Laguna Beach : Vote Urges End to Giving Sea Lions Spiked Fish

The City Council this week voiced opposition to a state Department of Fish and Game plan to allow commercial and sport fishermen to keep sea lions from stealing their catch by feeding them poisoned bait fish.

The council on Tuesday voted to ask Fish and Game to stop a three-year test program in which fish spiked with lithium chloride are tossed from boats to hungry sea lions. The nausea-inducing chemical causes sea lions to regurgitate within 30 minutes, and state biologists say that the intelligent sea mammals will quickly learn to stay away from the boats.

The plan to test the “aversive techniques” was approved this year in waters off Orange County, San Diego and San Pedro in response to complaints of fishermen about the burgeoning sea lion population.

“I’m just appalled by the idea,” Councilman Robert Gentry, who sought council action, said before the meeting. Gentry said Friends of the Sea Lion, a Laguna Beach facility that cares for stricken and injured marine mammals, “picks up sick sea lions from all over the county’s coast, and it can’t handle a major illness among sea lions.”

He said sea lions might associate the chemical-caused illness with all fish and develop an aversion to their only food supply, leaving them malnourished and vulnerable to disease and predators.

The council’s resolution will be sent to Orange County cities that formed a coalition to fight another coastal battle--offshore oil drilling, Gentry said. The cities include Newport Beach, San Clemente and Huntington Beach.

“I’m asking them to bring this item to their councils for similar action,” Gentry said. The resolution would also be forwarded to federal officials, he said.