News

Vaquita Project Supporters

Cetos and Dr. Tom Jefferson have teamed up to help the Vaquita. Support for the conservation and management efforts for this critically endangered porpoise have come in from many generous donors, grants, and funders, many of whom have made our work entirely possible through their contributions and ongoing support. Funders include SeaWorld & Busch Gardens Conservation Fund, Defenders of Wildlife Organization, the Dolphin Communication Project, the Marisla Fund, the Weyerhaeuser Foundation, World Cetacean Alliance, NozoMojo LLC, and others.

Cetos Gifts!

Cetos has cool gifts! We have Cetos athletic socks in blue or pink, and our logo in 3 sizes of stickers for your car, boat, pelican case, snowboard, etc! Let us know when you make a donation if you would like a thank you gift. Read more about it on our Support Us page.

Viva Vaquita

Cetos and Viva Vaquita continue to team with Dr. Tom Jefferson in his efforts to study this highly endangered marine mammal. See our Vaquita page to learn more or to donate directly via Paypal. Recent studies suggest there may be only 30 individuals left. This is a dire situation. Please help our conservation efforts for this critically endangered animals. In 2017, we organized International Save the Vaquita Day (ISTV Day). The venues included 11 aquaria and 10 museums.  There were experts on hand to answer questions, educational demonstrations, seminars, children’s games and events, face-painting, brochures and coloring books, etc.  The primary goal was to make as many people as possible aware of the vaquita and its plight, and spur them to act.  The events were all very peaceful, and respectful of the Mexican fishing culture.  It is estimated that over 56,000 people were directly educated about the vaquita at the various events on ISTV Day 2017, with over 100,000 more educated through social media postings. In addition we participated in a research survey to assess how many Vaquita may be left.

 

Society of Marine Mammology Presenters

Cetos researchers had their recent findings accepted for presentation at the Society of Marine Mammalogy meeting held in Halifax, Canada in October 2017. Data was presented on acoustic signals produced by tagged mothers and calves in Hawaii, including a unique sound not recorded previously either in HI or on other breeding grounds. Cetos also shared data on how to successfully approach mother calf pairs for tagging, and presented information on our new affordable GPS tag that we developed and tested.

2018 Fundraising Goals

Our fundraising efforts are geared towards our ongoing, long terms research or conservation work. All Cetos researchers are volunteers which allows all funding to go directly to research, conservation efforts (including education and working with local management personnel or organizations) and publishing our findings so that data can be disseminated quickly and efficiently. Donations currently go towards our upcoming 2018 field research project on Humpback Whale that will take place in Hawaii, our ongoing Vaquita conservation work, and a new project starting in Summer 2018 in the Gulf of Maine assessing effects of climate change on marine mammals in the Gulf.

New Affordable Tags Fundraising

Cetos wrapped up our recent crowd sourcing fundraising campaign on Experiment.com, a site for scientists to fund their projects. We met our target fundraising goal and raised $2500 towards R&D of our new affordable tag. Check out our page at Experiment.com to learn more about our project – Search for “humpback whale” and our View into Vocalizations project will pop up. Our goal is to continue our non-invasive tagging whale research in 2018.