \u201cBlow!\u201d<\/p>\n

Mayo jumps to his feet and scrambles up a ladder to the deck, where Goodwin gazes through binoculars at the seemingly empty sea.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think those are fluke prints,\u201d she says. \u201cSee, there. And there.\u201d She points to smooth circles on the choppy water that are created when a whale coasts beneath the surface. \u201cIt\u2019s coming toward us!\u201d<\/p>\n

And then, barely 20 feet away, a sloping black head surfaces.<\/p>\n

Everyone on the Shearwater springs into action. Goodwin and another researcher unravel nets to collect samples of whatever the whale is eating. A third crew member pulls out a camera and starts snapping photos of the animal.<\/p>\n

Mayo crouches on the deck and gazes at the whale, captivated. With just its craggy head visible above the waves, the comparison to a sea monster seems suddenly apt.<\/p>\n

The animal makes a snuffling sound and nods, as if trying to shake something out of its baleen.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhoa, whoa!\u201d Mayo says. \u201cCool! Got something going on there.\u201d<\/p>\n

He watches for the next several minutes as the whale zigzags through the water, slurping up massive mouthfuls of plankton. During one pass, Mayo notices horizontal white marks across its back.<\/p>\n

\u201cSee the entanglement scars?\u201d he calls out.<\/p>\n

Later, the Center for Coastal Studies will identify the whale as a female called 4617. She\u2019s only 2 years old, at least eight years away from being able to breed.<\/p>\n

The young animal has been seen in Cape Cod Bay before, but her scars are new \u2014 a testament to the risky world in which she is growing up.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s distracting, I guess, simply to know what she will go through in her life,\u201d Mayo says. \u201cHer life will be shorter. And that shortened life, because it\u2019s shorter, will threaten the population. .\u2009.\u2009. Her future is not a good one.\u201d<\/p>\n

For now, 4617 seems healthy. She has made it to Cape Cod. Her scars, though troubling, are relatively minor. And the food samples the scientists just collected suggest that she has found plenty to eat.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not much, but it\u2019s something.<\/p>\n

With a flip of her flukes, the whale plunges into a dive, and the Shearwater continues on its way. By the time she resurfaces, 4617 is just a small, dark spot on the horizon, barely visible in the fading light.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

A critically endangered North Atlantic right whale dives for plankton on April 2, 2018, in Cape Cod Bay. (Jamie Cotten\/For The Washington Post)<\/p><\/div>\n

___________________________________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Sarah Kaplan is a science reporter covering news from around the nation and across the universe. She previously worked overnights on<\/em> The Washington Post’s<\/em> Morning Mix team. <\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 washingtonpost.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

20 Apr 2018 \u2014 A century ago, humans had slaughtered nearly every right whale in the Atlantic. Now climate change seems to be shifting the animals\u2019 food source. Their habitat has been polluted with sewage and made noisy by construction and seismic tests. Speeding ships and tangles of hard-to-break fishing rope pose deadly threats.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":109715,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[170],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-109708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-animal-rights-vegetarianism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109708"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109708\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}