Marine mammals mooted at meeting

The Maui’s dolphin and other endangered marine mammals have been the focus of a huge international conference taking place in Dunedin this week.

File:Hector's Dolphins at Porpoise Bay 1999 a cropped.jpgMarine biologists and conservationist have taken over the town as part of the Conference on the Biology of Marine Mammals which this year has the theme, “Marine Mammal Conservation: Science Making a Difference”.

The week-long conference featured 357 talks and about 400 posters with up to 1200 delegates attending from more than 30 countries. You can read more about some of the research covered at the conference in this University of Otago media release.

The SMC also collected commentary from conference attendees regarding New Zealand’s most endangered marine mammal, the Maui’s Dolphin, available here.

Media coverage of the issues raised at the conference includes:

Otago Daily Times: Survey effect on sea mammals unknown
Radio New Zealand: Warning Maui’s dolphin headed for extinction
Otago Daily Times: Triage’ needed in saving marine mammals
Southland Times: Sea lion focus by scientists
Otago Daily Times: Fish and chips a threat to endangered dolphins