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Headlines – News – Articles
18th August, 2011
Media Watch, Honolulu Civil Beat, 11 August 2011
 Hawaiian monk seals and local fishermen haven’t been getting along very well. And fishermen aren’t happy about a proposal to extend a conservation zone around the main Hawaiian islands to further protect the endangered species.
This was the message conveyed to representatives of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration throughout two hours of heated testimony on Thursday at Ala Moana Beach Park.
More than 60 people turned out for the public hearing to discuss the proposal that would expand the critical habitat area for the seals, which have been protected under the Endangered Species Act since 1976. It is illegal to harass or kill the seals. [...]
But the plight of the monk seal hasn’t swayed many fishermen, if the testimony at the public hearing is any indication.
“They’re more of a nuisance than anything else right now,” said Brandon Hu. “I fish a lot at night. One of those seals started hiding under my boat. It takes fish from my lines, then my partner’s line. We’re losing fish left and right. We moved three miles down the coast. The monk seal started following us. They are already trained to be looking for our boats for a free handout.”
While only 153 monk seals are believed to be trolling the waters around the main Hawaiian islands, fishermen complained about the economic effects the seals were having on their fishing operations and their concern about the population growing. [...]
Source: Fishermen oppose extra protections for Hawaiian monk seals, Honolulu Civil Beat, 11 August 2011
23rd June, 2011
 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.)
→ Continue reading FAO adopts watered down protection measures
22nd May, 2011
Media Watch, The Huffington Post (Audry McAvoy, Associated Press), 21 May 2011
 James Watt / SeaPics / Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument Federal biologists scouring for ways to spare the critically endangered Hawaiian monk seal from extinction are embracing a desperate if unorthodox strategy: They want to pluck seal pups from the small, pristine island atolls where they’re born and move them closer to Honolulu and other highly populated areas.
Scientists say this counterintuitive step is needed to help save a species that’s declining at a rate of 4 percent annually. But it is already proving to be controversial, and even unpopular among fishermen who don’t want hungry seals eating their bait and accidentally getting caught in their nets and lines.
The National Marine Fisheries Service plans to formally propose the “translocation” of the seals in July, The Associated Press has learned. It wants to bring a few recently weaned female pups to the main Hawaiian Islands each year, keep them here until they’re three years old, and then send them back to the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands.
“We’re desperate. That’s the bottom line. We’re watching this species just crash right in front of our eyes. This is really one of the few things that we think has a chance of making a difference,” said Jeff Walters, the agency’s Hawaiian monk seal recovery coordinator. [...Continues...]
Source: Feds aim to save Hawaiian monk seal, The Huffington Post (Audry McAvoy, Associated Press), 21 May 2011
2nd February, 2011
NOAA announcement, 1 February 2011
 The National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), Pacific Islands Regional Office (PIRO) has published the Scoping Summary Report for the Hawaiian Monk Seal Recovery Actions PEIS, which presents a public record and summary of the scoping activities that occurred from October 1, 2010 through November 30, 2010. The report can be viewed online.
In the coming months, the Hawaiian Monk Seal Recovery Actions Draft PEIS will be released and a 60-day public comment period will be announced.
21st January, 2011
Media Watch, Plataforma SINC, Press Release, 21 January 2011
 Monk seal approaching artisanal fishers in Mauritania (Photo: A. Aguilar) Catalan researchers have studied the marine trophic network in Mauritania, on the north west coast of Africa, which is an extremely heavily exploited fishing area, as well as being home to two of the world’s most threatened species of marine mammal – the monk seal and the Atlantic hump-backed dolphin. The results of the study show that industrial and traditional fishing activities along the coast are putting these mammals and local marine ecosystems at great danger.
→ Continue reading Monk seal and hump-backed dolphin are threatened by fishing activities off coast of Mauritania
13th November, 2010
Media Watch, The Molokai Dispatch, 11 November 2010
 With a dwindling Hawaiian monk seal population, federal officials are proposing a new plan to improve the survival of the endangered species. However, some Molokai fishermen say they are worried the plan could come at their expense.
The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) is preparing a programmatic environmental impact statement (PEIS) for an action plan that seeks to relocate monk seals to Molokai and other islands.
The NFMS is considering moving recently-weaned female pups from the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands (NWHI) to the Main Hawaiian Islands (MHI) for three years. During this time, the seals would be released among wild pups and be monitored and studied before being returned to their respective islands. [...]
→ Continue reading Save Our Seals
14th October, 2010
Media Watch, Christopher Pala, Honolulu Weekly, 13 October 2010
Some folks made a killing depleting the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument. Wait ‘til you see how much they’ll make not to fish there anymore.
 The news came innocuously enough, in a press release earlier this year from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration. As a result of former President George W. Bush’s designation of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands as a marine national monument in June 2006, Congress appropriated funds to compensate the owners of seven bottomfish licenses and 15 lobster licenses because they would no longer be able to fish there. The bottom-fishermen would share $2.2 million, the lobster fishermen $4.3 million. All licenses had been given out for free. [...]
After two temporary closures by NOAA, the Honolulu federal court closed the fishery again in 2000 because of still-disputed evidence that the collapse of the lobster population had triggered mass starvation among monk seal pups, and that in turn caused a 5 percent yearly decline in the monk seal population. The fishery was never reopened, presumably because the lobster stocks never recovered, and the monk seal pups in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands are still starving. [...]
Full Story
1st August, 2010
Media Watch, Thomas Schultze-Westrum, EcoCommunications, August 1, 2010
Seals and coastal fishermen face identical threats, more than just the rapid depletion of fish resources by exploitive trawlers…
“Indiscriminate seal killers” … With this unjust accusation against the coastal fishermen – our allies from the beginning – the Hellenic Society for the Study and Protection of the Monk Seal (MOm) and their associates have demonstrated clearly their incompetence and regardless diffamation [sic], actually the total failure of their strategy. Because, at the time when MOm was founded, already there existed a full collaboration between the cooperative of the fishermen of Alonnisos and the conservation movement on behalf of the seals – see the “Declaration by the Fishermen of Alonnisos” of 1982 below. By this consensus the seals had become valued allies of the fishermen, in their function as guarantors of exclusive fishing rights in the coastal waters of the archipelago.
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