To the amazement of scientists, a grey whale (Eschrichtius robustus) has been spotted off the coast of Barcelona, after being tracked from Palestine/Israel. North Atlantic-Mediterranean populations were understood to have become extinct in the 18th century, and there have no sightings since. The most likely expllanation is that the animal is a Pacific grey whale that has become lost. If it does form part of a new Atlantic population that would indeed be news. El País and BBC

BBC documentary of killer whales off the coast of Cadiz attracted by huge tuna captured by the almadraba fishing technique.

From The Natural World – Wild In Spain. Unfortunately it features Micheal Portillo.

The almadraba is an elaborate and age-old Andalusian technique of setting nets in a maze that leads to a central pool called “copo”. The maze uses just two net lines, called “raveras”. One net is connected to the shore and other line is secured in deeper water. Those lines have smaller oblique lines which leads to the central pool. Tunas are not able to see the exit from the central pool and remain inside. This simple maze works because tuna tend to go into the Mediterranean during spring and the beginning of summer. The floor of the central pool is raised in order to catch the tunas and when that floor is up, there is little room for tunas and they are then caught easily and slaughtered. Wikipedia

From Dolphins and whales in the Strait of Gibraltar

Killer whales (Orcinus orca) visit the Strait of Gibraltar during the tuna migration season in July and August. At the same time Spanish and Moroccan fishermen fish for yellowfin tuna, using longline fishing technics, they lower their fishing lines, armed with several hooks, vertically to the sea bottom. This fishing procedure is possible only in a limited area, where the depth of sea is only 100 metres. Killer whales, being intelligent animals, found out that it is much easier to take a tuna already caught on a fisherman’s hook, than to race with a fish in all its strength. Fishermen must often be satisfied with no more than the head of a tuna; orcas never eat the head of the fish as it contains a metal hook. This is the most dolphin safe of all methods of tuna fishery.

The killer whale population of the Strait of Gibraltar is only 12 animals (2006). There is a photo-identification catalogue of them. They are rather difficult to observe: they can only be found easily if tuna fishermen are on the sea, and the orcas hang around them. In any other instances, whale-watchers only can come across them by chance.

The Shark Alliance has denounced the overfishing of sharks for their fins by Spanish ships. 60,000 tons were docked in Spanish ports last year.
“A new TNS Demoscopia poll, commissioned by the Shark Alliance, has revealed that people in Spain are unwittingly eating shark meat. Although 96% of those polled said that they did not eat shark, 76.4% were not aware that “cazón” and “marrajo” are sharks and nearly 33% said that they consumed these products.  The results were released in conjunction with a new report from SUBMON, titled Spain: A driving force in shark fishing around the world, that documents serious fishery problems including mislabelling sharks at market.”

Read Spanish unwittingly eat shark (Shark Alliance)

For more than a decade, Spain has been one of the top five world powers with respect to the fishing and marketing of sharks.  Spain’s fishing fleets, employing various gears,  span the globe, taking sharks as targeted and incidental catch.  Approximately 50% of the EU catch of “sharks” (all cartilaginous fishes: sharks, rays and chimaeras) is taken by Spain.

Photo by Scott Sonnenberg (wikipedia)

The Portuguese Man O’ War (Physalia physalis), one of the world’s most poisonous “jellyfish”, has been spotted off the Andalusian coastline near Almeria and along the Costa del Sol between Cadiz and Malaga. This is the first time they have reached Spain’s coasts for ten years. Scientists have warned the creatures could soon arrive in waters around the Balearic Islands and the Catalan coast. The species is not a true jellyfish but but rather a siphonophore – a colony of four kinds of minute, highly modified individuals, which are specialized polyps and medusoids.

