Article by Barbara Taylor and Lorenzo Rojas-Bracho   Given the 45% annual decline estimated in 2018, most people expected Mexico’s vaquita porpoise to already be extinct.  Scientists have just seen (May 2023) about the same number of vaquitas they saw in 2019 and 2021 in a small...

By Barbara Taylor, Lorenzo Rojas-Bracho and Kristin Nowell On 27 March 2023 the Secretariat of the Convention on the International Trade of Endangered Species (CITES) notified signatory countries to stop all commercial trade in CITES-listed (in Appendix I or II) species from Mexico.  This decision stems...

  A new report reveals evidence that many pangas have continued to use the ZTA (mostly for gillnetting). Observations of this illegal activity were made both from the sea by the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society and from land by ZTA Watch.  Pangas were present inside the...

[caption id="attachment_375681" align="alignright" width="300"] Mother and calf vaquita surface near San Felipe, Mexico. Credit: Paula Olson[/caption] New research shows that the endangered vaquita in the Gulf of California in Mexico remains genetically healthy enough for the species to recover if illegal gillnetting stops killing them.  The paper, “The...

Recent claims have been made that a reduction in illegal gillnet fishing in the northern Gulf of California is allowing for a gradual population recovery of the vaquita, Mexico’s endemic, critically endangered porpoise. Earlier recommendations by the Vaquita Recovery Team (CIRVA—Comité Internacional para la Recuperación...

From October 17 through November 3, 2021, a vaquita research effort was privately funded through the Museo de la Ballena y Ciencias del Mar and a number of private donors.  The survey focused on the last stronghold of vaquitas, the Zero Tolerance Area (ZTA) declared...