Sea Lions Hit by High Levels of Acid Poison in California

By REGAN MORRIS

LOS ANGELES, June 5 — A distressed, possibly pregnant sea lion was wheeled recently into the Marine Mammal Care Center here, just as two other lions were herded into cages in preparation for their return to the ocean.

“That’s just the way it is,” said Lauren Palmer, the chief veterinarian at the center. “Two go out and more come in.”

Peter Wallerstein of the Whale Rescue Team, a private group authorized by Los Angeles to rescue whales and other marine mammals, said he had found the sea lion on the sand in nearby Manhattan Beach. Mr. Wallerstein said he feared she could have been poisoned by domoic acid, a toxin released by large blooms of algae that causes seizures in sea lions.

Southern California marine mammal hospitals have been overwhelmed by sea lions sick from the acid, which appeared in record levels off the coast of Los Angeles in April. Domoic acid poisoning has killed hundreds of the animals across Southern California this spring and thousands since a major outbreak in 2002, and has also afflicted animals in Monterey Bay, south of San Francisco.

“In over 22 years of marine mammal rescues, I’ve never seen such distress of marine mammals,” Mr. Wallerstein said. “The stress and the fright, it’s kind of shocking.”
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