Rebekah Kohler

Fishing Gear Related Injury in California Marine Wildlife

Introduction
About 52 metric tons of lost or discarded fishing gear is said to accumulate in the ocean
each year near Hawaii alone. There have been projects to try and clean up some areas of
waste accumulation in certain parts of the ocean, one of these being the Channel Islands
where 11 tons of fishing gear was removed in 2005. The researchers reported that at least
267 marine species are known to have been injured by fishing gear. These injuries have been
caused by either taking in the fishing gear internally, or by the animal being entangled in it.
Some species have become threatened or endangered do to injuries and death caused by
fishing gear.
Researchers chose to study this subject to evaluate the percentage of a few specific
species injured due to fishing gear annually along the coast of California, USA. That way,
when a clean up project is instigated, they will know how many injuries and deaths resulted
from fishing gear before a clean up project compared to how many were caused by fishing
gear after a clean up project they will know the effectiveness of the project.
The researchers gathered information from marine wildlife rehabilitation centers in
California for a previous six-year period. The information they gathered was specific to sea
gulls, pelicans, 2 species of seal, and sea lions. They wanted to know the percentage of
injuries and deaths caused by fishing gear to these animals from the years 2001 2006.
This topic is of value because marine wildlife is threatened due to causes that can be
more prevented by humans. If knowledge about this problem is known, perhaps more clean
up projects can be funded in the future and preventative procedures may be put in place.

Rebekah Kohler

The researchers are trying to prove that lost and discarded fishing gear in the ocean is a
significant cause of deaths and injuries to marine wildlife along the coast of California.
Fishing gear in the marine environment is a significant cause of injury in coastal California
marine wildlife. (Dau, Gilardi, Gulland, Higgins, Holcomb, Leger, Ziccardi)
Materials and Methods
The information gathered was specific to Brown Pelicans, gulls, California sea lions,
northern elephant seals, and Pacific harbor seals because those animals are in large
population near Californias coast. These species are also known to live or congregate near
areas where fishing is popular. They researched the medical records for these animals from
certain California wildlife rehabilitation centers. They looked at the records that included
injuries caused by entanglement in fishing gear, and injuries caused by ingestion of fishing
gear.
They measured their information statistically, comparing data in a spreadsheet program
and then used statistic specific software to measure the ratios. They calculated the total
number of injuries (by any cause) per species and compared that to the number of injuries
that occurred due specifically to fishing gear.
Results
Researchers looked at 9,668 records or cases of injuries and deaths and found out that
1,090 of them were related to fishing gear, or 11.3%. Some of the specific injuries included;
entanglement of legs, wing, flippers; lacerations of legs, wings, flippers; hooks being
embedded inside the animal do to ingestion, or otherwise imbedded in the animals wing, leg
or flipper. The percentage of injuries do to fishing gear varied for the different species, with

Rebekah Kohler

the pelicans having the highest percentage of related injuries and deaths at an average of
31.1% average yearly.
The data gathered was sometimes surprising, in that, certain species seemed to be more
prone to being injured do to fishing gear than others (such as the pelicans). Other factors that
were somewhat unexpected, such as location, time of year, age of the animal, and gender,
also played a role in the likelihood of animals injury.
Discussion
The study proved that a significant number of injuries and deaths (1,090) caused to gulls,
pelicans, and pinnipeds (seals, and sea lions), were influenced or caused by lost or discarded
fishing gear. On average, injuries and deaths related to fishing gear for each specie was about
3/10 cases for pelicans, 1/10 for gulls, and 3/100 for pinnipeds yearly. This proves that if
clean up projects can be established along the coast of California, a little over 1000 lives of
marine wildlife species may be saved or protected annually.
The results of the research project were hard to summarize because the researchers felt
that there were many factors that could not be fully measured in the study. There may be
other species affected by fishing gear than those that were included in this study, therefore,
further and more in-depth study may prove that the negative effect of fishing gear on marine
wildlife near California is even more severe than proven by this study alone.
The researchers only used records and medical cases from 7 different marine wildlife
rehabilitation centers along the California coast. The information gathered came from cases
of animals that were living when rescued, no information was gathered from animals that
were found already deceased even though the cause of death may have originated from

Rebekah Kohler

fishing gear. Results may have been proven more severe if information was gathered for a
broader range of animal species, if records from more rehabilitation centers were included,
and if records of already deceased animals were evaluated in the study.

Rebekah Kohler

Bibliography
Dau, Brynie K., Kirsten V. K. Gilardi, Frances M. Gulland, Ali Higgins, Jay B. Holcomb, Judy
St. Leger, and Michael H. Ziccardi. "Fishing Gear-Related Injury In California Marine
Wildlife." Journal of Wildlife Diseases 45.2 (2009): 355-62. Web.
http://www.jwildlifedis.org/