down with murder inc

Japan's whale-seeking satellite
By Alex Kirby BBC News Online environment correspondent - Tuesday, 8 January, 2002, 16:27 GMT
One of the two countries that still hunts whales has announced plans to monitor the animals' movements by satellite.
Japan, which kills about 500 whales annually, plans to launch the satellite later this year.
Officials of the country's National Space Development Agency (Nasda) said the satellite would track whales fitted with electronic tags. One said it was thought likely to help with Japan's whaling plans. The officials said the 50-kilogram (110 lb) satellite would be launched around October. It would be used with the global positioning system to track whales that had been fitted with electronic tags the size of coconuts, which would carry transmitters. The system will collect data on the whales' migration patterns "and other activities".
The officials gave no details about which species of whales will be fitted with the tags, nor about how they will be attached.
Numbers disputed
The International Whaling Commission (IWC) agreed a moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986, but the following year Japan began whaling in the name of scientific research. This is permitted under the IWC's rules, which say that any member state can kill unlimited numbers of any species, so long as the purpose is research.
For some years the Japanese fleet has been killing around 400 minke whales every year in the Antarctic. Japan argues that there are ample whales there to support an annual kill on this scale. It believes there are about 750,000 Antarctic minkes. Last year, the director general of the Tokyo-based Institute of Cetacean Research, Dr Seiji Ohsumi, told the BBC: "Using the data we have acquired for the Southern Ocean minkes, our calculation is that a quota of 2,000 whales could be taken for 100 years without impact on the population."
But the IWC, responsible both for whale conservation and for regulating whaling, has recently said it does not know how many minkes there are.
Japan defends its Antarctic programme as necessary to establish the minkes' abundance.
Threatened by technology
In the North Pacific it has begun catching small numbers of sperm and Bryde's whales as well. It says they too are abundant, and it is examining their stomach contents to see whether they are eating commercially important quantities of fish.
Japan's critics say the research is simply a stratagem to keep the whaling fleet occupied until the IWC agrees to end the moratorium.
Many critics also allege that Japan misuses its aid budget to bribe smaller IWC members to vote its way at Commission meetings. Japan rejects the suggestion.
Richard Page of Greenpeace UK told BBC News Online: "The fisheries agency of Japan is hell-bent on resuming full-blown commercial whaling, including buying votes at the IWC. "Even before the advent of satellite technology, whales didn't stand a chance. What hope have they now?"
One cetacean expert told BBC News Online he thought Japan would use its satellite technology to enhance its research programme, not to replace it, and that using the satellite would not save a single whale from death. The only other country to kill whales in large numbers is Norway, which is not bound by the IWC's moratorium because it objected to it. Several communities in the Arctic and the Caribbean are allowed to continue their traditional whale hunts in order to ensure their survival.

New US sonars 'may harm whales'

Tuesday, 16 July, 2002, - The United States Government has authorised the Navy to use a powerful new sonar system to detect submarines, despite concerns that it could harm whales and dolphins. Today's decision is far too broad to provide any meaningful protection for whales, dolphins and other marine life
The US says the intense low-frequency sonar - the Surveillance Towed Array Sensor System (Surtass LFA) - has been extensively tested and will have only a negligible impact on marine life. The Commerce Department's National Marine Fisheries Service said in a statement that with proper monitoring "marine mammals are unlikely to be injured by the sonar activities".
But environmentalists say whales and dolphins will be particularly vulnerable to sonar interference, because they rely heavily on sound for communication, feeding and migration. They say the recent use of a similar system in a naval exercise off the Bahamas forced whales and dolphins to beach themselves, and that the animals had injuries consistent with being exposed to loud sounds.
"The Bush administration has issued a blank cheque for the global use of this system," Michael Jasny, policy analyst from the Natural Resources Defense Council, told the Associated Press news agency. "Today's decision is far too broad to provide any meaningful protection for whales, dolphins and other marine life."
Fears
The US says the Surtass LFA - capable of transmitting signals as powerful as 215 decibels - is vital to national security, because other nations such as Russia, China and Germany are developing new super-quiet submarines.
Washington, which has spent $300m developing the system, granted the Navy a five-year exemption from the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The exemption will be reviewed annually. The new sonars will be used on two US warships, capable of covering 80% of the world oceans.
But officials say they will require the personnel to use special protective measures such as a visual scan for marine mammals and shutting down the sonar if the animals are detected. They also say the detection will be almost 100% effective from a distance of 1.1 nautical miles (2 kilometres), and that the use of the sonars would be restricted to at least 12 nautical miles (22km) from a coastline.
But some scientists believe whales are affected by sounds louder than 110 decibels, and that a whale's eardrums could explode at 180 decibels. They also point out that at least 16 whales beached themselves in March 2001 - just hours after the US Navy tested similar powerful sonars near the Bahamas. - BBC

