The calf was taken out some distance from shore by a Far North Surf Rescue boat. Photo / Northern Advocate

Monday May 21, 2012. Everyone involved in the attempt to return a juvenile pilot whale to the sea at Ahipara on Friday were hoping that it would not come ashore again.

Confidence was running high on Friday after the 1.8-metre whale, so young that DOC’s Kaitaia area manager Jon Maxwell doubted that it would be able to keep itself upright, would not only head for deeper water but would be reunited with its mother.

Two adult whales washed up with the juvenile on 90 Mile Beach between Waipapakauri Ramp and Ahipara, both dying before they could be helped. One was a male and the other a non-lactating female, raising hopes that the calf’s mother was still “out there.”

Whales communicate over long distances, Mr Maxwell said, and if the mother was in the area, and the calf was successfully returned to the sea, they would probably find each other.

The calf was taken out some distance from shore by a Far North Surf Rescue boat, DOC Kaitaia’s acting manager Carolyn Smith saying it was very vocal and energetic.

“Hopefully it found its mother. She would have been out there somewhere,” she said.

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If we can understand through scientific means the threats to killer whales listed as endangered or threatened, then we are in a much better position to protect and recover that species, Ross says. Photograph by : Marcel Mochet , AFP

May 20, 2012 (Cindy E. Harnett). VICTORIA – Canada’s only marine mammal toxicologist at the Institute of Ocean Sciences on Vancouver Island is losing his job as the federal government cuts almost all employees who monitor ocean pollution across Canada.

Peter Ross, an expert on killer whales and other marine mammals, was the lead author of a report 10 years ago that demonstrated Canada’s killer whales are the most contaminated marine mammals on the planet. He has more than a 100 published reports.

Now, he’s a casualty of the Conservative’s budget cuts, one of 75 people across Canada told this past week his services will no longer be needed because the Department of Fisheries is closing the nation’s contaminants program.

For about a decade, Fisheries and Oceans has been trying to offload the program to Environment Canada, Ross said. Instead, this week, it axed it.

In total, 1,075 people working for the Department of Fisheries received letters Thursday telling them their jobs will be redundant or affected — including 215 in the Pacific Region.

The closure of DFO’s contaminants program in Victoria will see nine marine scientists and staff — two research scientists, a chemist and six support staff — based in North Saanich lose their jobs or be retrained and moved.

The entire Department of Fisheries and Oceans contaminants program is being shut down effective April 1, 2013. Official letters are expected to be delivered in June, and Ross said he’s been told he’ll have a few months to wrap up his files.

“The entire pollution file for the government of Canada, and marine environment in Canada’s three oceans, will be overseen by five junior biologists scattered across the country — one of which will be stationed in B.C.,” said Ross.

“I cannot think of another industrialized nation that has completely excised marine pollution from its radar,” said Ross, who was informed in a letter Thursday that his position will be “affected.”

“It is with apprehension that I ponder a Canada without any research or monitoring capacity for pollution in our three oceans, or any ability to manage its impacts on commercial fish stocks, traditional foods to over 300,000 aboriginal people, and marine wildlife,” Ross said.

Ross oversees pollution files including everything from municipal sewage and contaminated sites to the effect of pesticide on salmon and the impact of PCBs on killer whales.

If we can understand through scientific means the threats to killer whales listed as endangered or threatened, then we are in a much better position to protect and recover that species, Ross said.

DFO spokeswoman Melanie Carkner said between Fisheries and the Canadian Coast Guard, about $79.3 million in savings has been found, “primarily by adjusting our internal operations and administration.”

“We will be removing about 400 positions from DFO’s 11,000-strong workforce,” Carkner said. “This works out to less than two per cent a year over three years.”

The department said it is refocusing its research on conservation and fisheries management: “In lieu of in-house research on the biological effects of contaminants and pesticides, the department will establish an advisory group and research fund of $1.4 million a year to work with academia and other independent facilities to get advice on priority issues.”

