Nearly 800 stranded seahorses saved
PLETTENBERG BAY - The hard work of more than 100 Plett residents has led to the saving of just under 1 000 Knysna seahorses on Wednesday 27 September.
The seahorses washed up unexpectedly en masse, and the Plett community immediately jumped into action to save the endangered marine animals. Petro van Rhyn, general manager of advocacy at CapeNature, said the Knysna seahorse (hippocampus capensis) is truly a national treasure. She said by the end of the weekend, 1 079 seahorses were collected, of which 737 had been released.
The Knysna seahorse is South Africa's only endemic seahorse and is one of only two endangered seahorse species in the world.
Found in only three estuaries, all in the Southern Cape (Knysna, Swartvlei and Keurbooms), the Knysna seahorse is an iconic species for Knysna. As they are fish, they have a similar role to other fish. Fish, birds and crabs eat them and in turn they eat crustaceans that are small enough to be sucked into their tube snouts.
The limited range of this seahorse, its small population size and vulnerability to natural and anthropogenic disturbances puts it at great risk of extinction. It was the first seahorse species listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List. Van Rhyn said CapeNature has immense gratitude for the community and the way they came together to help. "We did not even ask for help, but the news of the stranded seahorses spread like wildfire on social media and local people, who obviously have a concern for this precious species," Van
Rhyn said.
"The public action was incredible, and it was a great combination of many people showing up and many people showing up at the right time. With this interaction we could find so many more seahorses. We absolutely commend the public and their actions. It was a huge community effort."
Last Wednesday, Van Rhyn explained why the seahorses washed up en masse: "Due to heavy rains, a flood occurred on Tuesday in the Keurbooms River and the Bitou River and the flood still persisted yesterday with high water flow. It flushed the seahorses out of the mouth of the river at low tide (spring tide, so a bit of a lower tide than usual). They were stranded yesterday morning just after low tide. The big swell yesterday also perpetuated the situation and they got washed out the mouth into a current and then the waves deposited them onto the beach."
She said by Tuesday afternoon, 1 079 seahorses were collected of which 737 had been released. Unfortunately 342 died, but will be kept for research purposes. "The strong live ones are being put back into the estuary where they naturally occur and where there is a huge eelgrass bed because that's where they seek refuge and shelter and where they find their food."
Van Rhyn said the situation has stabilised. The event was described as a natural occurrence. "In any flood event this would happen. In a big flood, 98% of the population could be wiped out, but luckily this was not a big flood, it was a minor event."