Category: Mediterranean News

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Monk Seal ‘Desertinha’ on display in Madeira

— by Rosa Pires, Parque Natural da Madeira Service
‘Desertinha’ at the Museum of Natural History. Photo: Rosa Pires

Following her death in late 2008, Madeira’s most popular monk seal, “Desertinha”, will be put on public display as a taxidermic model. The work, by a Portuguese taxidermist and sponsored by Deutsche Bank, was first presented to the public on 17 June at the Museum of Natural History in the Botanical Gardens, Funchal.

‘Desertinha’ gained local fame in 2006 after sustaining a serious injury to the lower limbs, her plight creating a huge wave of sympathy from Madeirans. This resulted in the most prominent conservation campaign ever made in the region [see Seal finds stardom, TMG 9(2): 2006].

Desertinha was first identified in 1993 and was monitored by the staff of the Parque Natural da Madeira Service over 16 years. After being found ill in Madeira in 2008, she was transferred to the Rehabilitation Unit on the Desertas Islands, where she died due to cardiac arrest, on 1 December [see Our monk seal ambassador, ‘Desertinha’ dies in Madeira, TMG 12(1): 2009].

Following display at the Museum of Natural History, the Desertinha exhibit was presented at the Expo Madeira from 8 to 17 July. The work will be put on permanent display at the Whale Museum of Madeira, which will be inaugurated in September this year.

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FAO adopts watered down protection measures

The FAO’s General Fisheries Commission for the Mediterranean (GFCM) adopted a series of recommendations aimed at protecting monk seals from accidental entanglement in fishing gear at its 9-14 May 2011 session in Rome.

Recommendation GFCM/35/2011/5 on Fisheries Measures for the Conservation of the Mediterranean Monk Seal (Monachus monachus) in the GFCM Competence Area calls for Contracting Parties and Cooperating Parties of the Commission (CPCs) to implement the following measures:

— Prohibit fishing vessels from taking on board, transporting or landing monk seals unless required to assist in the rescue of injured individuals, and only then with prior official authorisation.

— Seals encountered entangled in fishing gear must be released unharmed and alive.

— Seals found dead in fishing gear must be brought ashore and the authorities  promptly notified (at the latest upon arrival at port).

— Any incidental take and release must be recorded in the vessel’s logbook, and reported to the relevant authorities for onward notification of the GFCM Secretariat.

— No later than 2015, CPCs should adopt fisheries management measures designed to attain a “very low and close to 0 risk” of incidental take and mortality of monk seals in fishing activities.

— CPCs must provide the GFCM Secretariat with the geographical positions of already known, past and current monk seal caves, with corresponding information on fleets deploying bottom-set nets within a maximum 20 mile range. Preliminary maps and data should be completed by December 2011, and transmitted to the GFCM no later than 31 January 2012. (Access to such potentially sensitive data, the document is at pains to point out, will be restricted.)

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Monk seal favourite killed on Amorgos

— by Erwin Werdenigg, Amorgos Island Magazine
The young seal was found dead on an Amorgos beach

Amorgos – June 15th, 2011: The young friendly male monk seal appearing in the port of Aegiali at the middle of April quickly won the hearts of the people and became a “mascot” of tourists and also the magazine.  On last Friday (June 10th) Dimitris Synodinos (Amorgos Diving Center) alerted that the animal was found dead on the beach.

People from MOm (the Greek monk seal protection group) could not travel to Amorgos themselves due to increased ferry occupancy. The animal was send to Athens on Saturday for autopsy. The examination at MOm showed that:

It was a young male seal, 6-7 months old, in good nutritional status. The animal had injuries in the back sustained by a sharp object, which crossed the side to reach the thoracic cavity, thus injuring the lung. Histological analysis will give us information on whether the animal eventually died from suffocation or internal bleeding. In any case, death resulted from the trauma deliberately inflicted upon the animal, from close distance.

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Hundreds of species face extinction across Europe in ‘crisis of biodiversity’

Media Watch, Mail Online, 17 May 2011

young mediterranean monk sealHundreds of species are facing extinction across Europe in a ‘crisis of biodiversity’.

According to the EU’s Environment Commissioner Janez Potocnik, animals such as the Iberian lynx, the Mediterranean monk seal and the Bavarian pine vole could soon be gone.

These are among hundreds of species – up to a quarter of the total native to the continent – that are threatened with extinction according to a warning issued this month by the European Union.

‘Biodiversity is in crisis, with species extinctions running at unparalleled rates,’ said a statement from Mr Potocnik.

The threatened species include mammals, amphibians, reptiles, birds and butterflies and plant life is also under threat.

The crisis is due to several factors, including loss of habitat, pollution, alien species encroachment, climate change and overfishing.

Critics say the EU’s proposed solutions don’t go far enough and lack funding. […Continues…]

Source: Hundreds of species face extinction across Europe in ‘crisis of biodiversity’, Mail Online, 17 May 2011.