Green Party leader Elizabeth May, MP for Saanich-Gulf Islands, said it’s shocking to lose all the toxin-related research going on at the Institute for Ocean Sciences and across Canada, especially when the Conservative government is “blindly and recklessly enthusiastic about putting oil tankers on B.C.’s coastline.”

“I will do everything I can to stop this government’s budget bill,” May said of the Budget Implementation Act, Bill C-38.

Deficit reduction is important, she said. “But to take out an entire group, that’s not prudent fiscal management, that’s driven by ideology that doesn’t want to know what toxic chemicals are doing in the oceans and freshwater.”

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Rescue workers attend to two Pygmy Sperm Whales (an adult and a juvenile, both female) which washed up 100m apart at Surfers Corner, Muizenberg. Picture : Jeffrey Abrahams

May 19 2012 (SAPA). Cape Town – An injured baby pygmy sperm whale beached at Surfers Corner in Muizenberg, Cape Town, on Saturday, the National Sea Rescue Institute (NSRI) said.

“It has severe lacerations on its stomach caused from bashing against the rocks,” spokesman Craig Lambinon said.

Earlier, Lambinon said it was a dolphin that had beached.

The oceans and coasts branch of the department of environmental affairs was holding the whale where it was found until the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) arrives.

The SPCA’s vets would decide what further action to take.

The NSRI from Strandfontein and Simonstown were on the scene assisting.

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Photo : Rescue workers attend to two Pygmy Sperm Whales (an adult and a juvenile, both female) which washed up 100m apart at Surfers Corner, Muizenberg. Picture: Jeffrey Abrahams

Entanglement response team throws a cutting grapple into the entanglement of
the humpback whale, Basmati. PCCS image taken under NOAA permit 932-1905.

May 19, 2012. PROVINCETOWN – Marine crews from the Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies (PCCS) marine animal entanglement response (MAER) team had their hands full on Friday as they worked to try and free a humpback whale after it became entangled in some boating gear.

The operation to free the whale from what was described as a “relatively minor” but complicated entanglement, took about four hours, and was mostly successful.

Teams were able to cut away a buoy and part of the tangled line. Marine experts plan to continue monitoring the whale.

The humpback was identified as Basmati, a 14-year old female.

According to the PCCS, entanglement is one of the leading causes of serious injury and death in humpback whales.

The whaling vessel Yushin Maru No. 2 sets off for the hunt Friday from Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi Prefecture. KYODO

May 18, 2012 (AFP). A PAIR of Japanese whaling vessels has left for the northwestern Pacific aiming to catch 260 whales for “scientific research”, a fisheries ministry official says.

The Yushin Maru and Yushin Maru No 2 departed on Friday from Shimonoseki port in Yamaguchi, western Japan, to join the mother vessel Nisshin Maru, which has already set sail, the official said.

The fleet is scheduled to catch about 260 of the mammals, including 100 minke whales and 10 sperm whales, between now and early August, the official said.

Commercial whaling is banned under an international treaty, but Japan has since 1987 used a loophole to carry out “lethal research” in the name of science.

Japanese whalers have faced a series of high-seas confrontations with anti-whaling activists in the Antarctic Ocean, but they have not so far experienced any violent resistance in the Pacific.

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The carcass of a minke whale washed up Thursday on the rocky shoreline near Two Lights State Park in Cape Elizabeth. John Ewing/Staff Photographer

Experts say it will likely never be known why the minke whale died at sea before it floated ashore.

Friday, May 18, 2012 (Dennis Hoey). The carcass of a 27-foot-long minke whale that washed up on the shores of Cape Elizabeth will remain on the town’s rocky shoreline until the ocean washes it out to sea.

Marine mammal experts, who inspected the whale’s carcass, said it is too decomposed to take tissue samples.

It will likely never be known why the whale died at sea and floated onto the rocks near Two Lights State Park.

Lynda Doughty, executive director of the newly formed Marine Mammals of Maine, said her agency was notified by a state park ranger around 10 a.m. Thursday.

Doughty estimated the whale probably died at sea several weeks ago. It came ashore Thursday.

“It’s too far gone to get any (tissue) samples. We’ve decided to leave the whale there and let Mother Nature take its course,” Doughty said.

