SDRP made a strong showing at the 17th Biennial Conference on the Biology of Marine Mammals, held in Cape Town, South Africa in December.  The conference is an important forum for marine mammal biology, ecology, and conservation around the world.  Of 940 international attendees, about 800 gave talks or presented posters, all of which were selected on scientific merit.  A highlight of the conference was the Norris Award for Lifetime Achievement, given to Dr. Toshio Kasuya of Japan for his efforts to present solid scientific evidence of Japanese over-harvest of whales and dolphins.  With sadness, the scientists also discussed the likely extinction of the Baiji, or Yangtze River dolphin, and the importance of action for conservation of other endangered species of marine mammals.

Figure 1.  SDRP Staff Scientist Dr. Damon Gannon at the end of the earth, demonstrating the far-reaching influence of the SDRP!

      Twelve SDRP presentations included genetics, acoustics, social behavior, strandings, effects of red tide, habitat selection and human impacts on Sarasota Bay bottlenose dolphins, as well as presentations on marine mammals from Argentina and Colombia.  As one of the longest-running longitudinal studies of marine mammals, we are able to address questions about the biology and ecology of marine mammals that cannot be answered by any other program.   For example, Vice Admiral Lautenbacher, head of NOAA (the U.S. government agency responsible for managing most of the nation’s marine mammals), gave a plenary speech in which he outlined the six greatest threats to marine mammals, as perceived by NOAA. Harmful algal blooms were included in this list and it is worth noting that there were only 3 presentations at the conference on the effects of harmful algal blooms on marine mammals, all of which were given by SDRP staff. 
      At the Society’s business meeting, SDRP’s Randall Wells was recommended by the Board of Directors as one of two nominees for President of the Society.  The election for a two-year term will occur in April 2008.
      Before the conference, SDRP biologists Damon and Janet Gannon visited Hermanus, on the south coast of Africa, where they saw southern right whale mom-calf pairs lolling in the surf.  They also visited the Atlantic coast of the country, where they were lucky to see Heaviside’s dolphins, African penguins, baboons, and hyrax.