Stranded whales put to death in US Wednesday, 31 July, 2002, - BBC
US marine experts have put down a group of pilot whales after they swam ashore for a third time, despite efforts to keep them at sea. The animals were too ill, exhausted and distressed to return to the sea after they pushed ashore once more on a marshy, remote beach near Cape Cod, Massachusetts. So the decision was made to put down the surviving members of the pod.
Local volunteers and holidaymakers had spent two days herding the whales to sea and trying to regulate their body temperature with wet blankets and sheets.
"After two days of trying to give these animals any opportunity we could, a decision was made by the veterinarians on site to euthanise those animals that weren't already dead," said New England Aquarium spokesman Tony LaCasse. "It's probably one of the harder decisions that anyone can make," he added.
The whales, which were tagged, were found in shallow waters at Eastham, Cape Cod, on Monday. About 15 whales died at the first beaching. Early on Tuesday about 45 surviving whales beached again at Lieutenant Island. Some of the whales died after the second beaching, and those that survived were sunburnt and blistered and clearly distressed - wailing to each other.
Rescuers turned them onto their stomachs to prevent them from suffocating before high tide. But the 30 to 35 surviving whales swam ashore again on Tuesday afternoon.
According to Teri Frady, spokeswoman for the National Marine Fisheries Service, a total of 60 whales died, including those put to death.
Pilot whale pods become stranded fairly regularly as they are sociable animals and like to feed in coastal waters.
The Cape Cod region of Massachusetts is a common site for whale beachings as its curved peninsula can trap mammals attracted by its rich source of squid, sand eels and crustaceans which whales like to feed on.

Beached whales die off Tasmania
More than 100 whales and dolphins have died in two separate beachings in islands off Tasmania in Australia. Ninety-seven pilot whales and bottlenose dolphins died off King Island over the weekend, and several others have died off Maria Island.
Volunteers have been trying to prevent others from suffering the same fate, by carrying them back to deeper waters. Scientists have flown in to try to establish why so many of the mammals have died. Tasmanian wildlife officer Shane Hunniford said about half of the 53-strong pod of whales off Maria Island had already died, and efforts were under way to save the other beached animals.
"As I'm looking out to sea now, I can see seven people holding rescue whales and beyond that there's a police launch out there, and there's a mother and calf out there, so we've had a good success rate, we're pretty happy," Mr Hunniford told reporters. "In terms of degrees of health, some are good, some are not so good. If things keep going the way they're going now we're doing alright," he said.
The BBC's correspondent in Sydney, Phil Mercer, says just why so many have become stranded on the beaches remains a mystery.
In the past, scientists have speculated that predators such as killer whales may have forced them onto land. Other researchers have suggested that they are attracted by high levels of nutrients in the water, or that they become disorientated by the noise of oil and gas installations. BBC

Desperate attempt to save whales as 60 die in stranding
HEATHER LOW CHOY in Hobart 26oct05 - UP TO 60 long-fin pilot whales died in a tragic mass stranding on Tasmania's south-east coast yesterday. Rescuers were last night working frantically to save 11 whales which survived the beaching at Marion Bay, near Copping. Authorities were alerted to the stranding just after 11am yesterday but rescuers arrived to find most of the whales already dead. Parks and Wildlife Service rescuer Ingrid Albion said volunteers and authorities had refloated some whales by mid-afternoon.
"Every live whale we have found we have rescued," Ms Albion said. Rescuers were trying to send the whales they had refloated back to sea as a pod. "If we can put them together as one group that's our best chance," she said.
Yesterday's stranding was the second major beaching at Marion Bay during the past eight years. More than 100 whales died in a series of strandings on the East Coast, including Marion Bay, in 1998. Parks and Wildlife Service senior marine biologist Rosemary Gales said two pods of whales were involved in the stranding yesterday. The tragedy claimed all but seven whales from a pod of 60 as well as three from a pod of seven. About 80 scientists, police officers, rangers and volunteers joined the effort. Ms Albion said stranding could be linked to strong bonds between pod whales.
"If a whale is in trouble, it will call the others, who try to rescue it," she said. - the advertiser

