Numbers of Cook Inlet Belugas Dropping Again
09.10.2009 - Water & Oceans, Flora & Fauna, Arctic
A report released last Tuesday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) shows that Cook Inlet Belugas in southern Alaska are still on the decline. After scientists found the whales close to extinction, they were listed as endangered under the US Endangered Species Act, providing them protection from hunting. Nonetheless, their numbers have continued to fall. Dropping from 653 belugas in 1994 to 366 ten years later, the beluga population has shrunk to 321 this year.
Lacking precise information on the cause of the decline, researchers have hypothesized that the extension of the port in Cook Inlet and the noise and congestion that belugas are highly sensitive to might be a factor.
