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Hundreds of volunteers work to save stranded whales in Florida Keys - Environment - MiamiHerald.com
Hundreds of volunteers work to save stranded whales in Florida Keys - Environment - MiamiHerald.com
Hundreds of volunteers work to save stranded whales in Florida Keys
By CAMMY CLARK
McClatchy Newspapers
KEY LARGO, Fla. -- Since the first plea for help came over a Florida Keys radio station, hundreds of volunteers have worked around the clock to save pilot whales that mysteriously stranded in shallow waters.
The massive effort, now entering its third week, includes veterinarians, retirees, college kids, a paraplegic, two-time Olympic gold medalist swimmer Steve Lundquist and blockbuster film producer Jon Landau of "Titanic" and "Avatar" fame.
Some volunteers have worked shifts as long as 40 hours. Occupational therapist Brenda Ewer and her boyfriend, Brad Azar, postponed their "cruising" to the Bahamas on a trimaran to run a makeshift kitchen to feed the weary volunteers.
"We're exhausted at the end of the day, but it is just amazing to connect with the whales," Ewer said. "And I've noticed that as much as the humans are helping the whales, the whales are helping the humans."
Blair Mase, the marine mammal stranding coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Southeast Region, said events like this stranding of a pod of 23 whales "brings out the heart and soul of the people of the Keys."
The massive rescue that began on May 5 is now a rehabilitation effort to nurse the remaining four survivors back to health. They were found in critical condition, all with some form of pneumonia and various other problems.
The effort appears to be paying off.
"I'm very cautiously optimistic we can save all four," said Douglas Mader, one of the volunteer veterinarians.
The Marine Mammal Conservancy, the nonprofit organization leading the effort to save the whales, can be found at the end of a dusty dirt road off U.S. 1 in Key Largo. Its critical care unit operates from a hodgepodge of old trailers, shade tents and a sea pen.
While the all-volunteer organization is part of the stranding network coordinated by NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service, most of its funding comes from private donations.
Individuals and business have provided medical supplies, fish for the whales, food for the humans and tents to keep everyone cool from the blazing sun. Publix supplied a refrigerated truck to transport the surviving whales to rehabilitation.
But while there is bonding between the caretakers and the whales, the two adult and two juvenile patients are called by numbers: 300, 301, 302 and 303.
"Calling them by names gives us more of an emotional bond," volunteer veterinarian Pamela Govett said. "Then we start calling them our whales, and they are not. They are the ocean's whales."
The goal is to release three of the whales back into the deep sea. But the youngest, about 1 1/2 years old, most likely will end up in a public display facility such as SeaWorld because it probably would not survive in the wild without its mother, Mase said.
In 2003, during the last mass stranding of pilot whales in the Keys, four female adults and one male calf were rehabbed at the Marine Mammal Conservancy and released back into the wild. But the calf did not survive, believed to have been attacked by bull sharks.
Mase said the lesson learned from that experience is why the youngest female juvenile now being care for will not be released into the wild.
There are only three pilot whales in captivity in the United States. They all are at SeaWorld in San Diego.
Historically, most pilot whales don't survive a mass stranding.