Dolphin Dead in N. Peru but not 240

Photo of dolphin meat by Dr. Carlos Yaipen Llanos
By Dr. Carlos Yaipen-Llanos reporting to BlueVoice

I just returned last night from the stranding site. Several key findings. I traveled with the personnel of Reuters International (Press Agency) and it is going to be a press release tomorrow. I am on the paperwork for a denounce (report) to the Ecological Police of Peru too. Despite it was a one-day-round trip, it was enough to assess the situation. I will try to describe in detail our findings. Definitively, we have to go back because too many lives (both human and animals) are at stake.

1. The species affected are not bottlenose dolphins as depicted in the media, but Long beaked common dolphins (Delphinus capensis). We found adult males, females, pregnant females, juveniles and calves.

2. There were not 260+ stranded dolphins. In our survey over 100 Kms between San Jose and Morrope in Lambayeque State, we just found 17 dolphins.

3. A pod of over 150 Delphinus capensis was sighted during the survey, surfacing and feeding in coastal waters, 150+ meters inshore. So, it is a fact that the dolphins LIVE in the area and it is critical for their
breeding behaviour, that will justify the high presence of babies.

4. The stranding started last Thrusday (Feb 9th). However, at 5pm on the 11th, a juvenile dolphin stranded right in front of us (there is an online
picture of the dolphin with blood by the ear-eye).

5. I don't think this mass stranding is related to the earthquakes as stated in some media for two reasons:
a. The Delphinus capensis migrate from Costa Rica to the Central Pacific to northern Peru, to far away from the epicenter of any of the latest earthquakes (around 1000 km difference).
b. Since there are not 200+ stranded dolphins, the problematic is more "focalized" to a local issue.

6. There were no fish of any kind stranded sea animal next to the dolphins. Anchovies were reported floating in the water last week by the media and govenrment officials, but we found no evidence of fish species being affected at this point. Fishermen were fishing flying fish in the area with no problem.

7. As far as we know, the Imarpe (Institute for the Sea of Peru) took samples for analysis. However, in our survey no dolphin showed signs of necropsy or sample collection, just slaughtering from fishermen. I always
check this in the animals to have a bigger picture of what the authorities are looking for (and if they have any clue at all).

8. There was no evidence of carcass collection in 100 kms long, including within the town of San Jose were fishermen and children are in the beach covered of trash and the carcasses of death dolphins (most of them
slaughtered). There was also no evidence of ocean tide removing carcasses because we found several dolphins located far into the high tide, there since last Thrusday.

9. As you know, in January 21st this year, a previous survey performed in Colan, Piura State (300Km north of San Jose). We assessed nine baby common dolphins and a new born porpoise with acute gastric syndrome and signs of immune-suppression / toxicity, but next to them, hundreds of fish corresponding to both bentic species such as morena fish, clams and needle fish, and pelagic fish like anchovies...fish species that match the living sustrate of the common dolphin and the black porpoise. We also found large stains of oil compounds in water and sand by that time for our diagnose
was bio-accumulation under the frame of some sort of hydrocarbon flux to the sea in that area. Basically, long term pollution exposure.

10. In previous survey we collected samples of a baby porpoise for histopathology. In this survey, we collected samples from the juvenile common dolphin: Periotic bones and main organs. This dolphin was
immune-suppressed, since it has a severe infection, abscesses and signs of pox in the skin. I also sampled key tissues to discard the potential presence of viral diseases such as distemper through histopathology. I
certainly believe the common dolphin pods are suffering of long-term pollution exposition, leading them towards immune suppression symdromes that will be more evident in the forthcoming years.

11. Now Hardy, what we found in this mass stranding is that 10 of the 17 animals found dead had broken periotic bones, that is, due to acoustic impact. The source of the impact was from the right side of the pod, since hemorragic internal ear was found in the right side of the stranded animals.

12. We know that the use of dynamite is common among fishermen, and that fishermen are taking the meat of the stranded dolphins. This could be the cause of death of the animals...however, the signs do not correspond to that of explosive impact in their bodies. We talked today with people from the oil company and they say they haven't performed any seismic exploration in the area this month. However, here in Peru these companies
doesn't need to do the seismic assessment themselves.

13. ORCA has a wide registration of dolphin slaughtering in San Jose, as well as dolphin meat consumption and a high incidence of diabetes among
the human population that has dolphin meat in its diet.

It is our next step to go back to San Jose and vecinities to collect more information and samples for the pollution assessment. We can save it in
storage until the equipment is available. This is critical for both animal and human health.

Hope you find this information helpful.

Abraco,

Carlos.



**************************
Dr. Carlos Yaipen-LLanos
President - Science Director
ORCA

Organization for Research and Conservation of Aquatic Animals
Youtube: www.youtube.com/ORCAPERU
Facebook: Orca Peru

Results of Tests for Pollutants in my Body

In 2003 I was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a cancer of the blood. Medications have kept me in remission for more than seven years. One of the factors that can lead to this disease is exposure to persistent organic pollutants. A major source of these pollutants is large pelagic sea food such as swordfish and tuna. During the late 1990s I was eating large quantities of these fish thinking them healthy. After my diagnosis I decided to have myself tested for the levels of these pollutants. The results described below are excerpted from my forthcoming book "The Voice of the Dolphins." They were certainly shocking to me.

