photo by Julie Larsen Maher ©WCS

The United Nations has named 2009 the Year of the Gorilla, in an effort to raise awareness about gorillas and the threats they face.

photo by Julie Larsen Maher ©WCS

Gorillas share 98.4 percent of their genes with humans, and have been shown to possess self-awareness, remarkable intelligence and an ability to communicate with signs and symbols as well as use some basic tools. They express emotions such as joy and distress in a way similar to humans.

The main threats to gorillas are habitat loss, poaching, and disease, such as ebola.  Already ebola has killed one-third of the world’s gorillas and tens of thousands of chimpanzees.  The western lowland gorilla population has declined more than 60 percent over the last 20 to 25 years, which has led to the species being moved from endangered to critically endangered on the IUCN Red List.   A large portion of this decline is due to ebola outbreaks and the transmission of the disease from group to group through social contact.

photo by Julie Larsen Maher ©WCS

Ebola is reducing once healthy populations to a level where they are no longer resilient to other threats, such as poaching.  Between ebola and poaching, it is estimated that the existing world population of gorillas could become extinct in the wild in the next 10 to 20 years.

Ebola in gorillas and other great apes may actually be preventable through vaccination, which has already been proven effective in monkeys.  At least six experimental vaccines have protected laboratory monkeys from ebola virus.  It takes a significant amount of funding to adapt the current ebola vaccine into one that will be safe and effective for great apes.  People may be intimidated by the cost of vaccination, but one year of ebola vaccination could save as many apes as decades of anti-poaching.

“When people look back 100 years from now, most won’t even remember Iraq. One thing they will remember is that we sat by and did nothing while our closest relatives slipped away,” says Peter Walsh of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Antropology in Germany.  ”This is a case where one wealthy individual could have an enormous impact. He or she could quite literally save gorillas from ecological extinction.”

photo by Julie Larsen Maher ©WCS

…and so, I am asking for your help. On Saturday, April 25 I will be participating in the 5K Run for the Wild, hosted by the Wildlife Conservation Society, one of the United Nations Great Apes Survival Partnership (GRASP) partner organizations.

The Wildlife Conservation Society saves wildlife and wild places worldwide. By joining the Run for the Wild, my goal is to help assist with the fundraising efforts of the organization and make a difference for the future.

Please donate to protect gorillas on my fundraising page. Every little bit adds up!

photo by Julie Larsen Maher ©WCS

photo by Julie Larsen Maher ©WCS

The special brought up a lot of really important conservation issues facing blue whales, as well as other marine mammals.

The single biggest human act that decimated the blue whale population was whaling.  The blue whale population had once been estimated at more than 250,000 globally.  A ban on the commercial whaling oh blue whales was established in the 1966, but a century of whaling prior to the ban had already decimated the population by 90 percent.  Today it is estimated that there are now between 10,000 to 25,000 blue whales worldwide.

The International Whaling Commission (IWC) was set up under the rules of the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling in 1946.  The main duty of the IWC is to review and revise the measures which govern the conduct of whaling around the world, largely guided by the advice from the scientific committee.  In 1982, the IWC decided that beginning with the 1986 season, a moratorium would be placed on commercial whaling of all whale stocks.  The moratorium allows whaling to be carried out by aboriginal groups if it occurs on a subsistence basis,  as is the case in parts of Canada, Russia, Indonesia and the Caribbean.  Yet Norway and Iceland still participate in commercial whaling, and Japan has been whaling since 1986  under commercial scientific research permits.

In Kingdom of the Blue Whale, geneticists Scott Baker and Steve Palumbi buy whale meat in order to see if any of it is from illegally killed blue whales.  This is a common practice for scientists, and has been used to test caviar to determine sturgeon species, or to test fish or meat in various markets to see if any of it comes from illegally hunted species.  Due to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (better known as CITES), which prohibits endangered species and their parts to be traded across international boundaries, the geneticists had to duplicate the DNA in their portable hotel-room genetics lab in order to bring it back to their own lab for testing.

DNA samples were submitted to GenBank, a genetic sequence database, to determine the species of whale meat from the Japanese market.  Their findings were frightening:  the meat came from a blue/fin whale hybrid.  Perhaps due to availability of suitable mates, blue whales are now mating with their cousins, fin whales (the second largest whale species).  Because they resemble fin whales from the top, the Icelandic whalers do not realize they are hybrids until after they are killed.  So far there have been 11 documented cases of blue/fin whale hybrids.  Hybridization threatens the genetic integrity of the species, which can lead to extinction of that species.

Ship strikes are yet another threat to blue whales.  In Kingdom of the Blue Whale, we learn that whereas one strike used to happen every few years, four were killed that season alone in California.  The scientists used forensics reminiscent of CSI to determine that the dead whale they found was a victim of a ship strike.  How did they know that ship strike was the cause of death, and didn’t occur postmortem?  Subdermal bruising indicates that the whale was alive when it was struck, something that would not have occurred if the whale had been hit after it was already dead.