More beachings

Rescuers battle new whale stranding
October 26, 2005 - A THIRD pod of whales has stranded in southern Tasmania at the same spot where up to 70 pilot whales beached themselves yesterday.
Rescuers are working to save 14 whales at the southern end of Marion Bay, east of Hobart. Dozens of volunteers and Parks and Wildlife officers managed to save 11 whales last night after two pods of pilot whales - which are actually dolphins - beached themselves on the northern and southern ends of Marion Bay. It is not known what caused the beaching, but service spokeswoman Ingrid Albion told the ABC today that only one whale needed to get into trouble to cause a stranding.
"They use sonar so they can get confused when they come into sandy beaches," she said. "Only one of them has to get in trouble and make a wrong turn and they'll actually call the rest of the pod to them." - the australian

A denial means something, i reckon...

Australian navy denies links to whale strandings
SYDNEY (AFP) Oct 26, 2005 The Australian navy on Wednesday denied its ships were behind two mysterious mass strandings in 24 hours that left 130 pilot whales dead on the coast of the island state of Tasmania. Wildlife rangers said a pod of about 80 pilot whales beached themselves at Marion Bay late Tuesday, just hours after nearly 60 of the animals died in an earlier mass stranding in the same spot.
An Australian Defence Force (ADF) spokesman confirmed two naval ships had been operating in the area using short-range, high-frequency sonar as they searched for remnants of an historic ship wreck. Greens senator Christine Milne said an investigation should be launched into whether the sonar had contributed to the strandings.
"We know that high-intensity sonar, which some military vessels use, can disrupt the navigation system of whales and dolphins," she told reporters.
However, the ADF said the two ships were anchored far to the west in Hobart when the first stranding occurred and their presence had no bearing on the second. "The later presence of the two ships in the stranding area is purely coincidental and is considered unrelated to the cause of the strandings, which are considered by many to be a natural phenomena that occurs regularly in the Tasmanian area at this time of year," he said.
Tasmania Parks and Wildlife Service spokeswoman Liz Wren said dozens of volunteers and wildlife officials were involved in the rescue effort. "When we got here this morning there were about 70 dead whales scattered over a stretch of about a kilometer (half a mile) of beach," she said. "We've been able to put eight back in the water, but I'm afraid the rest died," she told AFP by mobile phone from the beach. "It's really terrible."
Pilot whales, which are actually a large species of dolphin that can grow up to six metres (20 foot) long, frequently beach themselves in a phenomenon that remains a mystery to scientists. Another parks and wildlife official, Ingrid Albion, said it appeared that one disorientated pilot whale in the first group may have led the entire pod to a stranding.
"Maybe they've come in close looking for food, maybe the tide's been a bit different," she said on Australia Broadcasting Corporation radio. "They use sonar so they can get confused when they come into sandy beaches," she said. "Only one of them has to get in trouble and make a wrong turn and they'll actually call the rest of the pod to them."
[note: these quotes are exactly the same as in the stories above]
On Tuesday, rescuers managed to push 10 of 67 stranded whales back out to sea.
Tasmania's rugged coastline has one of the highest stranding rates in the world. - spacewar.com

Dozens of pilot whales stranded on New Zealand beach
20/12/2005 - Conservation workers and volunteers were today racing against time in a bid to save 123 pilot whales beached on New Zealand's South Island.
At least three of the pod died before they could be shepherded back out to sea.
Department of Conservation area manager John Mason said workers had tracked the pod of whales during the day after they were seen apparently confused and milling around near the shore.
The first whale had stranded yesterday afternoon and the rest of the pod of 13-to-16-foot whales had progressively stranded on the shallow sandy beach.
"It wasn't a great surprise to us when they began to strand when the tide turned and began to go out," he said.
About 100 local people had volunteered to try to keep the whales as comfortable as possible on the beach near Farewell Spit in the north of South Island, Mason said. - IOL

