out there in the Gulf of California in
northern Mexico lies the small town of
San Felipe it's nicknamed the Gateway to
the Sea of Cortez one of the most
diverse seas on earth which is why even
jack Cousteau once called it the
aquarium of the planet
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but today the entire Sea of Cortez is in
danger
including one of the rarest species on
our planet a small porpoise that is so
shy that only a few people have ever
seen it the vaquita the vaquita is the
most endangered marine mammal on the
planet today
and it's this beautiful little purpose
which is a type of dolphin or whale and
it looks a little bit like a panda bear
so it has these beautiful black circles
around its eyes and around its lips and
it has this very distinct look to it and
so we are working hard to try to prevent
this animal from going extinct how could
this happen what is killing the vaquita
the Keita's are innocent victims of the
illegal wildlife trade they are tragic
bycatch of illegal fishermen casting
their gill nets to catch a fish called
the to java
the to Taba which is equally endangered
is often called the cocaine of the sea
like a drug it's swim bladders believed
to have tonic anti-aging and various
other miraculous properties and
therefore fetches huge amounts of money
on the Chinese black-market needless to
say there isn't one bit of scientific
proof of the two table swim bladder
superpowers
in order to catch the to Java gillnets
large vertical walls of nets designed to
snatch and entangle the fish are used
even though Mexico banned the use of
gill nets in the area since 2005 for the
vaquita gill nets are deadly trap
there's a couple different thoughts
about why the vaquita are being in
tandem and turning one is that these
fishing nets acoustically to the animals
they don't really show up and so they
might be able to detect them if they get
really close but their bio sonar their
echolocation
can can detect them somewhat but they're
pretty transparent to the animals and so
that's one reason why we think they're
getting entangled another is that if
fish are getting trapped in these nets
the vaquita may be going after those
fish and trying to pull out prey items
and then in the process accidentally
getting entangled and drowning this is
why makita's are dying this is why a lot
of species from the Opera Gulf of
California are in danger this is what is
feeling the entire operation sea
dwellers safeguarded by dedicated
activists from NGOs such as the sea
Shepherd monitor the area in search of
illegal gill nets
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they pull out old so-called ghost nets
finding all kinds of sea life entangled
in them the decline in this small marine
mammals population has been dramatic in
1997 there was an estimated 576 makita's
living in the Sea of Cortez today
estimates are below 20 something had to
be done to stop this deadly decline in
2017 in collaboration with several NGOs
the Mexican government launched a
mission to bring some of the last
remaining Akitas into a temporary ocean
sanctuary this unprecedented effort
included participation from an
international consortium of marine
mammal experts
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- the Keita's were captured but they
couldn't adapt to human care for the
scientist this was a devastating
experience so about in 2015 there was a
group of scientists and veterinarians
that started to realize that time was
swiftly running out because of this
illegal fishery that was creeping into
the picture with these organized
criminals and the tatata fishery was
rapidly decimating the vaquita
population it it really pushed the
community to explore what other options
do we have we wanted to make their home
safe for them that was the goal and will
always be the goal we want the Gulf of
California or the Sea of Cortez as it's
known to be safe for them but it wasn't
and it isn't and so what else can you do
to actually save the species from
extinction the sea sanctuary had to be
shut down just two weeks after the death
of one of the vaquita 's and human care
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but the poaching fishermen are still out
there casting their illegal bill nets to
this day a lot of people have asked me
when will you stop believing that it's
possible and yeah I don't I don't really
have an answer to that I won't give up
on the kiddos as long as there's one
left
we can't that's not okay we can't walk
away from this so I will continue to
have code at some point it will be too
small of a population for them to
recover and we really can't afford to
lose a single baqia at this point we are
really really small in terms of
population size so right now it has to
everything has to come together right
now we don't have another moment to
spare that the current rate of loss the
Keita's will likely decline to
extinction in the next year or two the
last hope for saving them is the
complete elimination of gill net fishing
in their habitat
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[Applause]
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