Saving Seafood

Whale Watchers Accused Of Loving Endangered Orcas To Death

June 19, 2019 — Whale watching is generally regarded as innocent fun. Unlike an aquarium park, whale watching boats take you to see majestic animals that remain free in their natural habitat.

But when it comes to marine mammals that are already struggling to survive, are the boat-based watching tours really harmless?

That question has become more urgent in Washington state, where Southern Resident killer whales that feed around the San Juan Islands in the summer months have been declining since the 1990s. There are only about 75 left. Orcas are a form of dolphin, though the cetaceans are also sometimes classified as “toothed whales.”

Experts blame the shrinking runs of chinook salmon, the Southern Residents’ preferred meal. (Other kinds of orcas hunt other sea mammals, and are not declining the same way.)

The plight of the Southern Residents gained international attention last summer, when one of the orca females was seen “grieving” for its dead calf, keeping the body afloat for 17 days.

Read the full story at NPR

PFMC: Ad Hoc Southern Resident Killer Whale Workgroup to Meet July 2 and July 23-24

June 11, 2019 — The following was released by the Pacific Fishery Management Council:

The Pacific Fishery Management Council’s (Pacific Council) Ad Hoc Southern Resident Killer Whale (SRKW) Workgroup will convene two meetings, which are open to the public. The first meeting, to be held via webinar, will convene on Tuesday, July 2, 2019, from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time (PDT), or until business for the day has been completed. The second meeting, to be held in-person, will convene Tuesday, July 23, 2019, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.PDT, or until business for the day has been completed. It will continue on Wednesday, July 24, 2019, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. PDT, or until business for the day has been completed. These are public meetings and not public hearings. Public comments will be taken at the discretion of the Workgroup co-chairs as time allows.

Please see the SRKW July 2019 meeting notice on the Council’s website for full details(both the July 2 webinar and the July 23-24 in-person meeting).

For further information:

Killers and kings: West Coast group intervenes in orca lawsuit

May 31, 2019 — On Wednesday, May 29, the federation, the West Coast’s largest trade organization of small-scale commercial fishermen, filed its opposition to the lawsuit filed in a Seattle federal court lawsuit on April 3, by the Wild Fish Conservancy and the Center for Biological Diversity.

The suit was reportedly filed to protect endangered Southern Resident Killer Whales which eat primarily king salmon, by arguing that their food supply is not well managed. This orca subgroup migrates from California’s coastal waters to Washington’s Puget Sound and into British Columbia. West Coast salmon fisheries outside of state waters are managed by the Pacific Fishery Management Council, which prioritizes sustainability and replenishment.

The suit claims that federally managed ocean salmon fisheries are allowing commercial harvest of the orcas’ food supply, which is contrary to NMFS data and management standards that commercial salmon fisheries have little or no impact on the whales. For many years the council has managed West Coast salmon fisheries to minimize any potential competition between orcas and fishermen, including through a NMFS-approved 2009 biological opinion, which contains various required mitigation measures that further minimize and mitigate impacts to the endangered whales.

“Seafood lovers on the West Coast should be proud of their fisheries management system, which is among the best in the world,” said Noah Oppenheim, executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations. “The Center for Biological Diversity and Wild Fish Conservancy lawsuit against the National Marine Fisheries Service is naïve, counterproductive, and unnecessary. By suing, these two groups instead undermine the extraordinary coalition of scientists, managers, commercial fishermen, and conservationists that has come together to identify the strategies that will be used to recover the Southern Resident Killer Whale population.”

Read the full story at National Fisherman

WASHINGTON: State legislators fund ‘stakeholder forum’ for orca recovery, dam removal

April 30, 2019 — Conservationists, industry officials and other Snake River “stakeholders” will bring dam breaching to the center of the orca recovery conversation with a $750,000 forum, which received funding in the state Legislature’s budget proposal last weekend.

Proposals to remove the Ice Harbor, Lower Monumental, Lower Granite and Little Goose dams on the Lower Snake River are well-backed by conservationists, who say the move would help restore dwindling salmon and orca populations. However, regional commerce and power industries that rely on the dams have historically opposed the idea. Those opponents say removing the dams would make it impossible to move cargo along the Snake River, and it would reduce the amount of clean energy available in the region.

Inslee’s task force recommended the forum last fall as a way to “proactively identify and detail” a plan for several communities that use the river, should the federal government decide to remove those dams, according to a press release by several fish and orca advocacy groups.

“For decades, our elected officials have avoided the difficult conversations we need to have about the lower Snake River dams and their impact on salmon and orcas,” said Robb Krehbiel, Northwest representative for Defenders of Wildlife and member of the Southern Resident Orca Task Force. “Bringing people together to work collaboratively on solutions that help salmon, orca and our communities is the right next step.”

Read the full story at The Daily News

Should seals and sea lions be killed to help save the orcas?

April 26, 2019 — Seals and sea lions are competing with the Southern Resident killer whales for limited Chinook salmon stock. That has some people calling for a cull where the government would organize the hunting and killing of a certain percentage of sea lions and seals.

Sea lions and seals are often seen as adversaries of fishermen. Last year, more than a dozen sea lions were shot, many in the head, and washed up around Puget Sound; mostly in West Seattle.

A recent paper published by federal scientists shows pinnipeds eat twice as much salmon as Southern Resident killer whales in Puget Sound, and six times more salmon than recreational and commercial fishermen combined.

It’s created quite the debate over the recovery of Southern Resident killer whales who depend on salmon as their main food source.

Should seals and sea lions be killed to save orcas? The question is complex and scientists don’t all agree. Most aren’t sure if it would work. They’re also turning their attention to what they believe is the preferred prey of pinnipeds: forage fish.