Whales at risk in sonar sea exercises
It is one of the loudest sound systems devised by man, capable of sending a sonic boom so thunderous experts warn it can rupture the brains of whales hundreds of miles away.
Yet defence chiefs have earmarked a staggering 340m for a new submarine sonar system increasingly linked to a number of mysterious whale deaths. Experts yesterday condemned the decision to press ahead without even a public meeting into its effects. A single ping of the new low-frequency technology can affect animals across 3.8 million square kilometres of water, roughly the size of the Pacific Ocean.
The noise, far greater than any natural sound, has been linked to ear damage and harm to body tissue, and can trigger intense confusion. Startled whales surface too quickly and suffer the bends, a decompression sickness that affects deep-sea divers but was thought an impossible condition in whales.
Environmentalists believe the introduction of the new radar violates marine laws to which the UK has signed up. They point to a series of whale strandings that coincided with naval exercises involving sonar, to support their concern. During the latest, a fortnight ago, a NATO exercise off Morocco was followed by two dead whales being washed ashore on the nearby Canary Islands. source

Dead whales found after military exercises
The Natural Resources Defense Council has already secured an injunction limiting the U.S. Navys use of new low-frequency sonar that can travel vast distances through the oceans, and is now targeting the more common mid-frequency sonar.
This is the first time such a broad, diverse group (of scientists) has made this finding, said council lawyer Joel Reynolds. Navies of the world do back-flips to deny any connection.
The IWC, a 57-country intergovernmental body which regulates whaling, said earlier in the week that oil and gas exploration off Russias Pacific coast threatened a colony of gray whales with extinction due to sonar and pollution.
Energy firms blast noise waves down to the sea floor to detect the presence of oil and gas reserves.
The IWC expressed concern about energy activities in the Sakhalin Island region off Russia where Royal Dutch/Shell, Exxon Mobil and BP operate.
Its scientific report also identified oil and gas exploration near the Abrolhos Banks, a coral reef off Brazil, as a hazard for humpback whales and called on the government to protect the mammals from the noise. MSNBC

Whales attempt second stranding on New Zealand beach
NELSON, New Zealand (AFP) Dec 21, 2005 - Rescuers who Wednesday helped save more than 100 whales stranded on a New Zealand beach were recalled several hours later to try to prevent some of the pod returning to shore as darkness approached.
About 15 of the estimated 123 pilot whales that stranded Tuesday had died before the pod was shepherded out to sea on the mid-afternoon high tide by Department of Conservation (DOC) staff and hundreds of volunteers. But, after many of the volunteers had gone home, several of the whales were back in shallow water near Puponga Beach at Farewell Spit on the northwestern tip of the South Island,
"They're still floating but the tide's going out," DOC spokeswoman Trish Grant said. "We've been quite hopeful that they were all going to go safely out to sea and we didn't have to worry about them again. "It is a bit gutting really."
Grant said the rescuers would do what they could until nightfall, but it would be too dangerous to remain on the beach once it was dark.
Earlier, several foreign tourists from as far afield as China and Germany, broke from their holiday schedule to help locals cover the whales with wet sheets and blankets and pour water over them to try to keep them cool before the afternoon tide.
German backpacker Martin Huehmergarth said he was in a beach cafe looking at photos of whale strandings when, minutes later, the whales got stuck on shore. "We were up to our hips in the sea bailing buckets of water, doing it for real. It is so sad to see them all," he said.
Japanese visitor Mieko Sato said she spent a couple of hours helping out, noting: "We want to do what we can."
If the whales -- some of which are five metres (more than 16 feet) long -- do become stranded again, conservation officials hope they will be able to refloat on their own at the next high tide in the early hours of Thursday morning. - terradaily.com

Whale spotted in central London
A whale has made its way up the River Thames to central London, where it is being watched by riverside crowds. The northern bottle-nosed whale, which is 16-18ft long and is usually found in deep sea waters, has passed Parliament and is moving upstream.
"I saw it blow, it was a spout of water which sparkled in the air," said eyewitness Tom Howard-Vyne.
A boat has been sent to protect the whale and rescuers have been trying to keep it away from the Thames's banks. It has come within yards of the banks and has crashed into an empty boat, while trapped in a narrow estuary between the banks and moored vessels. Vets are remaining on standby, experts have said it does not appear to be ill, but are concerns it will get weaker and may become beached.
'Breathing normally'

The RNLI say it is the first whale rescue on the Thames.
Reports of two whales in the Thames were first received on Thursday by the British Divers Marine Life group.
But at 0830 GMT on Friday, a man on a train called in to say he might have been hallucinating, but he had just seen a whale in the Thames.
Alison Shaw of the Marine and Freshwater Conservation Programme at London Zoo, said the northern bottle-nosed whale was usually found in groups of three to 10 and there had been sightings of another two.

