A Less-than-Steller Field Season

Andrew W Trites, Ph.D.
Research Director
North Pacific Universities Marine Mammal Research Consortium

In a normal year, this would be the month that summer field work on Steller sea lions wraps up. But this was no normal year.

On May 29, we and all other Steller sea lion researchers working in U.S. waters were informed that our field research permits were null and void. Just as the field season was starting up, all permitted Steller sea lion research activities were to cease immediately. Biologists who were already in field camps were radioed to remain inside and not to look at another sea lion or record another observation. They were then taken off the islands by helicopter or chartered boat. Research boats stayed tied to the dock and aerial survey planes were grounded.

The root of this federal court decision began many months earlier, when the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) sued the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) over permits issued to conduct research on Steller sea lions. Of particular concern to the Humane Society was that sea lion pups were being branded with hot irons, a technique used by some researchers to mark and a sea lion over its lifetime. The court decision successfully stopped branding, but took down all other activities in its wake – even the most benign and non-intrusive research such as behavioral observations.

The judge ruled that NMFS had not prepared an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on the effects of research on sea lions, as required by law. As such, all research permits issued by NMFS in May 2005 – both to its own researchers and to all other individuals – were in breach of the law. It was a procedural legal point that won the day but did not reflect in any way the quality of science being undertaken.

Soon after the court order, NMFS and HSUS negotiated to allow a limited number of studies to proceed. On June 30, HSUS agreed to allow researchers to observe and photograph sea lions from land, sea and air – with payment of $237,500 for costs. However, no scats could be picked up to monitor diet and no animals could be marked to determine their rates of birth and death, what they eat, and where and how they find food – key information needed to understand why sea lions declined and why they are having difficulty recovering. 

The lawsuit has affected three Consortium field studies that involved collecting scats to determine what sea lions are currently eating, how their diet and energy intake changes by season and by region, and which populations are experiencing the highest levels of stress. These studies were being done in collaboration with NMFS and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G), and have been canceled or modified.  

However, the lawsuit was focused primarily on Alaskan fieldwork and has not affected another 30 Consortium studies. As such, we continue to run an innovative research program with trained sea lions, and we continue to analyze data collected from previous field seasons. We are also continuing our research into the decline of northern fur seals on the Pribilof Islands, and – most importantly – we are still publishing our findings.

The permit office of NMFS hopes to have the required EIS completed in time for sea lion researchers to return to the field next summer. Meanwhile, the biologists dedicated to ensuring the survival of a species have been left to pick up the pieces of their valuable research. The data that should now be arriving from this year’s field work cannot be replaced and will be forever missing – and a number of long-term studies of marked animals may have to be started over again, at a tremendous cost and effort. 

We do not yet know the full extent of damage caused to Steller sea lions by the HSUS lawsuit, but it is sad to think that their well-intentioned actions to protect individual animals may ultimately represent the greatest threat that Steller sea lion populations have faced in recent years.

21 August 2006