Busier oceans means more hazards for blue whales, which feed in dangerous shipping lanes.  The increase in ship strike victims indicates that our bigger, faster, more powerful ships are now a greater danger to them.  Not only because of the possibility of ship strikes, but because of the increase in anthropogenic noise.  It is unknown how anthropogenic noise affects blue whales, but noisier oceans could mean that blue whales perhaps can’t hear each others’ calls.  Sonar has been implicated in mass-strandings of other marine mammal species, and examinations have revealed hemorrhages in the ears and brains of the deceased.

Despite the increased threats, it is not all gloom-and-doom.  Scientists are studying the life histories of blue whales to learn how to better protect them.  Further study of the Costa Rica Dome will also provide us with a better insight to the species.  In September 2007, the Center for Biological Diversity, a California conservation group, petitioned the federal government to reduce ship speeds off the U.S. West Coast.  The IWC is maintaining a database of ship strikes in order to detect trends over time.  Pressure from conservation groups has led to restrictions of underwater noise, and many oil and gas companies have now begun to limit their use of seismic air guns.  The Southern Ocean Sanctuary and the Indian Ocean Whale Sanctuary were established.  And then there’s you.

Be a scientist:

• Tag, track and identify individual blue whales like scientists Bruce Mate and John Calambokidis

• Follow the steps of scientists Steve Palumbi (Stanford University) and
  Scott Baker (University of Oregon), who used DNA data (“Barcoding”) to reveal the species identifications of kujira (whale meat) from foreign markets

© Flip Nicklin / National Geographic

Clear your schedule for Sunday night.  That’s right, you heard me.  CLEAR YOUR SCHEDULE!  Because on March 8, 2009 at 8pm EST you HAVE to watch Kingdom of the Blue Whale on National Geographic Channel.

I had the pleasure of watching the special in advance, compliments of the wonderful Minjae Ormes, digital consultant for National Geographic.  Reviews on the special are a collaborative effort between Daniel at Biochemical Soul, Christie at Observations of a Nerd, and myself.  Daniel covered the presentation and visuals of the special, while Christie covered the science and physiology.  Without further ado, I give you the conservation review.  (And sound like Dr. Seuss in the process, hehe!)

Heart the size of a mini cooper.
Mouth big enough to hold 100 people.
Longer than a basketball court.
Weighing as much as 25 large elephants.
It is the largest creature to ever inhabit the earth.
But we know precious little about it.

In addition to normal video footage, the special also includes footage from the Crittercam, a technology invented by National Geographic marine biologist Greg Marshall in 1986.  The crittercam is comprised of a video camera and microphone, temperature and pressure gauges, headlights, a remote release mechanism, a microprocessor and tracking systems, all housed in a small case worn by the animal.

The special covers a lot of really important conservation issues for blue whales, and other cetaceans as well. I don’t want to give too much away, since I think you should watch the special, so I’ll just do a brief overview for now. Expect an in-depth post next week at some of the conservation issues these magnificent creatures face.

Some of the issues that blue whales face:

whaling
ship strikes
anthropogenic noise
hybridization with other species

Officials seized 1,000 kg of ivory during the bust, as well as hippo teeth and animal pelts of cheetah, leopard, serval cat and reticulated python skin.

The investigation, called Operation Baba (in honor of Gilbert Baba, a Ghanaian ranger killed in the line of duty a decade ago by poachers), was a collaboration between the Kenya Wildlife Service, INTERPOL, and the Lusaka Agreement Task Force, Africa’s first ever task force to fight wildlife crime and smuggling across international borders.  It initiated as a result made to INTERPOL by African elephant range states to help the continent deal with illegal elephant poaching.  As the operation came together, more than 300 staff from the police, customs, wildlife agencies, national intelligence agencies and the Lusaka Agreement Task Force were involved across the five participating countries.

Experts say that the growing presence of China in Africa is seen as a major driver of the ivory trade.  Each kilogram of poached elephant tusk may fetch $35 US dollars, the same piece of ivory can sell for $100 in Ethiopia, and up to $800 if it makes it all the way to China.  Since 2004, the global ivory trade has been steadily increasing, with China as the number one destination.

Now let’s jump to another corner of the globe….

Earlier in November, Malaysia’s Department of Wildlife and National Parks conducted two raids resulting in some of the largest-scale seizures the country has seen, indicating the growing sophistication of wildlife smuggling in the region.  The first raid took place on November 4 and found 900 oven-ready owls, defeathered and plastic-wrapped, including 796 barn owls, 95 spotted wood-owls, 74 buffy fish-owls, 8 barred eagle-owls and 4 brown wood-owls.  The state of the owls indicates they are intended for food.

“It’s the first time we’ve ever seen a big shipment like this of owls,” said Chris Shepherd, a senior program officer for the wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC.