User:Danielrgjoseph/Sea otter conservation

Sea Otter Conservation: Article Draft

Conservation Issues:

The IUCN describes the significant threats to sea otters as oil pollution, predation by orcas, poaching, and conflicts with fisheries. Sea otters can drown if entangled in fishing gear. They can also be stressed by well-meaning human watchers who approach too closely. The most significant threat to sea otters is oil spills. Unlike most other marine mammals, sea otters have very little subcutaneous fat. Otters rely primarily on their fur to be clean, dense, and water resistant in order to be insulted from the cold. When their fur is soaked with oil, it loses its ability to retain air. The liver, kidneys, and lungs of sea otters also become damaged after they inhale oil or ingest it when grooming. The contamination of their fur destroys the insulating properties of the fur, causing the animal to experience hypothermia and death.

The small geographic ranges of the sea otter populations in California, Washington, and British Columbia mean that a single major spill could be catastrophic for that state or province. Prevention of oil spills, and preparation for rescue of otters in the event of one, are major areas of focus for conservation efforts. Increasing the size and the range of sea otter populations will also reduce the effects of catastrophic oil spills.

More broadly, sea otters must maintain a high level of internal heat production in order to compensate for a lack of blubber. Because of this, sea otters need to consume food equal to 25% of their body mass every single day to satisfy their high energetic requirements. Consequently, depending on the habitat, reproductive status, and per capita prey presence, hunting for food can cost sea otters between 20 to 50% of the day foraging, leaving sea otters significantly vulnerable. Sea otter in the Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge.

Marine protected areas provide good habitat in which activities such as dumping waste and drilling for oil are not permitted. The sea otter population within the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary is estimated to be more than 1,200. The at the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary is over 500.

California:

California is the only location where the southern sea otter (Enhydra lutris nereis) subspecies is found in significant numbers. In 1938, a couple testing a telescope discovered a group of about 50 of these animals in a remote part of the coast near Big Sur, California. With conservation efforts, including the crucial pioneering of Monterey marine protected area by Julia Platt and Margaret Wentworth Owingsand the Friends of the Sea Otter organization, this group has since grown and expanded its range. However, recovery has been slow in comparison to sea otter populations elsewhere, and also in comparison to sympatric marine mammal species such as California sea lions and harbor seals. Its average growth rate between 1914 and 1984 was only 5%, and fluctuated or declined in the late 1990s.The southern sea otter was listed under the Endangered Species Actas a threatened subspecies in 1977. A survey taken in the spring of 2007 counted a little over 3,000 sea otters in California, up slightly from previous years but down from an estimated pre-fur trade population of 16,000. For the subspecies to be delisted from the list of threatened species, the count must average 3,090 or more over three years.

The expansion of the sea otter population brought it into conflict with shellfish fisheries. Beginning in the 1980s, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service attempted to manage the competition between sea otters and fishermen by creating an "otter-free zone" from Point Conception to the U.S.-Mexico border. In this zone, only San Nicolas Island was designated as sea otter habitat, and sea otters found elsewhere in the area were supposed to be captured and relocated. These plans were abandoned after it proved impractical to capture the hundreds of otters which continued to swim into the zone.

In December 2014, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service received a tip that a man docking his boat in Moss Landing, California, shot at a mother sea otter with a pellet gun. The otter was nursing twin pups at the time of the incident.

References

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