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In that time, they've recorded 30,000 individuals of 15 marine animal species. The Hebridean Whale and Dolphin Trust (HWDT) have been monitoring the cetaceans found there for 15 years. More than a quarter of all cetacean species can be found off the west coast of Scotland. The Hebrides are an extraordinarily diverse area of the world, thanks in part to a long, complex coastline and a nearby deep-water basin that attracts large whales. Porpoises can be seen all along the British coastline, but larger mammals are usually seen in Scotland, most commonly in the Hebrides. More and more marine mammals are willing to swim in our waters, whether staying permanently or just passing through. The summer of 2018 was a record season for whale, dolphin and porpoise sightings in Britain. An entanglement case study: the Scottish Hebrides

Entanglement was the primary cause of death. Of the eight species examined, six are endangered or of special concern.Īnother paper, published in January 2019, reports that numbers of the North Atlantic right whale have been in decline since 2011, largely because of vessel collisions and increasingly fatal and serious entanglement in fixed fishing gear. A paper from Conservation Biology in 2012 examined the cases of 1,762 dead or injured whales from between 19 in the northwest Atlantic Ocean. 'It's one of the biggest issues in the waters around Britain at the moment.'

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Big whales are strong and can sometimes break free of ropes, but they can also end up towing nets behind them for months. It often results in animals starving or drowning. 'Entanglement is a major welfare issue causing a horrible death. Porpoises sometimes have circular rope marks around their mouths, and in the tangled whales you see evidence of bigger ropes.

You can often tell what kind of fishing gear killed the animal from its injuries. Kate Swindells, a Cetacean Strandings Research Assistant, says, 'The single most common cause of death for cetaceans in the UK is bycatch, and the worst-affected species are harbour porpoises and common dolphins. Partners in the programme conduct postmortems on some of the animals to find out why they died.īetween 19, the project carried out 3,380 postmortems, and 699 animals were found to have died through becoming bycatch. The Museum is part of the UK Cetacean Strandings Investigation Programme (CSIP), and keeps data on whales, dolphins and porpoises that wash up along our coastline. Larger animals such as whales can also get lines or discarded nets wrapped around them, which is known as entanglement. When animals get unintentionally captured in a fishing haul, it's called bycatch. Whales, dolphins, porpoises, seals, fish, turtles and sharks are all vulnerable to fishing gear, and they are getting into trouble up and down the British coastline.

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