From "The Voice of the Dolphins" (c) Hardy Jones
The first task was to document correlations between high levels of toxic substances in the oceans, and clusters of multiple myeloma and other cancers in humans on adjacent lands. I decided to begin with myself and had my blood tested for environmental toxins. It wasn’t cheap – four thousand dollars. But if I was going to pursue this line of investigation, I needed to know whether I had high levels of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) in my own body that might have triggered the myeloma.
I contacted AXYS Analytical in Victoria, Canada, a company that analyzes the contaminant levels on both the Canadian and American orca that pass through the Straits of Juan de Fuca and the San Juan Islands. They sent me a kit with a return Fed Ex package and pre-addressed label. Getting my blood drawn was a simple matter. I went to the lab where I had my monthly blood tests done and handed them the instructions from AXYS. They sat me down, wrapped the rubber ribbon around my arm and drew the blood. Then it went into the hands of Fed Ex.

The report took three months in coming, but the results were staggering. I had hundreds of toxic chemicals in my tissues. The report showed significant levels of POPs, in particular heptachlor, nonachlor, aldrin, mirex, dieldrin, and dioxins. But what really jumped out were spikes of particular congeners (subtypes) of DDE ( a metabolite of DDT), hexachlorobenzene (a petroleum derivative known to cause cancer), chlordane (a pesticide known to cause cancer and banned in the USA in 1988), PCBs (the same chemicals found in declining populations of orca off Washington State), hydroxy PCBs, hexachlorbyphenyls, and PBDEs (flame retardants).

Not only were levels of some of the individual toxins high, but the combined total of all classes of specific chemicals, each of which could produce cancer by itself, was enormous. Beyond that, these chemicals synergize to produce effects greater than that of each individual chemical.

Where had all these chemicals come from?

I showed Dr. Durie (Dr. Brian Durie, International Myeloma Foundation) the results of the tests. He was amazed by both the variety of chemicals documented and the very high levels of some of them. But he further surprised me with the news that the levels in my body were not atypical in the relatively few Americans who have been tested for their toxic burden. But, he cautioned, just because certain values were “common” in the general population didn’t mean they were harmless, especially in combination. The very fact that they were common might mean the levels of pollutants in the American population were far more dangerous than imagined.

Author's Note: Vastly more is known about the levels of pollutants in marine mammals than in humans.

BlueVoice Busts Illegal Whale Commerce in Greenland

Greenland Blog #3

BlueVoice Uncovers Unsanctioned Commercial Whaling in Greenland
by Hardy Jones

The word that the IWC had granted Greenland a quota to hunt nine humpback whales in each of the years 2010 – 2012 reached me in Iceland as I traveled to Nuuk, capital of Greenland.

The word that twenty-seven of these curious, intelligent, infinitely graceful creatures will be killed after years of protection is heart wrenching. Over the decades during which the approach of a boat did not mean a painful death, humpbacks have become friendly, approaching boats and even divers in the water.

Now that bond of trust will be broken. That is sad in itself but it may also impact the whale watching business that supports communities all along the east coast.

The IWC granted Greenland the humpback quota for whaling that would provide meat for ABORIGINAL USE ONLY. But in Nuuk I’ve discovered the meat in a super market, in the form of sushi at a Thai restaurant and as steak in a greasy spoon burger and pizza joint. Tonight I will head out to find whether there are other establishments purveying whale. Commercial sale of whale meat is not allowed under the IWC quota.

It is sad that humpbacks have just reappeared off Greenland after sixty years only to be slaughtered.

I am in Greenland to attend the Inuit Circumpolar Council. I want to learn what information is available on levels of heavy metals and organic pollutants in marine mammals killed for food and in the people who eat it what health problems have been identified and how the Inuit intend to deal with that information.

It’s an established fact that women who eat large quantities of dolphin, whale and seal meat give birth to a high ratio of girl babies over boys. In some villages the ratio is two to one. In one village no boys have been born in some time.

I discussed this issue with William L. Iggiagruk Hensley (Willy) an Inupiaq who has too many major league political and business credentials to list. He was a member of the Clinton transition team, a leader in several Alaska native organizations and author of Fifty Miles From Tomorrow, a brilliant work.

I was astonished to learn that he had no knowledge of the fact that eating marine mammal meat was causing such a bizarre impact on Inuits. It is literally suppressing the production of male children not to mention immune systems and mental development.

Among the speakers at the conference is Per M. Bakken of the United Nations Environment Programme. He warned that a chemical catastrophe faces the people of the north from contamination in some of the food they take from the sea – marine mammals in particular. I asked him if he felt the Inuit ignored or were in denial about these facts and he agreed that they paid little attention to it.

What they are really ticked off about is the fact that trade in seal skins is prohibited by many nations.