'Cocaine of the sea' threatens critically endangered vaquita

[Judi Lynn]

By Linda Pressly
BBC News, San Felipe, Mexico

Published 6 hours ago

The vaquita marina is found only in Mexico. It is the most critically endangered sea mammal on the planet, its survival threatened by a deadly clash of interests between fishing and conservation. Scientists estimate there may be fewer than a dozen left in the wild.

Jacques Cousteau, the marine explorer, called the Sea of Cortéz, also known as the Gulf of California, "the world's aquarium".

One of its treasures is a silvery-coloured porpoise with wide, panda eyes. But the vaquita's days may be numbered because of illegal fishing for another protected species: totoaba.

Totoaba, a fish that can grow as large as a vaquita, was a food source before it was placed on Mexico's endangered list.

"We used to catch it in the 60s and 70s," remembers Ramón Franco Díaz, president of a fishing federation in the coastal town of San Felipe, on the peninsula of Baja California. "Then the Chinese came with their suitcases full of dollars, and bought our consciences."

More:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-57070814

[marble falls]

1. Somedays I think the world is entering some combo of Soylent Green/Mad Max. Other days I know it.

[Duppers]

2. There are so many misguided Chinese remedies.

Their "medicines" are based on junk folklore which results in so many speices' doom. If there were only a way to stop their "superstitions."

Impunity "...the absence of law enforcement may account for the dozens of totoaba launches leaving from San Felipe's beach and heading into the Refuge.

"Not a single authority stops them," says Ramón Franco Díaz. "If you dared approach them, they'd give you a bullet. Organised crime has stolen the Sea of Cortéz."