Their sting is 10 times stronger than an ordinary jellyfish. Wikipedia notes:

The stinging venom-filled nematocysts in the tentacles of the Portuguese Man O’ War can paralyze small fish and other prey. Detached tentacles and dead specimens (including those which wash up on shore) can sting just as painfully as the live creature in the water, and may remain potent for hours or even days after the death of the creature or the detachment of the tentacle.Stings usually cause severe pain to humans, leaving whip-like, red welts on the skin which normally last about 2–3 days after the initial sting, the pain should subside after about 1 hour. However, the venom can travel to the lymph nodes and may cause, depending on the amount of venom, more intense pain. A sting may lead to an allergic reaction. There can also be serious effects, including fever, shock, and interference with heart and lung action. There have even been deaths, although this is rare. Medical attention may be necessary, especially where pain persists or is intense, or there is an extreme reaction, or the rash worsens, or a feeling of overall illness develops, or a red streak develops between swollen lymph nodes and the sting, or if either area becomes red, warm and tender.

Treatment for Man O’ War stings elsewhere on the body involve washing the affected area with salt water and then applying ice to dull the pain. More here

“Climate change is changing the migration patterns of many creatures. If they establish themselves it would be very worrying because they really are very dangerous,” Xavier Pastor, the European director of the Oceana ecological campaigning group, told the Independent.Even dead or washed up on shore the creatures still pose a threat because their tentacles retain their poison.”The Portuguese Man O’ War hasn’t been seen in the Mediterranean for a decade, and its appearance off the Spanish coast could herald a process of colonisation, which has happened with other invading species,” Mr Pastor said. Read in The Daily Telegraph

The Portuguese Man O’ War (named caravela-portuguesa in Portuguese) is named for its air bladder, which looks similar to the triangular sails of the Portuguese ship (man-of-war) Caravela latina (two- or three-masted lateen-rigged ship caravel), of the 15th and 16th centuries. As can be seen in the photo. Photo (wikipedia)

See also last year: Portuguese man o’war threat in Cantabrian Sea

I liked this photo report of the fishing industry in Vigo by Ian Berry of Magnum Photos. The above image “ Gulls follow the trawler in the hope of picking up any fish left uncovered. 2008″
All photos here

According to a new report by Oceana, if Spain is to meet the deadline in three years imposed by the United Nations to protect at least 10% of the world’s marine areas, it needs to rapidly increase the paltry 0.5% currently protected. This means protecting almost 65 km² a day.

The designation of new protected marine areas such as Seco de los Olivos (Andalusia), the seamounts of the Mallorca channel (Balearic Islands), the canyons of Palamos and Creus (Catalonia), the Seco de Palos (facing Murcia) and Cape Nao (region of Valencia), along with the expansion of other already protected areas such as Columbretes, Alborán and Doñana, are some of Oceana’s proposals in this report concerning approximately 50 areas in the Spanish Mediterranean and adjacent Atlantic waters….“Not only should new areas be afforded protection, but also many of the existing areas should be expanded. Nearly half of Spain’s marine protected areas barely reach a surface area of one square kilometre, making them inefficient for conserving certain habitats and species,” affirms Ricardo Aguilar, director of research and projects for Oceana in Europe and campaign director on board the Ranger.

• Read in Oceana (English)
• Propuesta de áreas marinas de importancia ecológica: Atlántico Sur y Mediterráneo español (pdf)
• Above image the areas proposed

• Read in El Mundo

The first loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta) from eggs brought from Cabo Verde have hatched in Fuerteventura, in the Playa de Cofete in the Parque Natural de Jandía. More are expected to hatch from a total of 781 eggs. The project is planned to last ten years as it will take at least a decade to be able to begin to measure its success when hopefully some of those turtles hatched will return to the same beach as adults.

Dylan Walker of planetwhale has sent iberianature this great guide to whale watching in the Bay of Biscay Highly recommended! (Above photo is a fin whale)

Just how rich the Bay is for cetaceans can be assessed with a quick number crunching session of the ORCA database. This database includes over 50,000 km of survey effort from volunteers working aboard both ferries between February and November 1996 – 2008. During the period 1996-2004, for example, cetaceans were encountered on 3,429 occasions involving 15,725 individuals of 21 species. This equates to an average of one encounter every 44 minutes of ferry cruising – a very high return for any whale watcher! Read

Also well worth reading see is piece on the 2008 Plymouth – Santander Big Whale Watch

Newly hatched turtle being measured (CSIC)

246 eggs of loggerhead turtles (tortuga boba – Caretta caretta) have hatched in the last few days on a beach in Cabo de Gata, Almeria. The eggs were taken from Cabo Verde, where a third of the world’s population of Caretta caretta lives, and form part of a reintroduction programme of the Junta de Andalucía, CSIC and the Canarian goverment (Loggerhead turtles in Fuerteventura). They have been taken to a reintoriduction sent which will raise them for the first few months to reduce mortality rates. El Mundo

It will take at least 15 years to be able to begin to measure the success of the project when hopefully some of those turtles hatched will return to the same beach as adults. Small populations of loggerhead turtle in the Mediterranean exist in the Turkey and Greece.