She told the BBC News website: "This is extremely rare in British waters as they are normally found in deep waters in the North Atlantic. "It is about 16-18ft long, so is relatively mature "It is a very long way from home and we don't know why it has ended up here".
The whales usually weigh about seven tonnes, which will complicate any rescue attempt. London Aquarium Curator Paul Hale told the BBC: "Getting that to do anything it doesn't want to do is going to be extremely difficult. "This is a very active swimming animal and it's not going to go anywhere it doesn't want to go so we have to persuade it to swim back out."
Liz Sandeman, a medic of the Marine Connection, a whale and dolphin protection charity, accompanied the RNLI to examine the animal and said it looked "quite healthy and quite relaxed". But she feared it might be in danger from other boats, or be frightened by the noise. "The last thing we want to do is stress the animal out," she said.
Over the years dolphins and seals have been spotted in the Thames. Sperm whales have been seen in the Thames Estuary and porpoises have feasted on fish near Vauxhall Bridge, in central London. bbc

Necropsy Performed on River Thames Whale
By ED JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer 22nd Jan 2006 - LONDON - A marine mammal expert conducted a necropsy Sunday on the whale that wandered into the River Thames, hoping to determine what caused the 20-foot-long animal to veer off course and splash through central London before dying during Saturday's rescue attempt.
The Zoological Society of London said it hoped preliminary results on what killed the Northern bottlenose whale would be available Wednesday. Paul Jepson, who has conducted government-funded research into why dolphins and whales strand themselves on British shores, was performing the examination, the society said.
The whale captivated onlookers as it swam in the shallow, murky waters of the River Thames past the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben. It died Saturday night after rescuers tried to carry it into deeper waters of the North Sea, swaddled in blankets on a rusting salvage barge. Thousands of onlookers had lined the banks of the river and jostled for space on bridges to watch the whale being lifted by crane into the barge. The drama was broadcast live around the world. Earlier, the whale twice tried to beach itself. Experts said the whale died Saturday after suffering convulsions and struggling with the effects of being out of the water.
It was the first sighting of a Northern bottlenose in the Thames since records began in 1913.

The Zoological Society said Jepson would look for signs of damage to the whale's skin before sending blubber samples for analysis. He would then examine the whale's internal organs and the echo response areas of the brain, which may reveal why the mammal became lost. The whale was about 40 miles from the mouth of the Thames on the North Sea.
Tony Woodley, a director of the British Divers Marine Life Rescue group, defended the attempt to move the whale to deeper waters. "We believe that if the whale would have been left how it was then it would have just slowly died and we don't think that was the acceptable option to take," said Woodley, whose group led the rescue effort. "We always knew that it was going to be risky. We did everything that we could and I am afraid that this time it was not a success."
The Northern bottlenose whale can reach nearly 30 feet in length - longer than a traditional red double-decker London bus - and weigh nearly 8 tons. The whales are known as curious animals, readily approaching boats and normally traveling in groups, according to the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society's Web site. When sick, old or injured, whales often get disoriented and swim away from their pod.
The sight of the whale swimming past London's famous landmarks bemused thousands of onlookers in the British capital. Witnesses reported seeing a second whale in a different section of the Thames on Friday.
Scientists have said fluctuating ocean temperatures, predators, lack of food and even sonar from ships can send whales astray into potentially dangerous waters.
Woodley said it was too early to say what caused the whale to become lost, and he dismissed as speculation suggestions the mammal may have been disoriented because of sonar signals from navy ships in the North Sea. "It is generally accepted that the animal was lost, being away from its normal environment of the deep sea Atlantic," he said. "But until the post-mortem is completed we can't tell if it had major internal problems or not." - news.yahoo.com

