BajaNomad

WHALE AND TURTLE DEATHS IN OJO DE LIEBRE (SCAMMONS)

Aqsurfer - 1-23-2015 at 01:19 PM

Hola Nomads,

I was sent this from the Sudcaliforniano regarding the deaths of whales and turtles. Any info from the field?

Death of whales and turtles worries tourism service providers in Scammon Lagoon . Tourism service providers at Scammon Lagoon put into question the versions of the delegates of CONANP's Benito Bermudez and Jose Carlos Cota Osuna of SEMARNAT, who reported that the recent death of 14 whales and 16 turtles was because of the cold and therefore " there is nothing to worry about " and no reason to be alarmed " regarding a local cold [temp] phenomenon that has never been seen in the last 35 years. Two tourist service providers engaged in the gray whale tourism in the region expressed concern that officials might be " hiding information ," recalling that the mortality of species in Scammon has lasted several years, and that CONANP paid Fisheries Research Center ( CRIP ) for the study to find the causes of this phenomenon, " and they refuse to release information." the Sudcaliforniano

Peace,
Aaron
www.worldsaquarium.org

woody with a view - 1-23-2015 at 05:24 PM

while the water is 4-7 degrees above normal along the rest of the coast, perhaps the lagoon is different?

Bajahowodd - 1-23-2015 at 05:44 PM

We saw a dead turtle floating in the lagoon two years ago. Have no idea if it is representative of an ecological problem or not.

churro - 1-23-2015 at 09:10 PM

Cold water?!?! This is an El Nino year... Something sounds fishy to me .. Hope it is not polution or a toxic spill or something along those lines

Marla Daily - 1-23-2015 at 10:30 PM

Our fishermen friends said that after some recent (2014) marine geological testing offshore from San Gregorio (south of San Juanico), the ocean was dead ~ completely devoid of fish and life. They said the testing killed everything for miles, including turtles.

shari - 1-24-2015 at 08:20 AM

I am just back from a couple days at the lagoon and there is alot of scuttlebutt about this. I gotta admit I shook my head in disbelief when I read the article about the nonsense of deaths due to cold water...NOT. The water temps in the lagoon are the same if not a bit warmer than usual.

It reminded me of when there was a massive turtle die off years ago and the statement from officials was that a tuna boat jettisoned some illegal catch...that was totally untrue and the real reason was finally uncovered that a dyke had broke in the salt works spilling toxic brine into the eel-grass where the turtles feed...ooops.

There are several whale deaths every season as some whales die in childbirth, calves dont make it and old whales come there to die as well so it is normal to have a few but this seems like a high number to me but they wouldnt die from a breach in the dykes as they are not feeding there...it is a mystery that will be interesting to solve as time goes on. I wonder if biologists are taking any tissue samples of the dead whales to determine cause of death. There is a discussion of it on facebook and most folks arent buying the official statement.

woody with a view - 1-24-2015 at 08:59 AM

if there are significantly more whales this year (it's a question, not a statement) wouldn't there be more deaths just due to the numbers?

shari - 1-24-2015 at 09:01 AM

No Woody...the numbers are about the same as last year.

woody with a view - 1-24-2015 at 09:05 AM

hmmm.....

BajaDanD - 1-24-2015 at 09:08 AM

Shari have you noticed more dead whales then usual

Graham - 1-24-2015 at 09:26 AM

The first thing I would rule out is the El Nino effect.

After the major 1997-98 El Nino, according to NASA's JPL "Sea lions and other marine mammals starved off the California coast because warm water blocked the normal upwelling of cold nutrient-rich coastal water... The lack of nutrients in the ocean resulted in less abundant plankton, organisms which are the foundation of this marine food chain."

And as reported in the recent book Lagoon Time by Steven Swartz, the gray whale population experienced a major die-off in the years immediately following 1998. After having risen 3-4% for many years, estimated numbers went from 26,000 to 16,000. That's a 20% decline.

durrelllrobert - 1-24-2015 at 11:36 AM

Quote: Originally posted by Marla Daily  
Our fishermen friends said that after some recent (2014) marine geological testing offshore from San Gregorio (south of San Juanico), the ocean was dead ~ completely devoid of fish and life. They said the testing killed everything for miles, including turtles.


The Marine Geological Testing must have consisted of setting off very large underwater demolition charges for that to occur. When I worked for the US government we killed off all marine life (including blue crabs) within a mile radius when we set off a charge in the Chesapeake bay.

shari - 1-24-2015 at 11:53 AM

Hmm...gray whales arent plankton eaters and I read a paper that said they had an abundance of food this season which is great. I do know that clear cut logging in the north has affected the feeding grounds in BC as silt has destroyed the amphipods in their traditional feeding grounds.

They also are affected by toxins from industrial waste that sink to the bottom in some of their feeding areas. It may be a combination of factors. One really needs to examine what whales are dying, whether they are in their prime or dying of old age, or calves etc. Did they find and study the dead whales? or are they relying on census data which can be unreliable for example if whales are migrating further offshore, they miss them in the counts etc....so many factors.

It is my understanding when whales reach their population size that is optimum for the food source, they limit reproduction as the population reaches a stable point. If the food source is marginalized there are fewer births as may have happened in the early 1990s after the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska which is reflected in this population chart.
https://swfsc.noaa.gov/textblock.aspx?Division=PRD&Paren...

Skipjack Joe - 1-24-2015 at 12:16 PM

Are similar die offs occurring at the lagoons of San Ignacio and Mag Bay? If not then it may well be related to the GN salt works or other GN effluents. The cold water theory sounds like BS to me. Since both turtles and whales are involved it seems that a pathogen is unlikely to be the cause.

mtgoat666 - 1-24-2015 at 05:07 PM

Quote: Originally posted by shari  
I am just back from a couple days at the lagoon and there is alot of scuttlebutt about this. I gotta admit I shook my head in disbelief when I read the article about the nonsense of deaths due to cold water...NOT. The water temps in the lagoon are the same if not a bit warmer than usual.

