Illegal fishing threatens vaquitas
As scientists planned an expedition in Mexico this fall to count one of the world’s most endangered animals, a shy porpoise called a vaquita, they dreaded the possibility that there would be none left to find. The last survey, in 2019, estimated that only about 10 remained.
At the same time, fishermen in the area were preparing to set out with the illegal nets scientists say are driving the porpoises to extinction: walls of mesh that hang upright below the surface, up to 20 feet deep and stretching the length of several football fields.
Called gill nets, they trap shrimp and fish. They also entangle vaquitas, drowning the mammals. Researchers say the nets are the only known cause for the species’ catastrophic decline, but getting rid of them has turned out to be a challenge.
Amid a global biodiversity crisis, with an estimated 1 million species threatened with extinction, the story of the vaquita shows how even obvious solutions — in this case, putting a stop to illegal fishing — require political will, enforcement and deep engagement with local communities to meet the needs of both people and animals.
“The government still hasn’t given us a solution or an effective way to support our families without going out to fish illegally,” said Ramón Franco Díaz, president of a federation of fishing cooperatives in San Felipe, a town alongside the vaquitas’ habitat. “The children need food and clothes.”
Early results from this year’s vaquita survey, completed in early November, show that the animals still exist but on a knife’s edge.
Marine mammal experts say a recovery is possible, but only if their habitat is free of gill nets.
Instead, illegal fishing in the area is widespread and happening in plain view. Even as a team of scientists from Mexico and the United States arrived in San Felipe for this year’s count, it appeared to continue unabated.
The vaquita population has plummeted from an estimated 600 individuals in 1997 to around 10 in 2019. But examples exist of endangered species climbing back from similarly tiny numbers, and the 2019 survey documented three healthy calves among the remaining porpoises. Since then, at least one vaquita has died in a gill net, according to advocates.
“They’re going extinct because of human activities, even though it could be avoided,” said Jorge Urbán Ramírez, a biologist who runs the marine mammal research program at the Autonomous University of Baja California Sur. “It’s not a priority.”