At National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Manchester lab, scientists are studying steelhead migration through Puget Sound.

Read the full story at K5 News

SeaWorld Publishes Decades of Orca Data to Help Wild Whales

April 23, 2019 — The endangered killer whales of the Pacific Northwest live very different lives from orcas in captivity.

They swim up to 100 miles (161 kilometers) a day in pursuit of salmon, instead of being fed a steady diet of baitfish and multivitamins. Their playful splashing awes and entertains kayakers and passengers on Washington state ferries instead of paying theme park customers.

But the captive whales are nevertheless providing a boon to researchers urgently trying to save wild whales in the Northwest.

SeaWorld, which displays orcas at its parks in California, Texas and Florida, has recently published data from thousands of routine blood tests of its killer whales over two decades, revealing the most comprehensive picture yet of what a healthy whale looks like. The information could guide how and whether scientists intervene to help sick or stranded whales in the wild.

Read the full story at NBC Washington

WASHINGTON: Gov. Jay Inslee’s orca-recovery agenda advancing, but billion-dollar funding yet to be seen

April 22, 2019 — Gov. Jay Inslee’s orca agenda is advancing in the Washington state Legislature, but with the budget yet to be decided how much of the governor’s billion-dollar-bold ambition will be accomplished is yet to be seen.

Budgets passed by the House and Senate so far contain no funding to continue the governor’s task force on orca recovery. There’s no agreement yet on funding the governor’s proposed panel to consider the effects of breaching the Lower Snake River dams. And revenue measures to help pay for everything, from increasing hatchery production to enforcement of habitat protections, have yet to be decided.

There also were policy disappointments for the governor, who got no takers for his request for legislation to put a temporary stop on whale watching of southern resident killer whales; no lawmaker would introduce the bill. A vessel noise-reduction package will take years to implement with rule making yet to be done, and because U.S. Coast Guard regulations include important exemptions, including for commercial shipping that makes most of the noise that can disrupt orcas as they hunt.

Read the full story at the Seattle Times

First Bill to Help Save Orcas Passed in Washington State

April 12, 2019 — The first in a series of bills intended to help prevent the extinction of Southern Resident killer whales is headed to the desk of Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee. The measure, which Inslee requested, would protect habitat for the Chinook salmon the whales eat.

Southern Resident killer whales live in the inland coastal waters near Seattle. Suffering from a lack of their main source of food – threatened Chinook salmon – as well as toxic home waters and a cacophony of ship noise that dampens their ability to hunt and communicate, their population has reached a 30-year low of 74 whales.

Inslee convened a task force in March 2018 to guide state action to prevent the whales’ extinction. The task force issued its first-year recommendations this past November. The following month, Inslee proposed over $1 billion in state funding to implement the recommendations and asked the Legislature to introduce bills where necessary to accomplish task force recommendations.

House Bill 1579 is the first of a suite of such bills to pass the Legislature, clearing the state Senate on Wednesday night and now awaiting Inslee’s signature. The bill encourages the catch of non-native fish that eat young Chinook salmon as they swim toward the ocean and compete for habitat in Washington’s rivers and estuaries, and increases catch limits for bass, channel catfish and walleye. Fishermen will now be required to get a license to catch freshwater smelt, which Chinook eat.

Read the full story at the Courthouse News Service

Groups sue to restrict salmon fishing, help Northwest orcas

April 4, 2019 — Federal officials say they may restrict salmon fishing off the West Coast to help the Pacific Northwest’s critically endangered killer whales, but two environmental groups are suing anyway to ensure it happens.

The Center for Biological Diversity, which filed a lawsuit nearly two decades ago to force the U.S. government to list the orcas as endangered, and the Wild Fish Conservancy asked the U.S. District Court in Seattle on Wednesday to order officials to reconsider a 2009 finding that commercial and recreational fisheries did not jeopardize the orcas’ survival.

The National Marine Fisheries Service issued a letter early last month indicating that it intends to do so. Julie Teel Simmonds, an attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity, said the point of the lawsuit is to ensure they finish the job with urgency, given the plight of the whales, and to take short-term steps in the meantime to help provide more of the orcas’ favored prey, Chinook salmon.

“We have got to figure out how to get them more salmon,” she said. “Since 2009 it’s become much more crystallized just how critical prey availability is to their reproductive success and survival.”

The Endangered Species Act requires the government to certify that any actions it approves won’t jeopardize the survival of a listed species. In the 2009 review, experts found that it wasn’t clear how a lack of prey affected orcas, but that the fisheries were not likely to contribute to their extinction.

Read the full story at the Associated Press

Feds could restrict Pacific Ocean fishing over endangered orcas, NOAA letter says

March 8, 2019 — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is taking a fresh look at whether new fishing restrictions are needed to help prevent the extinction of endangered southern resident killer whales that frequent Puget Sound.

New evidence about the fish the whales depend on and the risk posed to orcas by depleted prey has caused the agency to write a letter of guidance to the Pacific Fishery Management Council, indicating the agency is examining whether new restrictions are needed — particularly on fisheries in the Lower Columbia and Sacramento River and on fall-run chinook salmon in the Klamath River.

NOAA in 2009 concluded fisheries did not jeopardize the survival and recovery of killer whales.

But since then, “a substantial amount of new information is available on SRKW (southern resident killer whale) and their prey,” and has the agency wanting to take another look at fishing, Barry Thom, regional administrator for NOAA’s West Coast region, wrote to Phil Anderson, chairman of the council, on Wednesday.

Read the full story at The Seattle Times