Jeanne Curran, a spokeswoman for the Maine Department of Conservation, said the whale’s body is on private property near the boundary with the state park. Curran said a ranger notified Marine Mammals of Maine that there was a dead whale on the rocks near the park.

Because the animal is on private property, the state park staff can not keep curiousity seekers from trying to view the animal.

“By the look of it the whale has been dead for several weeks,” Doughty said. “It probably had been floating at sea for some time.”

Doughty said minke whales — this male weighed about 8,000 pounds – are commonly found in the Gulf of Maine.

They typically live between 30 and 50 years, with some reaching the age of 60. A male which has reached full sexual maturity averages about 23 feet in length.

Minke whales are known for their deep diving abilities, a maneuver that is marked by a pronounced arch to their back. The dives can last up to 20 minutes.

Marine Mammals of Maine was formed recently as a non-profit organization to provide assistance to stranded marine animals.

Doughty said that last month the federal government approved a stranding agreement that authorizes the Portland-based organization to respond to reports of stranded or dead marine animals. The organization is also authorized to conduct public education programs.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration removed the Marine Animal Lifeline of Westbrook from the national marine mammal stranding network in April 2007 for alleged violations that included returning sick animals to the wild.

Late last year, the Maine Department of Marine Resources, which replaced Marine Animal Lifeline, stopped providing the service after it ran out of money.

Under the new stranding agreement, Marine Mammals of Maine is authorized to respond to the coastal area between Kittery and Rockland. Allied Whale, which is affiliated with the College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, responds to strandings between Rockland and the Canadian border.

“Thank God, for Lynda and for Marine Mammals of Maine. Things could have gotten ugly this year without her stepping up,” said Keith Matassa, rehabilitation coordinator for the Marine Animal Rehabilitation Center on the Biddeford campus of the University of New England.

“When the Department of Marine Resources lost its funding, it left southern Maine with no response team for 1,700 miles of shoreline,” he said. “With Lynda’s knowledge, southern Maine is covered again.”

The Center, which is the only facility of its kind in Maine, takes in injured marine animals such as seals and tries to rehabilitate their injuries, Matassa said.

UNE features four pools, a surgical and treatment area, and a diagnostic lab. It also offers an outdoor rehabilitation area for injured Cetaceans such as porpoises, dolphins and whales.

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May 17, 2012 (Reuters). BRASILIA – An oil spill was discovered off Brazil’s coast near the country’s Espirito Santo state, Brazil’s Navy said on Thursday, the latest in a series of spills that have raised questions about the safety of a massive expansion of the country’s oil production capacity.

The Navy said it has sent a team to investigate and has no immediate estimate of the spill’s size.

Oil workers returning home after work offshore said there was an oil stain about 1 kilometer (0.6 mile) long on the ocean near the P-57 oil platform operated by Petrobras, Brazil’s state-controlled oil company, the Folha de S. Paulo daily newspaper reported.

The P-57, a converted oil tanker, works in the Jubarte field about 85 kilometers (53 miles) off Brazil’s coast. Jubarte produced 186,000 barrels of oil per day in February, or about more than 8 percent of Brazil’s total oil output of 2.1 million bpd, according to Brazil’s oil regulator, the ANP.

Jubarte is the fourth largest producing oil field in the country. When natural gas is added, production was equivalent to 198,000 barrels of oil per day (boepd).

Petrobras plans to spend about $225 billion over five years to help triple output to about 6 million bpd by 2020. The vast majority of that oil will come from offshore fields near Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo.

A spill in the Frade field south of Jubarte in November led to civil lawsuits seeking about $20 billion in damages and criminal charges against Chevron, which operates the field, as well as Transocean, its drilling contractor, and 17 of the two companies’ employees.

Chevron and its partners in the field decided to shut down output in Frade after additional, unexplained leaks were found in field waters in March. Frade produced 64,000 barrels a day of oil in February, the ANP said.

Chevron and Transocean deny any wrongdoing. Chevron owns 52 percent of Frade and Petrobras owns 30 percent. The rest is owned by a Japanese group led by Inpex and Sojitz Corp .

