The US President’s budget released on May 23, 2017 zeros out funding for the Marine Mammal Commission. The Commission’s annual budget ($3.43 M) represents one cent per person per year.

The MMC has a long history of sponsoring and facilitating international marine mammal science and conservation. The elimination of the MMC will limit the US government’s expertise in this field and their ability to oversee the management of marine mammal resources.

The Full announcement and information on this proposal in a statement by the MMC can be found here.

On Earth Day, April 22, 2017 the Society for Marine Mammalogy reaffirms our mission and joins scientists and citizens from around the globe in their efforts to promote science that serves the common good, is inclusive, and advances evidence-based solutions to challenges facing our globe. We encourage all of our membership to attend local March for Science events this Saturday.

Our Mission

The mission of the international Society for Marine Mammalogy  (SMM) is to promote the global advancement of marine mammal science and contribute to its relevance and impact in education, conservation and management.

Our Objectives

• Evaluate and promote the educational, scientific and managerial advancement of marine mammal science.
• Gather and disseminate to members of the Society, the public and public and private institutions, scientific, technical and management information through publications and meetings.
• Provide scientific information, as required, on matters related to the conservation and management of marine mammal resources.

Most people publishing in scientific journals are aware of what plagiarism is, but fewer think about the concept of self-plagiarism, except for maybe the idea of duplicate publishing of the same study. However, less clear, but nonetheless of concern, is the reuse of text repeated verbatim or nearly verbatim from one paper to another without acknowledging that the ideas/text in the new paper were presented in a prior publication[1]. While there is an ongoing debate about how much redundancy without attribution from one paper to another by the same author is acceptable, it is best to avoid cutting and pasting language from one paper to another, or to make only a word or two change to avoid it being identical. Many journals have no explicit policy on this matter, and until recently this has been the case for Marine Mammal Science. However, the occurrence of several cases of self-plagiarism raised by reviewers of papers or Associate Editors over the past year has brought this issue to a point where it has become important to make potential authors of papers submitted to Marine Mammal Science aware of the issue and the policy of this journal.

Marine Mammal Science believes that repeating text (full sentences or paragraphs) verbatim or nearly verbatim from previously published papers without giving proper attribution is not acceptable, whether the paper from which the text has been taken was by another author (plagiarism) or the same author (self-plagiarism). When the issue of plagiarism is raised by a reviewer or Editor, the paper will likely be rejected without the ability for resubmission, although cases deemed minor may be given the opportunity to be remedied. Major cases may also be brought to the attention of the author’s institution. When the issue is self-plagiarism, the nature and extent of the overlap in text will be examined through software that cross references published material, and a determination of the course of action that should be taken will be made by the Editor in consultation with Wiley publication ethics advisors. It is recognized that methodology often follows previously developed methods, and thus descriptions may be the same or similar. This is fine but authors must be sure to acknowledge the source of previously published methodology. If it is large amounts of text verbatim, use quotation marks along with the source, but if it is paraphrased, providing the source is sufficient. Consideration of a first case of self-plagiarism for an individual author will likely not result in a rejection or retraction, but the author will be notified in writing and be required to revise the paper appropriately. The author will be cautioned that a second offense would likely result in rejection/retraction of the paper and future submissions by the author would be checked by the cross-referencing software before being considered.

Please see the following for discussions of self-plagiarism:
http://www.ithenticate.com/plagiarism-detection-blog/bid/65061/What-Is-Self-Plagiarism-and-How-to-Avoid-It#.WL1TsoWcGwc
https://ori.hhs.gov/avoiding-plagiarism-self-plagiarism-and-other-questionable-writing-practices-guide-ethical-writing

[1] Interim reports, manuscripts and many government documents are not considered published material even if they might be available through the internet or other means. What is key to making something published is the transfer of ownership and distributing the material for redistribution (from U.S Copyright Law of 1976). One could thus use language from such a non-published source they wrote without citing the source and not commit self-plagiarism. If uncertain, it is always best to cite a source.

Despite serious efforts by the government of Mexico that warranted the Society’s first Conservation Merit Prize, vaquitas have continued to decline at a high rate. Papers describing the decline from 2011-2015 and the 2015 abundance estimate are now published and available by OpenAccess. The recovery team (CIRVA—Comité Internacional para la Recuperación de la Vaquita) reiterated the need for gillnets to be permanently banned (including all gillnets within the range of vaquitas including the fishery for totoaba’s smaller cousin the corvina).

After reviewing both the acoustic monitoring results that estimate numbers declined from 60 in 2015 to 30 in 2016 and the finding of many nets in the derelict gear removal program (details in the full report here) the team recommended accelerating attempts to place some vaquitas into a temporary sanctuary.  The team noted that the capture of all remaining vaquitas is not a viable conservation strategy for vaquitas, which must, first and foremost, be protected in their wild habitat.  They noted that activities to remove some vaquitas should not divert effort and resources away from extension and enforcement of the gillnet ban, which remains the highest-priority conservations actions for the species.

A coalition was formed called VaquitaCPR (details here) and despite not yet having sufficient funds they are targeting October as the month to attempt capture.  The continued campaign by Sea Shepherd’s Operation Milagro (here) is reporting high levels of illegal activities.  These activities peaked last year during the corvina season, which was recently suspended by SEMARNAT because of lacking approved Environmental Impact Statements.  No announcements have been made about continuing the 2-year gillnet ban that is set to expire this April.  Very recently the Mexican Congress, in agreement with CIRVA recommendations, reformed the Federal Penal Code and the Federal Law Against Organized Crime, to sanction with imprisonment and economic fines the illegal capture of several aquatic species, including the totoaba, considered more valuable than cocaine.  The document imposes sentences of two to 18 years in prison and criminally penalizes anyone who catches, alters, collects, transports or damages totoabas.