Endangered Right Whale Calf Dead in Fla.
Sun Jan 22, - An endangered North Atlantic right whale calf was found dead Sunday off Florida's northeast coast, the second such death reported this month, officials said.
Fisheries biologists with the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration were towing the whale to shore, where a necropsy was scheduled Monday, said Kim Amendola, a NOAA Fisheries Service spokeswoman.
Recreational boaters reported the whale sighting to the U.S. Coast Guard around 10:30 a.m. about 16 miles off Jacksonville Beach, Amendola said.
Another right whale calf was reported dead off Jacksonville on Jan. 10, NOAA officials said. Preliminary necropsy results indicate that calf died from a vessel strike, said Barb Zoodsma, a NOAA Fisheries Service right whale biologist.
"The tail had been severed," she said.
Once numbering in the thousands, only about 300 right whales remain in the North Atlantic, Zoodsma said. In the fall and early winter, the whales leave the North Atlantic waters near Nova Scotia and New England and travel south to the calving grounds off north Florida and south Georgia to give birth. Calves are about 15 feet long at birth and weigh up to 7,000 pounds, while adult right whales can grow up to 55 feet long and weigh up to 55 tons, Zoodsma said.
Right whales were hunted to near extinction in the 19th century. They got their name from whalers who said they were the "right whales" to hunt because they were easy to approach and their high blubber content kept them afloat after they were killed. The whales live close to shore, and can become entangled with fishing gear or collide with vessels unaware of their presence, Zoodsma said.
"The calves spend a lot of time at the surface of the water, and that makes them vulnerable as well because they're not submerging and not as quick as other whales at getting out of the way," she said. - news.yahoo.com

Beached Whales Shot

41 Beached Whales Shot in New Zealand
2nd jan 2006 - Wildlife officers shot 41 pilot whales that beached on New Zealand's South Island, the Department of Conservation said.
A total of 49 whales came ashore Saturday near Farewell Spit in the second major stranding in the area within two weeks. Eight died on the beaches, and the remaining animals were shot when heavy seas prevented any attempt to refloat them.
"Given the hopelessness of being able to successfully refloat the whales, our prime concern was then to avoid the whales' suffering a long and painful death," Greg Napp, the department's Golden Bay area officer, said in a statement. Napp said the latest stranding was likely unconnected to another last month when 129 pilot whales came ashore close by. Conservation officers and volunteers managed to refloat more than 100 in that stranding, but 21 whales died. Mike Rogers, a Department of Conservation worker, said the whales that beached Saturday were not thought to be from the pod involved in the larger stranding on Dec. 20.
"There have always been strandings at Golden Bay," he said, noting that the tide goes out as much as four miles and the animals "get trapped on this gentle sloping beach." - news.yahoo.com

"It's a bunch of fish up here, but they're not dead. They're almost docile."

Scores of Fish Beach Themselves in N.C.
Sun Feb 26, JACKSONVILLE, N.C. - State and local wildlife experts are trying to figure out what led more than a thousand flounder, spot and pin fish to beach themselves at the Marine Corps' New River air base - and then swim away.
They believe it may be related to a popular phenomenon known in coastal Alabama as "jubilee."
The fish surfaced in shallow water Friday morning. They were lethargic, but alive.
"It's kind of strange," said Mike Sanderford, New River Riverkeeper. "It's a bunch of fish up here, but they're not dead. They're almost docile." When he arrived, Sanderford said, the fish were lying in shallow water and allowed him to touch them before they swam away.
Representatives of the Division of Water Quality, N.C. Marine Fisheries and N.C. Marine Patrol checked on the fish along the air station's shoreline Friday morning. One expert estimated about 1,000 to 1,500 were crowded in the waterline. But by afternoon, they were gone. The timing matched another oddity: the water's oxygen level, which veered from one extreme to the other.
"We measured the oxygen levels in the water this morning and they were very low," said Stephanie Garrett, environmental technician with DWQ. "Then two and a half hours later, they were high." She said that might be a clue that the area saw a case of the "jubilee" phenomenon, in which thousands of live, healthy fish beach themselves.
Scientists know that a jubilee occurs when variety of factors deoxygenate the water, forcing fish to the shore. Jubilees occur in a number of places, but nowhere as often and as regularly as on Mobile Bay's eastern shore. Jubilees usually occur during the summer, providing a free feast to locals who head to shore to gather the fish up.
"It's normal to them, they all know the conditions that are needed and go down with gigs to get the flounder," said Bianca Klein, biologist at the Air Station. "It's definitely a rarity here, though."
Only about 50 fish died, and that may not have been from natural causes.
"The flounder that were dead were the big ones," Sanderford said. "We're guessing someone came out here early this morning and started to pick out the biggest ones to take home for dinner, but wondered why they were beached and thought something might be wrong with them." - news.yahoo.com

