Sea Shepherd and the Galapagos

Some 960 kilometers off the coast of Ecuador, the Galapagos Archipelago is famed throughout the world for its unique plant and animal species. In 1959, ninety-seven percent of the total land area of the islands - some 800,000 hectares - was declared a National Park by the Government of Ecuador.

Twenty years later, UNESCO declared a Natural World Heritage Site in recognition of its universal value. [UNESCO is the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization].

In 1986, the establishment of the Galapagos Marine Resources Reserve in the waters surrounding the islands brought an additional seven million hectares under official protection. With the exception of the colonized areas of San Cristobal, Santa Cruz, Isabela, and Floreana Islands, 97% of the total land area of the islands constitutes Protected Lands under Ecuador's Forestry Law for Conservation of Wildlife and Protected Areas.

Unique and fragile, the history of the Galapagos is such that it is a miracle that any of the irreplaceable wildlife of the islands still survives today.

For a hundred years, starting in the late 18th century, whalers used the islands as a base camp and hunting ground, supplementing their cetacean slaughter by helping themselves to the local fur seals for extra income and to the Galapagos tortoise population for food.

By 1900, the Galapagos fur seal was nearly extinct, and the shells of the slaughtered giant tortoises littered the beaches. The first legislation to protect Galapagos fauna was passed in 1934, but the iguanas of the island of Baltra did not survive the construction of a U.S. air base there during World War II. In the early 1970s, Japanese fishing fleets came in to help themselves to the sea turtles, with many depredations routinely committed since by driftnetters and longlingers.

The Galapagos National Park (GNP) Service, with the help and advice of the Charles Darwin Research Station, works to protect the archipelago from abuse and illegal exploitation. In 1995, we published the first Sea Shepherd field report on marine poaching in the Galapagos Islands (Sea Shepherd Log, 3rd-4th Quarter 1995), along with an offer to Ecuador to assist in patrolling the Galapagos with our fast coastal conservation patrol boat, Edward Abbey (later re-christened "Sirenian," and more recently "Yoshka").

In March 1997, Fabricio Valverde with the Technical Department of the Galapagos National Park Service contacted us to express definite interest in the possibility of joint conservation patrols.

The Park Service was patrolling the waters of the National Park and the Marine Reserve with the boats Guadalupe River and the Belle Vie, and they felt "the addition of the Edward Abbey (Sirenian) can be extremely helpful for the conservation of the Islands."

There followed years of on-again off-again negotiations, with the Ecuadorian government at one point saying a foreign vessel simply could not patrol within the Park. Time marched on and we had to press other campaigns elsewhere, but we could not give up on the Galapagos, as the island are unique in the world: A haven for species found nowhere else on earth, under increasing pressure from human encroachment and illegal fishing.

Finally, Captain Watson and the crew of the Ocean Warrior (later renamed R/V Farley Mowat) dropped in on the Galapagos in March 2000, en route from the celebration of the demise of the saltworks plan for San Ignacio Lagoon in Baja California, and just prior to crossing over to the Atlantic for the Faeroe Islands Whale Defense Campaign.

The Ocean Warrior's executive staff sat down with National Park personnel and in short order hammered out a provisional joint patrol agreement. By August, a final agreement had been worked out, and preparations to make the Edward Abbey (Sirenian) ready for her first year of Galapagos duty were under way.

Our patience and persistence was well worth it. The Sirenian went into service under a five-year agreement to help the National Park Service clamp down on illegal commercial fishing operations within 40 miles of the islands. The Sirenian became an indispensable part of the GNP, and therefore, in October of 2005, Captain Watson signed a new agreement with the director of the GNP to keep the ship patrolling in the Galapagos on a permanent basis.

The commercial fishing ban has been in effect since 1997, but is regularly violated by the huge Ecuadorian fishing fleet, foreign vessels, and independent operators.

Heavy damage is being done by longliners going after billfish and sharks. A series of coastal "no take" zones were established for the Marine Reserve and they must be enforced.

All we need now is your support, and the Sea Shepherd Galapagos Conservation Patrols will make the difference in the preservation of the world's most precious natural environment.