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Poisonous algae blooms could signal tough season ahead for marine mammal rescue centers

Marine mammal veterinarians at facilities in Laguna Beach and San Pedro are paying close attention to a toxic algae bloom that is sickening hundreds of sea lions off the Ventura County coast with domoic acid exposure, leading to skyrocketing strandings and a state of emergency declaration.

Officials at the Channel Island Marine and Wildlife Institute in Santa Barbara are scrambling to help the mostly adult sea lions reported on area beaches, and are fielding as many as 100 calls a day.

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For 24 consecutive days, the institute has been inundated with reports of sick sea lions throughout Ventura and Santa Barbara counties. The marine mammal rescue center  – with only one dedicated hotline volunteer – typically averages about 20 calls at this time of year.

One 180-pound sea lion was so disoriented that it swam for 3.2 miles up a shallow, muddy canal near the Santa Barbara airport and ended up close to a busy four-lane road before a rescue team could get it. Three days before, rescue teams responded to reports of 40 animals in trouble.

The situation is so dire that institute officials are calling for a state of emergency.

And the emergency unfolding now up north is of acute interest to rescue groups in Southern California.

Dr. Lauren Palmer, veterinarian at the Marine Mammal Center Los Angeles in San Pedro, said she worries what could happen this winter when new pups are weaning from their mothers.

Each year, thousands of pups are born on the Channel Island rookeries. There, mothers tend to the newborns, which wait on shore while mothers hunt for prey. Because sea lion mothers eat as much as they can to nurse their pups, both are vulnerable to the effects of the toxin algae bloom.

In past instances where there have been mass strandings along southern and central California beaches, some pups began leaving the islands to forage on their own when mothers didn’t return and then struggled to survive on their own. Many end up sick on beaches further south.

Palmer has taken in 12 adult female sea lions with symptoms of domoic acid exposure. Three have died, and the others are recovering. While she said it’s too early to speculate on the upcoming season, she worries it could have dire consequences.

“If a large number of nursing moms are affected, then their pups will also be affected, either directly through the milk or possibly by abandonment and rejection,” she said. “Domoic acid and animal parenting don’t mix well.”

The toxin occurs in phytoplankton and, when ingested, can cause symptoms of disorientation, frothing at the mouth, lethargy and unawareness. Sea lions are exposed to toxins when they eat surface fish, such as sardines and anchovies that consume the algae.

At the Pacific Marine Mammal Center in Laguna Beach, Dr. Alissa Deming is also holding her breath.

“We have three domoic acid patients in-house and are geared up to receive more in case things do pick up,” she said. “We are watching the domoic acid models closely and manning the phones with bated breath.”

Deming’s patients are responding to medications and treatments, she said, and appear to be on the mend. But, Deming has also offered PMMC’s help to the Channel Island center and is assisting with necropsies on some of their patients that had to be euthanized because of severe seizures.

“During times like these, it’s important for the stranding network to come together to ensure live animals get the help they need,” Deming said.

San Diego SeaWorld, the farthest south in the stranding network, has taken in no animals with signs of poisoning yet, officials there said, adding that they, too, are monitoring the situation.

Typically, toxic blooms off Southern California occur early in the year, between February and May. In central and northern California, the blooms occur in July and sometimes August.

“This is late in the season for a bloom of this magnitude,” said Clarissa Anderson, who heads up the Southern California Coastal Ocean Observing System at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. “Not unheard of, but certainly anomalous.”

While Anderson doesn’t know what it might mean for the sea lions and their pups, she said the bloom is “part of an upward trend in bloom frequency and toxicity in the California current over the last 15 to 20 years.”


Source: Orange County Register

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