Whale Rescue Team’s 2005 Report

By Peter Wallerstein

Right from the start of 2005 Whale Rescue Team (WRT) volunteers faced challenges like we’ve had never faced before. It all started on the afternoon of January 12, we had just completed our ninth marine mammal rescue of 2005 when we received a call about an injured seabird. We arrived on the scene to find a Western grebe that was heavily covered in oil. It wasn't long before we found others as well. Upon delivering our victim to the Bird Center in San Pedro, we learned that on the previous Tuesday an oil spill had been reported, thought to be located somewhere in the Santa Barbara area. The seabirds we rescued, which are known to be highly susceptible to oil spills of this nature, were in all probability victims of this spill

Dozens of heavily oiled birds were now stranding themselves on local beaches, with hundreds more swimming off shore futily attempting to clean the oil from their feathers. The California Department of Fish and Game, the agency responsible for bird rescues of this nature, did not arrive on the scene for a full forty-eight hours after the first oil-soaked bird was reported. During that period, Whale Rescue Team volunteers, working with Los Angeles County Lifeguards, came to their aid and rescued hundreds of these birds.

For the next few months we saw a dramatic increase in stranded elephant seal pups, skinny, starving sea lions and the most harbor seal pups we’ve ever rescued in one season.

Then, right around Memorial Day weekend pregnant sea lions suffering from the debilitating effects of domoic acid poisoning began washing up along our local beaches. In the month of June WRT rescued a record number of 89 seals and seas lions.

In 2005 year we also had some of our most challenging rescues ever – sea lions in trouble on buoys, in flood control channels and inside power plants. I’m proud to say we’ve been successful in all our rescue attempts.

2005 A Record Year!

• 264 MARINE MAMMAL RESCUES
• 190 Sea lions
• 57 Elephant seals
• 12 Harbor seals
• 1 fur seal
• 4 Dolphins
• 200  OILED GREBES
• 526 POUND SEA LION
• 8 1/2 FOOT LONG ELEPHANT SEAL
• MOST HARBOR SEALS IN ONE YEAR
• 3 DWP RESCUES
• GILL NET RESCUES
• JUNE 2005 89 MARINE MAMMAL RESCUES

One of the most challenging rescues we’ve ever faced was a sea lion stuck in a power plant basin. All standard rescue techniques and equipment had to be abandoned for this challenging rescue. For over a week a 400-pound male sea lion swam circles in the cooling basin of the DWP Power facility. The animal was tired and cold because there was no place for him to haul out to rest and warm himself. After lowering a small boat 40 feet down into the basin that was draped with netting the sea lion found a bit of sanctuary. But not for too long….

Sea Lion rescued from a gill net. The Full stories of this rescues and more can be found on the Rescue Stories page!

WRT has devoted two decades to raising the standard of marine wildlife rescue in our community, and today it is one of the best in the country. Yet, we are aware that we have along way to go. There are still many serious problems to solve and many difficult challenges ahead. The good news is that the WRT has a plan to better prepare our community to assist distressed marine wildlife, a plan which would leave no animal unattended or uncared for.

We ended 2005 with 264 marine mammal rescues and over 240 sea bird rescues.