Petrobras’ press office said it had no comment. The ANP said officials were not immediately available for comment. Brazil’s environmental protection agency Ibama did not immediately return calls requesting comment.

Petrobras preferred shares, the company’s most-traded class of stock, fell 1.4 percent to 19.02 reais in Sao Paulo trading. The benchmark Bovespa index of the most-traded stocks on the Sao Paulo stock exchange fell 0.33 percent.

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17 May 2012. The Prime Minister of Solomon Islands Gordon Darcy Lilo has left the door open to again supporting Japan’s controversial whaling program.

Since 2008 Solomon Islands has abstained from supporting Japanese whaling in the Southern Ocean, despite its continued support from many of the Pacific neighbours.

Next week Mr Darcy Lilo will join Pacific leaders in Japan, taking with him what has been described as a shopping lift of the projects he wants Japan to fund.

When he was asked if, in return, he would support Japan’s whaling program, he did not say say yes or no, but supported killing whales for research purposes.

Presenter : Campbell Cooney

Speakers : Gordon Darcy Lilo. prime minister, Solomon Islands; Richard Marles, Australian Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs; Mick McIntyre, director, Whales Alive

COONEY : On the eve of his departure to take part in this sixth  ”Pacific Alliance Leaders Meeting”, or PALM 6, the Prime Minister of Solomon Islands Gordon Darcy Lillo was asked if he was prepared to give his country’s support to Japan’s annual whaling program, in return for whatever aid funding Japan was prepared to donate.

LILO : We are against commercial whaling but we do understand there needs to be scientific research whaling to be carried out.

COONEY : In an effort to get a firmer answer the question was asked again.

JOURNO : Yes or no about supporting Japan ?

LILO : I’m not going to answer that question in that way, because you’re asking a direct question.

COONEY: The question was refined.

JOURNO : I’ll just rephrase my question, will you support Japan’s scientific whaling program for scientific purposes?

LILO : Well scientific whaling is encouraged under the Convention on Endangered Species, and these are the kind of developments that are good for the purpose of us understanding science, and understand the very species that has a lot to be understood about it in the context of our seas, in our oceans. And so we have to abide by the conditions of scientists upon it.

COONEY : In 2008 then Solomon Islands Prime Minister Dr Derek Sikua, announced his government had decided to withdraw support for what Japan calls its “Scientific whaling”, and since then it has not voted as part of the Pacific bloc of nations which do support Japan, and twice when the issue has been debated and voted on at the annual general meeting of the International Whaling Commission, Solomon Islands has abstained.

 The Director of the Anti Whaling NGO “Whales Alive” Mick McIntyre has no doubt why this time, the Solomons’ Prime Minister is leaving the door open to once again supporting Japan.

MCINTYRE : It’s clear that if it’s on the eve of a visit to Tokyo that there’s clearly some pressure from Japan on this.

COONEY : And Mr McIntyre has dismissed Mr Darcy’s Lilo’s claims about the need to harvest whales to improve the available science on the mammals.

MCINTYRE : The support of scientific whaling is bumpkin, the International Whaling Commission itself has said that this scientific whaling is not necessary for the management of whales.

COONEY : Mr Darcy Lilo’s statements were made just before he was scheduled to dine with Australia’s Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific and Foreign Affairs, Richard Marles who is in Honiara to discuss the future of the Regional Assistance Mission RAMSI. And Mr Marles has reiterated Australia’s position on opposing whaling for commercial and also scientific purposes.  But after listening to what Mr Lilo had to say, he was diplomatic in his response, saying he wasn’t sure if it meant a change of Solomon Islands position.

MARLES : If indeed there is a shift in the Solomon Islands position I have no doubt that this will be a matter that we will be raising. To the extent that anybody is supporting a position of scientific whaling, where whales are being killed, then obviously that’s a position that we do not support, and we have made our position in relation to Japan clear. If indeed that’s where any country is going and there is a change in position in relation to that, then obviously we’d be disappointed about that. And I do note the comments of Prime Minister Lilo about the role of science, and we think that that role can be performed and is important to be performed without killing whales.

