The Monachus-Guardian — Headlines-News-Articles — 2008-2018
Dedicated to Monk Seals and their Threatened Habitats
Karamanlidis, A.A., S. Adamantopoulou, V. Paravas, M. Psaradellis, P. Dendrinos. 2013. Demographic structure and social behaviour of the unique Mediterranean monk seal (Monachus monachus) colony of the island of Gyaros. Poster presentation, in: 20th Biennial Conference of the Society for Marine Mammalogy. 10th December 2013, Dunedin, New Zealand. [PDF 5.1 MB]
In their just-published September-October Newsletter, Greek NGO MOm reports the births of 29 monk seal pups to date this breeding season: 11 in the Cyclades, 8 on the island of Evia and 5 each in the Ionian and the Dodecanese. The pup counts form part of population monitoring in specific areas of Greece, in an attempt to gather information on overall trends. No pup count information has been released from the National Marine Park of Alonnisos, Northern Sporades, where no population monitoring appears to have been conducted for several years — apparently the victim of funding cut-backs.
Over recent years, camera monitoring systems have been installed on several occasions in Madeira’s Desertas Islands, yet failed to achieve the desired results.
This year, however, we obtained the first images of monk seals on site using a simple system, comprising an automatic camera.
On 26 October 2012, the system captured the first pup of the reproductive season — barely one day old.
The calf, a female, is healthy and being cared for by two females who share the role of mother. It is thought possible that one of them may have previously lost her own calf.
It is hoped that the initiative, undertaken through the BES Biodiversity award, with the technical assistance of Spanish organization CBD-Habitat, will allow more effective monitoring of monk seals both on beaches and in caves. The system is also expected to prove its value during the current stormy season, which often prevents or inhibits firsthand observation.
By January or February 2013, we hope to have results from the camera system installed inside ‘Tabaqueiro’ — a maternity cave.
Funded by the Portuguese bank Espírito Santo’s Biodiversity Award, Parque Natural da Madeira Service has installed four cameras in the area most frequented by monk seals on land — in Tabaqueiro cave and on Tabaqueiro beach, on the Desertas Islands of Madeira.
The PNMS team was assisted by CBD-Habitat Foundation of Spain, which has been developing and perfecting this method of monitoring the monk seal population since 1994, at the Côte des Phoques in the Western Sahara. The teams have been collaborating on monk seal conservation since 2008, under the framework of the “Action Plan for the Recovery of the Mediterranean Monk Seal in the Eastern Atlantic”, established under the auspices of the Bonn Convention.
The main goal of the Desertas camera initiative is to improve seal monitoring in the nature reserve, gaining a better knowledge of seal behaviour on land, while improving the photo-identification catalogue of this population. Should it prove successful, this monitoring method will be maintained in the Tabaqueiro area but also expanded to other areas that are used or have high probability of being used by monk seals. We eagerly await the next reproductive season — which begins in November — when seals will again use the Tabaqueiro area!
Portugal
Some fishermen blame the endangered species for stealing their catch. There are unfounded rumors that they devour and deplete fish stocks. And at least four of them have been killed by humans in Hawaii since late last year.
To help correct the misconceptions, government scientists plan to glue submersible cameras onto the seals’ backs, using the footage to prove to fishermen the animals are not harming their way of life. It may even end up on reality TV. [More]
For further information on the project: http://www.monksealfoundation.org/research.aspx
Source: Scientists to strap cameras to Hawaiian seals, Washington Examiner, 15 June 2012.
Spanish filmmaker Rafa Herrero Massieu has released a brief film tribute to biologist Didier Marchessaux and his colleagues Alain Argiolas, Gerard Vuignier and Ely ould Elmine, who were killed in a landmine explosion on 16 October 1988 while researching the important Mediterranean monk seal colony in the disputed Western Sahara.
August / Agosto from Rafa Herrero Massieu on Vimeo.