They're definitely saying it's starvation and that something has happened to their prey.
www.npr.org...
After doing some poking around, I read that California sea lions can have their food levels impacted by El Nino weather. The odd thing is that, from
the reports, we've been in a weak El Nino to neutral so no go there. Started looking at what California sea lions eat specifically and found this:
latimesblogs.latimes.com...
Apparently, they found a neurotoxin in the guts of a fish that is associated with the diatom, Pseudo-nitzschia. That's a lot of sardines dying.
Well, flash forward a little to November of 2012 and you find reports of sardine levels declining by 33% from the prior year. Stimulated this
response from Oceana:
oceana.org...
Apparently, Oceana warned that the federal government is allowing still too much overfishing of Pacific sardines in November 2012 and that it could
have impact on other species that depend on it. The Pacific sardine population, one of the major food sources for California sea lions, are
collapsing.
The Northern Anchovy--No data but warnings of possible overfishing on another food source for sea lions, :
animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu...
Pacific Whiting--supposed to be okay.
Pacific and Jack Mackerel--also in not so good shape apparently:
www.npr.org...
Shortbelly rockfish--open to fishing but this paper from 2010 is stating that there was a 50% decline in juvenile Rockfish but focuses on its impact
on seabirds, not sea lions.
www.jstor.org...
Market squid--was purportedly in a boom as of December 2012. Found this article though where Humboldt squid, with bellies full of market squid, had
died of the neurotoxin found in Pseudo-nitzschia:
abclocal.go.com.../state&id=8918576
Going back to Pseudo-nitzschia, the toxic algae, it always has a small presence off the coast of California with there being cases where the blooms
get bigger and cause mass marine animal mortality. Apparently, there has been an increase in both size and frequency in these blooms and this is
would have an impact on California sea critter populations. Why the blooms are increasing in size and frequency is apparently unknown. This paper
suggests that it could be due to increase upwelling:
climate.biol.sc.edu...
So, overfishing and increased toxic algae blooms of Pseudo-nitzschia leading to decline in fish stocks and shortage of food for the California Sea
Lion from the looks of it but I'm just somebody with a biology background--not marine biology.
Very troubling though at least BP is off the
hook (was slight chance but was subject of nightmares due to having to do so much research on the subject lol). I think it's interesting that the
government apparently did not curtail the sardine fishing more. Considering that California is not doing well economically, I guess that losing that
$9.7 million of revenue from sardines would be one more sting but it's still pretty sad that money--something that we created--trumps nature yet
again.