50 Wins for Marine Mammals: Celebrating 50 Years of the Marine Mammal Protection Act

This year is the 50th anniversary of the Marine Mammal Protection Act, a law that protects all marine mammals, including whales, dolphins, seals, sea lions, manatees, sea otters and polar bears, within U.S. waters. Since becoming law in 1972, the Marine Mammal Protection Act has played a critical role in the survival of marine mammals and the health of our ocean ecosystem—and will continue to do so for years to come.

Over the last 50 years, the Marine Mammal Protection Act has enabled countless conservation success stories. We couldn’t possibly name them all, so we’ve created a list of 50 of our favorite wins (in no particular order!) for marine mammals and our ocean, and you can feel proud of the role you’ve played in making these successes possible.

These conservation wins are just the beginning: As the world’s largest marine mammal hospital, the Center will continue building on the success of the Marine Mammal Protection Act by supporting thriving marine ecosystems, building ocean-literate communities, training leaders in the field and more.

In 1975, The Marine Mammal Center was founded and our first patient, California sea lion Herman, was treated and released. 

The Guadalupe fur seal population is slowly recovering from the brink of extinction, and is now classified as a threatened species. The Center is one of few organizations permitted to rehabilitate this species.

Recently, the endangered Hawaiian monk seal population surpassed 1,500 individuals for the first time in more than 20 years. Of the 1,500 monk seals estimated to be in the wild, nearly 30 percent are alive today directly due to conservation efforts led by NOAA and partners like the Center. 

Harbor porpoises returned to the San Francisco Bay after an absence of approximately 65 years , which researchers suggest was due to poor water quality, and the arrival of other whale and dolphin species soon followed. 

As part of our work to save the Hawaiian monk seal, we opened Ke Kai Ola, a state-of-the-art hospital and visitor center on Hawai‘i Island in 2014. The Center is the only organization permitted to rehabilitate Hawaiian monk seals.

The Global Ghost Gear Initiative, an alliance of countries, industries, nonprofits and academics focused on tackling the issue of lost and abandoned fishing gear around the world, was formed. This initiative, which the Center is a former member of, is the first global collective impact alliance dedicated to tackling the problem of ghost fishing gear at a global scale.

The Center is a leading first responder to cetaceans in distress. With the expansion of our large whale entanglement response efforts, we’re now creating the capacity and infrastructure to collaboratively advance whale entanglement response on the West Coast of the United States.

Sea otters were hunted to the brink of extinction, but the population has grown and is now listed as a threatened species. The Center is one of few organizations permitted to rehabilitate this species.

The National Network for Ocean and Climate Change Interpretation was created as a nationwide network of zoos, aquariums and science centers that work together to identify and teach best practices for climate communication. The Center serves as chair of the National Training Committee.

The California Dungeness Crab Fishing Gear Whale Entanglement Working Group was convened to address an increase in large whale entanglements in Dungeness crab fishing gear. The Center is a member of this working group, which also includes commercial and recreational fishermen, environmental organizations, and state and federal agencies.

Experts at the Center developed an acoustic dart for remote sedation that allows for successful rescue of California sea lions in high-risk situations. This also led to the first successful darting of a phocid, or seal, for disentanglement.

Researchers began attaching satellite tags to marine mammals from threatened and endangered populations, including Guadalupe furs seals and Hawaiian monk seals, in order to track their movements in the wild, which allow our experts to learn more about how to better protect these species.

After identifying ship strikes with marine mammals near San Francisco Bay, the Center contributed data that led to changes in the mile-wide shipping lanes into San Francisco Bay to reduce traffic. The Center’s researchers continue to study whales in the area along with ship speeds so that informed decisions can be made to further protect whales in the Bay.

The Marine Mammal Center expanded its Hawaiian monk seal outreach and education programs to Maui. 

In 1986, the International Coastal Cleanup® began when communities rallied together with the common goal of collecting and documenting the trash littering their coastlines.

The Center’s researchers are compiling the first-ever humpback whale, gray whale, harbor porpoise and bottlenose dolphin photo-identification catalogs for the San Francisco Bay in order to identify known individuals and track their movements.

In 2010, Center scientists brought together an array of international researchers to form the Sea Lion Cancer Consortium to enhance, promote and coordinate research to understand urogenital cancer in California sea lions, and this work continues today. 

The Center performs a necropsy on every patient that dies at our hospital, as well as whales in the field, because an extraordinary amount of information can be learned and collected, which is then shared with researchers around the world. 

In 1982, formalized education programs began at the Center. Today, programs like Ocean Ambassadors and Nā Kōkua o ke Kai inspire thousands of students each year to become ocean stewards.

The Center performed the first CT scan, with partners like NOAA, on a wild Hawaiian monk seal. The CT scan allowed experts to resolve the seal’s complex diagnosis and begin a treatment plan that led to a successful release back to the wild.

The Center’s Sausalito hospital added solar panels over the patient pens and medical buildings, which generate 25 to 35 percent of our energy consumption.

The Center’s Sausalito hospital recycles 80 percent of the water in the patient pens and treats it with ozone gas in order to ensure that our patients have a clean environment for healing without wasting precious water resources.

In 1979, the Center published its first scientific paper. Since then, our research scientists have been primary or contributing authors on hundreds of peer-reviewed research papers and textbook chapters with the goal of understanding the lives and deaths of marine mammals to improve conservation outcomes.

Leptospirosis was first detected in California sea lions in 1970. The Center has been on the forefront of research on this disease in marine mammals and has published a number of scientific papers on it dating back to 1985 in order to better understand the dynamics of this pathogen in the California sea lion population.

Hawaiian monk seal Kilo was the first patient rescued from the Main Hawaiian Islands as much of the population resides in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. Kilo was released after seven months of care.