Wildlife Disease News Digest

Fish Farms Drive Wild Salmon Populations Toward Extinction
Science Daily - www.sciencedaily.com
13 Dec 2007

Parasitic sea lice infestations caused by salmon farms are driving nearby populations of wild salmon toward extinction. The results show that the affected pink salmon populations have been rapidly declining for four years. The scientists expect a 99% collapse in another four years, or two salmon generations, if the infestations continue.

"The impact is so severe that the viability of the wild salmon populations is threatened," says lead author of a new article in Science (December 14) Martin Krkosek, a fisheries ecologist from the University of Alberta. Krkosek and his co-authors calculate that sea lice have killed more than 80% of the annual pink salmon returns to British Columbia's Broughton Archipelago. "If nothing changes, we are going to lose these fish."

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Dorset marine wildlife threatened by millions of plastic pellets
Wildlife Extra.com - www.wildlifeextra.com
2007 Dec
Area: Kimmeridge, Dorset, England

December 2007. Volunteers for Dorset Wildlife Trust’s beach clean at Kimmeridge last Sunday were horrified to find a white beach. On closer inspection this turned out not to be snow or Caribbean sand, but millions of tiny plastic pellets called nurdles. Too small to pick up and too numerous to count, these pellets will remain on the beach with potentially lethal consequences. They were almost certainly lost from the Napoli, grounded in Lyme Bay last January.

Nurdles are the basic material from which plastic products are made. Transported in massive containers to factories, they are turned into CDs, drainpipes, food containers and virtually anything plastic. They often end up in the sea, washed down factory drains or, as in this case, lost from container ships. As they float on the surface of all the world’s oceans they attract toxins from the water and are swept onto beaches with each tide.

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Habitat at risk for Jackass Flats bighorn herd
The Hub - www.ouraynews.com
14 Dec 2007
K Griffiths

Scientists, wildlife agencies and advocates along with many Ouray County residents and property owners remain alert to the conditions afforded for Ovis canadensis, commonly known as Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep. This is particularly true concerning a 41-acre parcel called Jackass Flats used as a wintering area by the sheep north of Ouray near Lake Lenore and the Bachelor-Syracuse mine.

. . . Studies show that Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep have a low tolerance level for handling stress, expressly stress caused by close proximity to humans and dogs. Human development and recreational use of land around the remaining fragments of bighorn sheep wintering ground such as Jackass Flats pose the risk of alarming the sheep thereby raising their stress level leading to weakened physical conditions, pneumonia and other complications like aborted lambs.

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Indian alligators found dead in Chambal River
The Cheers magazine – www.thecheers.org
13 Dec 2007
Area: Chambal River, Uttar Pradesh, India

In a shocking incident, several Indian alligators (Gharials) have been found dead in the Chambal River in Etawah's Chakar Nagar sub-division of Uttar Pradesh. The main habitat for crocodiles and alligators in India are the Rivers Chambal, Girwa, Rapti and Narayani in the orbit of central and northern India.

. . . "The forest department has conducted a post-mortem on two to three Gharials. The Gharials were recently brought from Lucknow's Kukrail Gharial Rehabilitation Centre, and they might have become victims of some contagious disease or the target of some hunters," claimed Rajeev Chauhan, the Secretary of the Society for the Conservation of Nature.

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OTHER RELATED WILDLIFE DISEASE NEWS
Photo of Red Tide courtesy of Wikipedia

WILDLIFE DISEASE RELATED PUBLCIATIONS

Avian Diseases - December 2007
Volume 51, Number 4
Table of Contents

Science. 2007 Dec 14 [subscription required]