Although the situation faced by the vaquita is quite dire, there are lots of organizations and individuals that are committed to doing all they can to prevent the vaquita’s extinction. In this article, we will summarize the scientific research and monitoring work that has been conducted on the vaquita population.
The Ocean Starr – vaquita survey vessel in the Northern Gulf of California in 2015.
Scientific Research and the Remote Acoustic Monitoring Program
Without scientific data collection we would know nothing about the vaquita, and therefore be unable to take any action to save the species. The ongoing research effort associated with the vaquita has been critical to understanding both the rate of the vaquita’s decline and the causal factors behind that decline. There have been three large scale visual survey efforts conducted, all of them designed to provide population estimates for the species – in 1997, 2008, and 2015. These surveys documented the decline of the vaquita population from just under 600 individuals in 1997 to only 60 animals in 2015.
The research crew searching for vaquitas through high powered binoculars on board the survey vessel, Ocean Starr in 2015.
These visual surveys are extremely expensive and time consuming, and scientists knew early on in the recovery effort that a more efficient technique for estimating population size was needed. This need led to the development of the remote acoustic monitoring program, which uses remote acoustic detectors, or hydrophones, placed throughout the vaquita’s range. These hydrophones are designed to record the high frequency sonar clicks emitted by the vaquita, which can then be analyzed to make accurate estimates of abundance. It’s important to note that these are estimates, not concrete numbers, but this technique has proven to be extremely valuable to the vaquita conservation effort. In fact without this ability to estimate population size on a yearly basis, it almost certainly would have taken much longer for vaquita advocates to recognize the negative impact of the illegal totoaba fishery. If it had taken an additional few years to recognize the enormous role of the illegal totoaba fishery in the vaquita’s decline, conservation efforts would have been stalled, and it’s possible that the vaquita would already be extinct. So the importance of the remote acoustic monitoring program cannot be overstated – without this program all other conservation efforts for the species would be working in the dark.
It’s also important to note that there is a group of local fisherman who have been assisting with the remote acoustic monitoring program for many years. This is important for several reasons – first, because it provides the direct assistance that is needed to implement the program. Fisherman are hired to both place these acoustic detection devices in the waters of the Gulf of California, and to periodically retrieve these devices to access the data they have been collecting. This is not easy work, and it’s a huge benefit to the program that they are able to work with people who are intimately familiar with the local marine environment. The second reason this is so important however, is the message that this sends to other members of the community. These fisherman who have opted to participate in the acoustic monitoring program for vaquita are showing their fellow community members that it is possible to opt out of the illegal totoaba fishery, and stand up for what is right.
Javier and Alan Valverde deploying acoustic monitoring equipment.