See also:

• Loggerhead turtle eggs to be buried in Fuerteventura
• Loggerhead turtles hatch in Almeria (October 21st, 2007)
• loggerhead turtles (Wikipedia)

800 Loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta – tortuga boba) eggs are to be buried today in La Playa de Cofete de Fuerteventura in an attempt to reintroduce the species in the Canary Islands. The eggs have been brought from the Cape Verde. 200 more are to be sent to the Centro de Recuperación de Especies in Taliarte, in Gran Canaria, and 400 to the Estación Biológica in Doñana, Andalucia. Loggerhead turtles disappeared from the Canary Islands some 300 years ago. It wil take at least 15 years to be able to begin to measure the success of the project when hopefully some of those turtles hatched will return to the same beach as adults. Terra

More on loggerhead turtles (Wikipedia – above photo) which notes that the genus name “Caretta” is a latinization of the French “caret”, meaning turtle, tortoise, or sea turtle.  Small populations of loggerhead turtle in the Mediterranean exist in the Turkey and Greece.

See also: Loggerhead turtles hatch in Almeria (October 21st, 2007)

Photo by Scott Sonnenberg (wikipedia)

In recent weeks the presence of Portuguese man o’war (Sp. carabela portuguesa- Physalia phisalis) has been detected at various points on the coasts of Asturias, Cantabria and the Basque Country. Several people have been stung in beaches in Guipúzcoa (Ondarreta and Zarautz) and in Cantabria (Isla) although nobody has yet been seriously injured. Four years ago, the massive presence of the species forced the closure of several beaches in Asturias. Experts believe that the rise in the temperature of the Cantabrian Sea due to climate change has brought the Portuguese man o’war here with warmer waters. The cooler waters of Galicia have so far been free of the threat. El País. The purple Man-o-war is not a true jellyfish, but a colony of hydrozoan polyps. It can in extreme cases provoke a cardiac arrest and death in particularly sensitive persons.

Note the English and Spanish etymology comes from the creature’s air bladder, which looks similar to the triangular sails of the Portuguese ship (man-of-war) Caravela latina (two- or three-masted lateen-rigged ship caravel), of the 15th and 16th centuries. See Wikipedia

See also: Sharks, weaver fish, jellyfish and other dangerous animals in the seas around Spain

Elsewhere, in 2007 in Greece 28 pups were born, and in the Desertas Islands (Madeira), there are just three breeding females. The Algerian and Moroccan coasts support no more than 15 individuals. Source: La Crónica Verde

Distribution of monk seals. From The Monachus Guardian.

Figures of a world population of 500 Mediterranean monk seals are being quoted in the press though I can find no “official” figure. The Monachus Guardian states

“Thousands of islands, inaccessible coastlines, and a species that shies away from human contact have all conspired to make distribution and abundance assessments for the Mediterranean monk seal (Monachus monachus) an extraordinarily inexact science. Conventional wisdom, however, suggests that fewer than 600 individuals survive, making the Mediterranean monk seal Europe’s most endangered marine mammal

Remarkable news. A diver from Palma claims to have seen (and taken photo above) a possible monk seal (foca monje – Monachus monachus) in the marine reserve of Isla del Toro. The monk seal is considered to be extinct is the Balearic Islands (where it was known popularly as the vell marí – old man of the sea) since the late 1950s, and is among the ten most endangered mammals in the world, with colonies divided between Mauritania and the Eastern Mediterranean, the former being far the stronger. If true, I imagine we are talking about an animal in dispersion or just plain lost. The Balearic government periodically considers the possibility of attempting to reintroduce the animal. Whether it would fare well in an area of sea so popular with pleasure craft is another question. See more in El País

Update: this version of the story from Libertad Balear is much better researched.

