Vancouver Aquarium Presents
in conjunction with The North Pacific Universities Marine Mammal Research Consortium

Introduction:

Over about the last thirty years, Steller sea lions have declined about eighty percent in Alaska, where most Steller sea lions are found. The population in British Columbia and southeast Alaska is still pretty healthy, but the majority of the population has simply disappeared in Alaska. And scientists have been putting in a huge effort to try to figure out exactly why they’re disappearing or why they’re dying or why they’re not being born. And the research here at the Vancouver Aquarium and with our captive sea lions is part of a huge international effort to try to figure out what might be wrong with Steller sea lion populations.

Steller Sea Lion Research Project
Hazy's Moving Day

Vance Mercer:

This is basically just a part of a larger project that’s been ongoing at the Aquarium in conjunction with the University of British Columbia and the research consortium. They’ve been studying the decline of Steller sea lions in the wild over the past 20 years. There’s been about an 80 percent decline and we’ve been studying basically sea lion energetics.

My name is Vance Mercer and I’m a Steller sea lion trainer with the Open Water Project here at Reed Point Marina.

Today is kind of a special day because we received our third animal, Hazy, and she’s joining up with Sitka and Boni who have been our veterans of the project with us now for 15 months.

She’s going to have to learn a lot of basic behaviours; she’s going to have to learn to work off boats, work in the open water in general. It’s a big world out there; it’s not like living in an aquarium. There are a lot of other stimuli that the environment provides so she’s going to have to learn how to be a more focused animal and pay more attention to the trainers to work in the open water.

And of course the most important behaviour is the dive physiology. It consists of them diving to a predetermined depth and sitting at a target for X amount of time and releasing from that light and coming to the surface in a dome. So it’s a complex 20-minute behaviour in which we’re measuring the effects of diving on sea lions.

Day to day, initially it’s going to be learn how to live comfortably with Sitka and Boni first, and then we’re going to have to teach her loading in boats so it’s going to be a progression. Right now it’s going to be more of an acclimation to the pen and surrounding areas.

Hazy's contribution to Steller sea lion research is helping scientists to better understand and protect her species.