COONEY : But the Director of Whales Alive Mick McIntyre is in no doubt.

MCINTYRE : We’ve had real progress with the Solomons over the last couple of years in not supporting Japan. For them to turn around now and go back to voting for Japan, it sends a very mixed message and something that other Pacific Island neighbour countries will take note of.

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When warned of a loud noise, a false killer whale reduced its hearing sensitivity in anticipation of the sound. Sophie Bushwick reports.

May 15, 2012 (Sophie Bushwick). Have you ever wanted to turn down the volume at a deafening concert or noisy bar ? Envy the whale : a new study finds that toothed whales can reduce their own auditory sensitivity when they expect a loud sound. The work is presented at this week’s Acoustics 2012 meeting. [Paul E. Nachtigall and Alexander Ya Supin, Immediate changes in whale hearing sensitivity]

Whales and dolphins rely on their responsive hearing to interpret returning echolocation clicks. Previous research suggested that these marine mammals could dull their hearing before uttering outgoing echolocation clicks, which are very loud. Could they use the same coping mechanism for external noises ?

To find out, researchers trained a false killer whale that a loud noise would always follow a brief warning signal. Then, they attached suction-cup sensors to the outside of the whale’s head and played the signal. The sensors measured brainwaves that indicated the whale did reduce its hearing sensitivity in expectation of a clamor. The researchers hope to test other species as well.

Loud noises from ships can disturb whales. To accommodate marine life, perhaps vessels could emit signals before making a ruckus, warning whales to tune us out.

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Tuesday, May 15, 2012 (DAN JOLING). ANCHORAGE, Alaska — A lawsuit challenging petroleum exploration in Alaska’s Cook Inlet was filed Tuesday by four groups, including an Alaska Native village, that claim seismic testing will harm endangered beluga whales.

The plaintiffs are the Native Village of Chickaloon, Natural Resources Defense Council, Center for Biological Diversity and Center for Water Advocacy.

They claim the National Marine Fisheries Service improperly issued exploration permits to Apache Alaska Corp. for high-intensity seismic exploration.

“Each year, there are fewer and fewer of these whales left,” Taryn Kiekow, an NRDC attorney, said in an announcement of the lawsuit. “Oil and gas drilling activities expose Cook Inlet beluga whales to earsplitting underwater noise that threatens their survival. All that noise in the marine environment makes survival impossible for these endangered whales.”

National Marine Fisheries Service spokeswoman Julie Speegle said from Juneau the agency would have no comment.

“Because it’s a legal matter, we cannot comment,” she said

Beluga whales, which can reach 15 feet long, turn white as adults and feed on salmon, smaller fish, crab, shrimp, squid and clams. In late summer, belugas often can be spotted from highways leading from Anchorage, chasing salmon schooled at stream mouths.

From the 1980s on, the Cook Inlet population declined steadily from a high of about 1,300, and the loss was accelerated between 1994 and 1998 when Alaska Natives harvested nearly half of the remaining 650 whales. Belugas have not bounced back despite a hunting ban. A survey in June counted just 284 whales.

The federal government declared Cook Inlet belugas endangered in 2008. The state of Alaska fought the decision and said the listing would hurt economic development at the Port of Anchorage, the largest port in the state, as well as oil and natural gas development off the Kenai Peninsula.

The endangered species listing in November was affirmed by a federal judge, who rejected the state arguments that belugas already are protected by other environmental laws and that the fisheries service failed to consider state conservation programs designed to improve the habitat and food supply of belugas.

The lawsuit says Apache intends to explore for offshore oil and gas for 160 days a year using airguns that produce some of the loudest underwater sounds short of dynamite.

The lawsuit claims the noise is known to compromise foraging and other vital behavior of whales, and that it can affect species over great distances.

The noise will be on top of already high levels of noise from industrial traffic and pollution, according to the lawsuit.

 The groups claim the U.S. Marine Mammal Commission recommended against authorization for exploration, and that NMFS violated federal environmental law with its finding that seismic surveys would cause no significant impact.

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