Marine Mammal Fund

Marine mammals are considered to be some of the most spectacular and majestic mega fauna on earth; for generations, they have captured the attention and imagination of peoples and cultures all over the world. Despite their beauty and the awe that they inspire, virtually all species of marine mammals are threatened or endangered, largely do to the direct and indirect impacts of human activities. A number of species, such as most of the great whales, are considered to be facing imminent extinction. There are dozens of great organizations out in the field working to protect and conserve our remaining marine mammal populations, and providing them with the resources they need is one of our top priorities.

The purpose of The Ocean Foundation's Marine Mammal Fund is to bring new resources and value to marine mammal conservation by finding partners on both sides of the funding table, doing independent research and strategic assessments of projects, and acting as an honest broker with invested communities and constituencies.

There are roughly 120 species of marine mammals, defined as such because they are primarily ocean dwelling, or because they depend on the ocean for their food. Included in this list are Cetaceans (whales, dolphins and porpoises), Sirenians (manatees and dugong), Pinnipeds (true seals, eared seals and walrus) and some species of Mustelids (sea otters and marine otters). The polar bear is also considered to be a marine mammal, as it lives most of its life out on the sea ice, and gets all of its food from the ocean. Marine mammals have long been revered for their poignant beauty, and many species have historically served as an important cultural and subsistence resource for many indigenous populations around the world.

Most marine mammals are positioned at the top of their respective food chains, and as such are valuable to the ecological integrity of their entire marine ecosystems, and can serve as an important indicator for overall ecosystem health. It has been shown that top-down influences on food webs are vitally important, as reflected in their significant biomass and consumption. Sea otter populations in areas like the Aleutian archipelago are good examples of this; the sea otters there feed primarily on sea urchins, which in turn feed primarily on kelp. By comparison, after sea otters in the Pacific Northwest were devastated by hunters, the population of sea urchins exploded and wiped out much of the kelp forests, an essential habitat for many marine species.

Unfortunately, the example of the sea otter in the Pacific Northwest is hardly the exception; most species of marine mammals have a long history of unsustainable exploitation by humans. Historically, virtually all species of marine mammal have been commercially targeted for their blubber, meat, ivory or fur, and many species have been hunted to or past the brink of extinction. Today, some species are down to just a few isolated breeding populations, and the challenges they face are far more that just hunting. Rampant overfishing not only reduces food stocks for many marine mammal species, but also threatens them directly—marine mammals are accidentally caught as bycatch when they become entangled in fishing gear and drown. Pollution affects marine mammals in three major ways: marine debris (injured or killed by ingestion), chemical pollution (bioaccumulation of persistent toxins and heavy metals), and noise pollution (sonar, ship traffic, mining and extraction activities). Collisions with ships have also become a major cause of mortality for some species of whale, as well as manatee and dugong that live in shallow harbors and bays.

However, global climate change has quickly become the single most significant overarching threat to the long-term survival of marine mammal species. Many marine mammals will face loss of food and habitat to the changing currents, climates and ecosystems—even the very chemistry of the ocean itself is in flux. Warming oceans mean that dwindling fish stocks are moving deeper and farther from shore to colder water, which creates a troubling dilemma for predators like seals and sea lions that sleep and give birth on land. Changing currents and weather patterns will have unpredictable (and perhaps dire) consequences for migratory whales. As the Arctic sea ice continues to retreat in coming decades, polar bears and walruses will be forced to either evolve or die; already scientists and observers are reporting high instances of polar bears starving, drowning, and even resorting to cannibalism to survive.

On Thin Ice: The Precarious State of Arctic Marine Mammals in the US due to Global Warming