There is also a half plan to reintroduce the animal along the Costa Brava (La foca monje volverá a Cadaqués – El País)

A small group of monk seals survived in Cabo de Gata, Almeria until the 1960s.

See also

• The Monachus Guardian
• La foca monje
• Monk seal (Wikipedia)
• Caribbean Monk Seal Gone Extinct From Human Causes Jun. 9, 2008) — After a five year review, NOAA’s Fisheries Service has determined that the Caribbean monk seal, which has not been seen for more than 50 years, has gone extinct — the first type of seal to go extinct from human causes.

According to the Centro de Investigacións Mariñas of Galicia barnacle captures are likely to be favoured by alterations due to climate change, though clam and cockle farming will be hit.

Clams and cockles will be negatively affected by torrential rains as their principal beds lie at the mouth of rivers. Heavy rains will bring a large influx of fresh water harmful to shellfish. High water temperatures will lead to proliferation of pathogenic agents which attack clams and cockles.

On the plus side, the production of barnacles has increased in recent years coinciding with a fall in algal blooms, though the article does not explain why. More soon when I understand this.

El cambio climático favorecerá la captura del percebe en Galicia (El Pais)

More on barnacles from Iberianature

If good be damaged by rats, and there is no cat on board the ship, the managing owner of the ship ought to make compensation; but it has not been declared in the case where a ship has had cats on board in the place where she was laden, and after she has sailed away the said cats have died and the rats have damaged the goods before the ship has arrived at a place where they could procure cats; if the managing owner of the ship shall buy cats and put them on board as soon as they arrive at a place, where they can find them for sale or as a gift or can get them on board in any manner, he is not bound to make good the said losses, for they have no happened through his default. 
from “Les Bones Costumes de la Mar” (14th-15th c. Catalan text)  from Twiss, Sir Travers, ed. Monumenta Juridica, The Black Book of the Admiralty

Get Robert Hughes’ Barcelona from Iberianature/Amazon

Some key facts

• The spill is the largest environmental disaster in Spain’s history.
• 64,000 tons of fuel oil were spilled in the incident
• The cost of the clean-up to the Galician coast alone is estimated at €2.5 billion
• The World Wildlife Fund estimated that 300,000 seabirds died. A study published this month (Nov 2007) shows that hydrocarbons are still present in the seabird chicks (El Mundo)
• Seafood industry was halted along much of Galicia’s coast
• WWF warn of the possibility of other “Prestiges” today and notes three oil spills in Spain this year Sierra Nava (Algeciras), Don Pedro (Ibiza) and Samothraki (Gibraltar) WWF

See also “The largest environmental disaster in Spanish history began during a fierce storm off Galicia’s Coast of Death, la Costa da Morte, on 13th November 2002, as the Prestige oil tanker was sailing from Latvia to Gibraltar, to its ultimate destination of Singapore.” (Typically Spanish) + More on the Prestige oil spill (wikipedia)

El Mundo

El Mundo

Photo of beached Fin whale (rorcual común – Balaenoptera physalus) in Las Palmas

The beach takes its name from the 172 English sailors who were drowned off the coast here on 10th November 1890, when their ship, the Serpent, sank in a terrible storm. The Serpent had sailed from Plymouth on Saturday 8 November bound for Sierra Leone. Although there are several versions of what happened, the final verdict was that the Serpent had been lost through an error in navigation. Three surviviors reached the nearby village of Camariñas and sounded the alarm. A search party was sent out and most of the bodies were recovered. They were buried on the beach close to the wreck spot and a small cemetery was built around them. It stands today as a rather sad and lonely mounment. Letters of thanks were sent by the British government to the villagers and the mayor was given a shotgun and the parish priest a gold watch. Unusually for the time the survivors wore lifebelts, and there are claims that the incident led to their widespread use in the British merchant navy.

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Serpent
http://josecadaveira.tripod.com/militaryruins/id41.html

Striped dolphin in Almeria

El mar más sucio del mundo (El Pais)

I think we take that “sea” here means open sea, and so excludes bodies of water such as the inland Aral Sea.