It reminded me of when there was a massive turtle die off years ago and the statement from officials was that a tuna boat jettisoned some illegal catch...that was totally untrue and the real reason was finally uncovered that a dyke had broke in the salt works spilling toxic brine into the eel-grass where the turtles feed...ooops.

There are several whale deaths every season as some whales die in childbirth, calves dont make it and old whales come there to die as well so it is normal to have a few but this seems like a high number to me but they wouldnt die from a breach in the dykes as they are not feeding there...it is a mystery that will be interesting to solve as time goes on. I wonder if biologists are taking any tissue samples of the dead whales to determine cause of death. There is a discussion of it on facebook and most folks arent buying the official statement.


Animals die. Circle of life. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Is someone counting a few corpses and leaping to a conclusion that some massive die off is going on? I bet this is a story based on a non-event, someone counted a few corpses and created a story, never thinking if the corpse count was significant or normal.

It is disconcerting that officials covered up environmental damage from dike breaches at the salt works! How long ago did this occur?
I suspect the last hurricane blew out many of the dikes. That was a real record rainfall. Did salt work reveal any hurricane damage? I doubt the salt works builds their dikes to handle infrequent deluges like that last hurricane, would not be cost effective.

Anywho, I have seen poacher camps around the lagoons littered with bones from hundreds of turtles, the poachers probably are biggest threat to the cute little (and big) turtles.

Every year baby whales die. I suppose the mortality rate could be a few percent and up to 5 percent of infants in certain years.

Graham - 1-25-2015 at 12:55 AM

I spent over two weeks camped and exploring both sides of the entrance to Ojo de Liebre in July, and there were several recently dead marine mammals on the Pacific beaches, including these whales and what looks like a bottlenose dolphin:









There were many more but I didn't think it was a particularly excessive number given the location and its remoteness.

I think time will tell if there is an unusual mortality event among gray whales and other marine life in the lagoon. And if there is, what cause or combination of causes is to blame.

I'm glad to hear that there are reports saying the gray whales have plenty of food this year. That would suggest this year's warm water condition does not seem to have the same dramatic effect as that of 1997-98. The next few years will tell us for sure.

To be fair to the NASA scientists, I don't think there is any suggestion that gray whales need to be directly feeding on plankton to be impacted, rather a less abundant supply of plankton had its effect right up the food chain.

According to the multi-year research done by Steven Swartz and his colleagues at Laguna San Ignacio:
"This mortality event [1997-98] affected all age clas-ses of whales from yearlings to adults of both sexes and resulted in a ten-fold increase in the average annual stranding rate during the three year period from 1998 to 2000. The stranded whales appeared to be skinny and suffering from nutritional stress." [Lagoon Time]

And they reported that over the next several years, to summarize their data, "breeding females were producing calves every three to four years rather than in alternate years."

shari - 1-25-2015 at 10:51 AM

Yes Graham, whales that are plankton feeders may suffer but fortunately plankton does not feed the amphipods the grays eat...hmm...pondering that, it makes me wonder if that is why gray whales are the oldest whale on the planet...they are the only cetacean that bottom feeds.

this part of baja is a catcher of floating stuff so it is normal to see whales, dolphins, turtles etc washed up around here...doesnt mean they died here necessarily either.

I remember those years of seeing so many emaciated whales and I wondered what was affecting their feeding. It was always a concern of mine about whale watching in the feeding grounds as with the increase of boats, the whales would stop feeding and hide and werent getting the amount of food they needed to bulk up for the winter migration when they dont eat. Oil spills are dangerous for them as oil settles to the bottom and lasts a long time...as well as decimating the old growth forest and clogging up fresh water streams also has devastating effects on the feeding grounds.

My photo ID data concurs with the calving intervals stretching out more now.

Graham - 1-25-2015 at 01:28 PM

Shari, all the human agency factors you suggest certainly need to be carefully monitored and studied, but as yet they seem to be minimal factors in any whale population fluctuations compared to good old Mother Nature in the form of major El Ninos.

After that of 1997-98, the biggest ever recorded according to JPL, the effects on marine life from Alaska south were cataclysmic. Several studies suggest the gray whale population was reduced by around 20%.
Birds, fish and marine mammals were dramatically impacted, as were fishermen in Peru and Chile who essentially lost their livelihoods.

Up until then, gray whale numbers were rising steadily, afterwards there was a decline, and again an almost full recovery in recent years. If gray whales are indeed suddenly stressed now and sea temps are up, I certainly wouldn't rule out a link.

I would have thought that amount of plankton, being the "foundation" of virtually the whole marine food chain, likely impacts everything from copepods to bottom dwelling creatures.

The suggestion of brine spills from the salt works brings back memories of the battle against the proposed Mitsubishi salt works in Laguna San Ignacio. That was one of the charges raised back then against the existing salt company works in Ojo de Liebre (ESSA), suggesting they had been responsible for the deaths of whales, turtles and dolphins.

Of course, ESSA totally denied it, indignantly accusing environmentalists of conducting a smear campaign.

"Attempts by groups of activists to create a link that does not exist with Exportadora de Sal are reprehensible," ESSA said in a statement. "Furthermore they show the absence of any real concern for the well-being of the whales, trying to put responsibility on an institution that is not responsible at the price of genuine efforts to discover the true causes."

From Chapter 29, Journey With a Baja Burro

https://bajadetour.sharepoint.com/Pages/Chapter29Sacrednesso...