Number of California Sea Lion Pups is Dwindling

Photo credit: Leslie Willoughby

Healthy baby sea lions are a wonder to watch. They’re curious and down right adorable, but some in California are causing scientists to worry.

“Sometimes they could barely lift their heads, and they were reluctant to move, even when approached,” said Claire Simeone, a conservation medicine veterinarian at the Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito. “I could see the outlines of their hipbones and their shoulders.”

Normally a sea lion pup has a 70 percent chance of living through the first year. Pups born along the West Coast in late 2012 were emaciated and dehydrated, with 1,500 stranded by May 2013.

Only 30 percent of those pups survived.

The population of California sea lions has reached new heights in recent decades, but now marine biologists are seeing signs that the growth has reached the maximum of what the environment will allow.

That’s bad news for the sea lion pups, and for tourists who love the playful animals.

Why weren’t those stranded sea lions being cared for by the mothers? It seems there wasn’t enough food to support the newcomers, and here’s why.

The California Current flows south along the West Coast, but it has moved farther offshore, reducing the availability of sardines and anchovies that sea lions love to eat.

By switching to new diets, sea lion mothers became unable to produce the nourishing milk for their young.

The Marine Mammal Center which has rescued an increasing numbers of pups each year are training volunteers and ordering medications to help curb this cruel fate.

Read more from our source, Santa Cruz Sentinel.