WWF Travel Offers Chances to See At-Risk Small Cetaceans
Jul 9th, 2009 by wwftravel
© Cat Holloway/WWF-Canon
Small cetaceans—dolphins, porpoises and small whales—play a crucial role in ensuring healthy ecosystems. They’re also important parts of sustainably managed whale- and dolphin-watching industries, which helps support communities around the globe.
But small cetaceans are disappearing from the world’s oceans and waterways as they fall victim to fishing gear, pollution and habitat loss. And while large whales are protected by international conservation efforts, their tinier cousins are overshadowed and being pushed toward extinction, according to a new WWF report, Small cetaceans: The Forgotten Whales.
Small cetaceans are hunted around the world, largely unmanaged and unchecked by the international community. For example, the Convention on Migratory Species protects 87 percent of great whale species but less than half of smaller whale species.
The biggest threat to small cetaceans is bycatch, which is when untargeted species are accidentally caught in fishing gear and then thrown back into the ocean, either dying or dead. It is estimated that more than 300,000 small cetaceans die each year from entanglement in fishing gear.
WWF works with fishers, consumers, the seafood industry and governments to help reduce bycatch. Proven solutions do exist, such as modifying fishing gear so that either fewer non-target species are caught or non-target species can escape. In many cases, these modifications are simple and inexpensive, with the best innovations usually coming from fishers themselves.
WWF offers several tours in 2010 to see small cetaceans, supporting tourism outfits that manage their practices in environmentally sustainable ways. See them in the wild with WWF in 2010:
Copper Canyon and the Sea of Cortez, January 2-10, 2010
Baja California: Among the Great Whales, January 23-30, 2010
The Amazon Voyage, March 19-28, 2010
Baja Multisport, April 7-13, 2010
Northern Ring of Fire, July 25 – August 10, 2010
Northern Ring of Fire, August 9 – 21, 2010
Bridging the Equator: Micronesia to Polynesia, September 6 – 21, 2010
