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The decapitated bodies of at least fivesea lionsfound on the shores of Vancouver Island , Canada , over the preceding few months hint that there may be a marine - mammal serial cause of death on the wanton , or perhaps someone who is lopping off the head of already idle ocean lions , according to word sources .
It ’s unclear how these fauna die , but after looking at pic of the dead beast , Anna Hall , a nautical mammal animal scientist at Sea View Marine Sciences , a troupe that uses acoustic to supervise marine animal motion , said that humans are probable to blame .
Sea Lions enjoying the last light of the day during sunset at La Jolla beach near San Diego, California.
" To me , this looks knowing , whether it ’s by a single person or a mathematical group of people,“Hall told the Canadian news outlet CTV News . " I sincerely hope that Fisheries and Oceans Canada pursue this case to determine who is doing this and to bring them to justice because this is a infraction of federal law . "
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The images also argue that the species is a Steller sea lion ( Eumetopias jubatus ) , Hall added . These animals , which live along parts of the Pacific Coast of North America , Japan and Russia , are near - threatened , according to theInternational Union for Conservation of Nature . They are the fourthly largest pinniped mammal ( a mathematical group that includes seal , sea Lion andwalruses ) , as males can make length of up to 10.8 feet ( 3.3 meters ) and weigh an norm of 2,200 lbs . ( 1,000 kilogram ) , according to the 2009Encyclopedia of Marine Mammals(Second Edition ) .
Deborah Short , a resident of Nanaimo , a city on Vancouver Island , enjoin she noticed a headless ocean lion while walking her pawl along the shoring in April , and decide to take some pic . " At first I opine it was a logarithm and then as I got closer , I realized it was a ocean lion,“Short state Vice . " I immediately walk over in that direction , only to discover that its head had been severed . I was just disgusted to my stomach . "
In June , Short came across another brainless ocean that was near the body of a skinned seal , according to theCanadian Broadcasting Corporation(CBC ) . Other people who have found decapitated ocean Lion in the area have since sent their photos to Short . In some representative , it appears that the creature ’s fresh skull was leave next to the consistence . As of now , the body enumeration is at least five , Short said .
During her online research into sea lions , Short learned that several First Nations group were proposing that they be allowed toharvest or culllocal ocean Leo , because as ocean lion populations have boom , the numbers of some Salmon River and other protect and endangered Pisces the Fishes , which the sea lions exhaust , have plump . However , there ’s no indication that the decapitate ocean lions are related to the First Nations ' marriage proposal , according to CTV News .
Meanwhile , the Canadian Fisheries and Oceans Canada ( DFO ) state it was look into the pinniped subject .
" From time to time , individuals may fiddle with the brute once beached , " a DFO voice tell CTV News . " If this is determined to have been done in an effort to knowingly tamper with grounds , this would be an offense under the Criminal Code of Canada . "
More than 70 % of Steller ocean lion births encounter on the small island off the northwesterly tip of Vancouver Island , Vice describe .
If a wild animal carcass is discover in Canada , citizenry should call 1 - 800 - 465 - 4336 to report it to the administration . In Canada , ocean Lion are protect by the Fisheries Act and the Species at Risk Act . Sea lions are also protected in the United States under the 1972 federalMarine Mammal Protection Act .
Hall read she hope that government activity functionary will grade a necropsy ( an animate being autopsy ) to learn more about the deceased ocean Lion . " It ’s absolutely horrific and dismaying that there ’s anybody on this coastline that would feel that this is an appropriate course of action with wish to a nautical mammalian or any animal at all , " Hall recount CTV News .
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This is n’t the first fourth dimension that brainless pinnipeds have wash ashore . Four headless ocean lions were found on Vancouver Island in 2013 , and at least 12 seal carcasses were found on the bank building of the St. Lawrence in Quebec in 2014 , theCBC reported . It ’s still unclear why these fauna were aim ; while ocean lion skin and whiskers are sometimes used to make items such as drum and masks , these natural action require a permit , and each killing has to be reported to the DFO , theCBC report in 2013 . However , no such reportage or permit program surface in any of the sea lion deaths .
The brainless seals , on the other helping hand , were perchance the target of a wild scavenger , Stéphane Lair , a prof of veterinary medicine at the University of Montreal , told the CBC in 2014 . " Scavengers assault a carcass quickly , and they go for orifice — the olfactory organ , the backtalk , the nostrils . So it ’s the head that get along away from the body first , " Lair said .
Originally print on Live Science .
