Scientists collect samples for testing. (Representative)
Johannesburg:
About 7,000 Cape fur seals have been found dead at a breeding colony in central Namibia, scientists said on Saturday.
Conservationist Naude Dreyer of the Ocean Conservation Namibia charity began noticing dead seals littering the sandy beaches at Pelican Point settlement near the town of Walvis Bay in September.
Then, in the first two weeks of October, he found a large number of seal fetuses in the colony, Dr Tess Gridley of the Namibian Dolphin Project told AFP.
Fur seals normally give birth between mid-November and mid-December.
Gridley estimated that between 5,000 and 7,000 female seals had a young miscarriage and that more were still being discovered.
The cause of the massive death has not yet been established, but scientists suspect anything from pollutants or bacterial infections to malnutrition.
Some of the dead females found were “skinny, emaciated, with very little fat stores,” Gridley said.
Scientists collect samples for testing.
In 1994, some 10,000 seals died and 15,000 fetuses were aborted in a massive death that was linked to famine believed to have resulted from a shortage of fish as well as a bacterial infection at another breeding colony, Cape Cross , approximately 116 kilometers (116 miles) north of the central tourist town of Swakopmund.
Annely Haiphene, executive director of the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources, told AFP she suspected the seals had died from “lack of food” but would wait for the results of the tests.
(This story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
