Wednesday, March 08, 2017

A magnificent finding in the world of Marine Mammal biology.

March 7, 2017
By Carl Engelking

The first underwater images of True’s beaked whales offered insights into their coloration patterns and group behavior.
True’s beaked whale (click here) sightings are so rare, that scientists who devote careers to studying these animals may never actually witness one swimming in the wild.
But thanks to an international team of scientists that compiled True’s beaked whale sightings, we can all watch the first underwater video of True’s beaked whales swimming near Pico Island in the Portuguese Azores. Researcher’s collection also included the first close-up images of a young calf of the same species, and a genetic analyses of two stranded whales....

The truth is the global community needs to set standards through the United Nations that are amendments to the "Law of the Sea" that protects all species including endangered marine mammals.

The global community does not have protections for fisheries. As a result countries that do protect their fisheries are sometimes invaded by illegal fishing vessels. International waters remain a place where exploitation still occurs. The United Nations should recognize this valuable resource and protect it more.

The protections should include ending any dumping into the oceans and seas, especially plastics that never degrade. Three quarters of the reason fisheries are in trouble is because of overfishing. Fisheries can be adversely effected by pollution including floating trash. If the oceans were clean, monitored and protected the fisheries would be far healthier and more abundant.

The oceans are the largest part of Earth's surface, does anyone actually believe if they were pollution free there would ever be overfishing?