Bonjour!
Please enjoy this press article about the rotary club île de ré and the association "Ré Nature Environnement" and sea mammals, in French!
RCGOG has connected with the Rotary club Ile de Ré as partners financially in favor of marine mammals (dolphins, seals....) who spend some time around the Ré island coasts and are found sometimes dead or wounded on the beaches. The "Ré Nature Environnement" association is specially dedicated to the sea animals rescue on the island of Ré, to save them.
Introduction
The increase in dolphin strandings on the beaches of the Atlantic coast is a challenge for civil society. Why do these emblematic animals die like this every year? Pelagis, which coordinates the National Stranding Network, is on the front line in providing answers. the RNE, Réseau National Echouages (National stranding network), set up in 1972, is the main tool for monitoring marine mammal strandings. It is made up of local correspondents who are ready to intervene when a case arises. It is coordinated by the Observatoire PELAGIS. Dolphins, porpoises, seals and other marine mammals regularly stranded on beaches. This phenomenon, which can occur both in Metropolitan France and in the French Overseas Territories, is not always explained, but is largely explained by the examinations carried out by the RNE.
What needs to be done to protect marine mammals ?
The monitoring of strandings and the analysis of databases provide answers that public policies will have to implement in order, for example, to limit bycatches or to monitor the pollutants present in the marine environment.
A collaborative science programme
The monitoring of marine mammal strandings is the main environmental observatory for monitoring marine mammals in France and is largely based on the concept of participatory science. This monitoring is mainly carried out by volunteer correspondents from the Réseau National Échouages (RNE). 2 Marine mammal strandings are the main source of biological sampling for these species. The samples collected by RNE are the source of much of the knowledge on the biology and ecology of marine mammals in France. The main parameters monitored provide information on population structure (genetics, age structure, reproductive status, etc.), feeding ecology (stomach contents, metallic and isotopic tracers, etc.) and health status (causes of mortality, contaminant content, exposure to pathogens, etc.). The reporting of marine mammal strandings is stipulated in a ministerial note which, among other things, makes it compulsory for the RNE to examine the carcasses prior to their disposal.
Results
Based on these data, it is now possible to produce indicators of relative abundance, distribution, health status or to assess the areas and causes of mortality of marine mammals, which is often a real challenge for long‐lived, mobile top predators living in habitats that are difficult to access. The continuous collection of strandings for more than 40 years on the French coastline now makes it possible to obtain long time series that make it possible to monitor trends in stranding rates and to highlight unusual events. The most striking examples of the last 20 years are the sudden increase in harbour porpoise strandings on the Channel and Atlantic coasts and the phenomenon of stranding peaks observed in common dolphins in the Atlantic. 3
The Rétais's National Stranding Network
The Rétais's National Stranding Network is made up of a team of specialists, their mission is to collect information on animals stranded dead on the beach and also to enable the rescue of live animals such as dolphins and gray seals, on the beach. Island of Re. Our mission is also to collect dead animals that are fresh, to transport them to La Rochelle to the Pélagis laboratory so that veterinarians can carry out complete autopsies. Our mission is also to recover seal baby in distress, capture them and transport them as quickly as possible to a specialized care center. 4
The needs of the Retais's National Stranding Network
We would need an electric van to transport on the one hand the live, injured or sick baby seals, and on the other hand to be able to transport the dead animals that arrived in goods conditions on the beaches to transport them at the Pélagis Laboratory in La Rochelle. This electric vehicle would be an ideal way to optimize our work collecting marine mammals (live and/or dead) on island of Ré.