Sonar May Be Linked to Stranding of Whales
By AUDREY McAVOY, Associated Press Writer Fri Apr 28, 2:58 AM ET
HONOLULU - The Navy's use of sonar during maritime exercises may have contributed to the mass stranding of more than 150 whales in Hawaii's Hanalei Bay two years ago, government scientists said.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the finding - along with information from other studies - has led it to ask the Navy to reduce its sonar's power during exercises planned this summer in Hawaiian waters. It also asked the Navy to turn off its active sonar when the whales come within a set distance.
The Navy says it will comply with the agency's requests, but said the report released Thursday did not conclusively show sonar triggered the stranding.
Officials were unable to find other reasons that may have caused the melon-headed whales to swim into the bay on July 3, 2004. One whale beached itself and died a few days later, said Brandon Southall, director of NOAA's acoustics program.
Nearby predators or other factors may have also contributed to the incident, NOAA said in the report.
The Navy uses sonar technology to detect threats and to navigate. Some wildlife advocates believe the sound waves hurt whales, possibly by damaging their hearing or causing them to rise to the surface too quickly and get decompression sickness.
The day before the whales entered Hanalei Bay, six U.S. and Japanese vessels steamed north from the island of Oahu toward Kauai, intermittently using active sonar signals.
NOAA's study concluded the whales - which usually inhabit only deep water - may have heard thee signals and headed into the shallow water.
Lt. William Marks, Navy spokesman at the Pentagon, said the six-hour gap between the last use of sonar and the whales' arrival made it unlikely sonar triggered the stranding.
But environmentalists said the report clearly blamed sonar. "It adds to a long and growing use of strandings that have been associated with the Navy's use of sonar," said Michael Jasny, senior consultant with the Natural Resources Defense Council in Los Angeles, citing other mass strandings in the Canary Islands, Alaska and Japan. - News yahoo.com

400 Dead Dolphins Found Off African Coast
By ALI SULTAN, Associated Press Writer Fri Apr 28, ZANZIBAR, Tanzania -
Hundreds of dead dolphins washed up Friday along the shore of a popular tourist destination on Zanzibar's northern coast, and scientists ruled out poisoning.
It was not immediately clear what killed the 400 dolphins, whose carcasses were strewn along a 2 1/2-mile stretch of Nungwi, said Narriman Jidawi, a marine biologist at the Institute of Marine Science in Zanzibar.
But the bottleneck dolphins, which live in deep offshore waters, had empty stomachs, meaning that they could have been disoriented and were swimming for some time to reorient themselves. They did not starve to death and were not poisoned, Jidawi said.
In the United States, experts were investigating the possibility that sonar from U.S. submarines could have been responsible for a similar incident in Marathon, Fla., where 68 deep-water dolphins stranded themselves in March 2005.
A U.S. Navy task force patrols the East Africa coast as part of counterterrorism operations. A Navy official was not immediately available for comment, but the service rarely comments on the location of submarines at sea.
The deaths are a blow to the tourism industry in Zanzibar, where thousands of visitors go to watch and swim with wild dolphins, said Abdulsamad Melhi, owner of Sunset Bungalows, perched atop a small cliff overlooking the beach.
Villagers, fishermen and hotel residents found the carcasses and alerted officials. Mussa Aboud Jumbe, Zanzibar's director of fisheries, went on state radio to warn the public against eating the dolphin meat, saying the cause of death had not been determined.
But residents who did eat the meat were all doing fine, Jidawi said.
The Indo-Pacific bottlenose, humpback and spinner porpoises, commonly known as dolphins, are the most common species in Zanzibar's coastal waters, with bottlenose and humpback dolphins often found in mixed-species groups.

Captain Wardrobes

Beachings not natural?