In Spanish ballena yubarta

By the way, I’ve set up this page on whale watching in Spain

Whale_and_dolphin_watching_spain

From Scots Magazine 1739.

In Spanish a mermaid is a sirena. More Iberian knicknackery here

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Seal of the Basque town of Biarritz, 1351, with whaling scene and two-flued harpoon. (http://www.whalecraft.net/History.html)

An important feature of the Basque whale was that, like the sperm whale, but unlike many whale species, it floated when dead. The whale’s back shone obsidian black in the water, though the belly was a brilliant white. Averaging about fifty to sixty feet in length, a quarter of which was the huge head, a single animal could weigh more than sixty tons. Such a whale would yield thirty tons of blubber, which could be cooked down to an oil valued for centuries as fuel. Most coastal Basque communities established facilities along their beaches for cooking down whale blubber. As with most things Basque, it is not certain when this oil trade began, but in 670, at the end of the age of the Visigoths, there was a documented sale in northern France by Basques from Labourd of forty pots of whale oil……
……The first commercial whale hunters were the seventh- and eighth-century Basques, who found an eager market for this meat in Europe. Whale meat became a staple of the European diet partly because the Catholic Church forbade the eating of “redblooded” meat on holy days-about half the days on the calendar including every Friday-arguing that it was “hot,” associated with sex, which was also forbidden on holy days. But meat that came from animals-or parts of animals-that were submerged in water, including whale, fish, and the tail of the beaver, was deemed “cold” and therefore permitted. So with the exception of beaver tails and the occasional seal or porpoise, whale was the one allowable red meat. The Basques became the great providers of this holy red meat. They sold the leaner meat fresh or preserved in salt. Fattier parts were cured like bacon. In Paris, where these cuts were a Lenten specialty, they were known as craspois. Tongues, fresh or salted, were regarded as a particular delicacy and served with peas. Being the choicest part, the only good part, according to some medieval writers, whale tongues were often demanded by local church or government officials as tribute. The port of Bayonne jealously guarded its monopoly on the tongue trade.

Replica of a txalupa, the original Basque whaling boat (http://www.pasaiabai.com/cultura/2006/mayo/1-mayo-ontziola.htm)

In the seventh century, the Basques, no longer content to await for ailing whales to beach themselves, built stone whalespotting towers along the coast from Bilbao to Bayonne, manning them between October and March. One still remains on a mountaintop near San Sebastian and another in Guethary in Labourd. The whale’s undoing was the fact that it is a lunged mammal and must rise to the surface to breathe. When it does, a tall column of vapor is released. Spotting the spout of an approaching whale off the coastline, the lookout in the tower would let out a prolonged yell. His shouts were actually coded signals that told whalers the exact type of whale sighted, and whether it was a single whale or in a group. Five oarsmen, a captain, and a harpooner would then row out in a lightweight vessel.
The oarsmen would row as silently as possible, muffling the oars in their locks and even the oar blades in the water with oiled cloth. Then, having sneaked up on the unsuspecting giant foundering along the coast, they would strike suddenly with wooden-handled spears and harpoons. The oarsmen had to row, close enough to the whale for the harpooner to plant the har•
goon deeply into the body just below the head. Harpooning became the trade of the largest, strongest men. After harpooning the whale, the oarsmen had to row furiously in reverse, turning a fast circle, for an enraged whale could kill a dozen men with a flick of its huge tail. Or, instead of turning on its attackers, the whale might try to dive to the safety of great depths, dragging men and boats with it. The whale would dive with harpoon, line, and buoys until, out of breath, it had to furiously resurface, only to be harpooned again. The process was repeated numerous times until the whale spouted blood and died or the whalers capsized and drowned. Sometimes the boat and fishermen would just sink under the weight of the wet ropes.
By the late thirteenth century, whales marked the town seals of Bermeo and Fuenterrabia. Among the other towns that included whales in their town seals were Biarritz, Hendaye, Guetaria, Motrico, and Lequeitio. Not only did these towns keep the whale on their seals, but, from the use of whaling launches, they developed an early and enduring passion for rowing regattas.

More books about the Basque Country I have read

The Basque Country: A Cultural History by Paddy Woodworth: Full of fascinating facts. An excellent balanced account.