Officials Stumped by Return of Marauding Sea Lions

First Gumby was spotted taking a nap on a platform in Puget Sound near Seattle. Then Colin and Vern showed up at a popular sea lion hangout north of the city. And this week, to the dismay of weary marine biologists, George was found in the Columbia River between Washington and Oregon.

One by one, four of six California sea lions--packed up by Washington state officials in March and sent back to their birthplace near the Channel Islands off Ventura County--have returned to feast on the northwestern state’s precious steelhead trout.

And Hondo and Sandy, the two other mammals, are expected to reappear in the Northwest soon. In fact, one of them was recently spotted on an island off the San Francisco coast, marine officials said.

“This is getting increasingly frustrating,” said Doug Zimmer, spokesman for the Washington state Department of Wildlife. “We’re at the point where our steelhead trout cannot take much more abuse, and we’re running out of options.”

Since sea lions became a protected species in 1972, their West Coast population has virtually exploded. They have been running amok from Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco to the waters of Washington state.

In Seattle, the sea lions have eaten so much steelhead trout on their way to spawn in tributaries of Lake Washington that the run at the Ballard Locks canal has shrunk from about 4,000 fish annually to only 2,000.

Two Indian tribes in Seattle, the Muckleshoot and the Suquamish, have federal treaty rights to fish for the trout and have pressured the state and federal governments to do something about the carnage.

But nothing seems to keep the animals away, said Martin Fox, a biologist hired by the Suquamish.

State and federal officials decided to detonate firecrackers underwater to scare away the sea lions, but after a couple of years, the animals became used to the sound.

At one point, biologists fired plastic arrows at them, but “they got used to being bonked on the head,” Fox said.

Officials then turned to feeding them fish laced with a non-lethal substance that makes them vomit. But the animals were able to detect the tainted fare after a while.

So, in March, Washington wildlife experts decided to capture the six sea lions and ship them back to California to see how they would react.

Within a month, Gumby, Colin, George and Vern--named by Washington wildlife officials--had returned. They could be detected because radio transmitters had been glued to their backs.

“We were surprised they came back so fast,” said Joe Scordino, a deputy chief with the National Marine Fishery Service in Seattle. “I guess they like the food up here better.”

Scordino said marine officials are now looking for other options to control the beasts, which number up to 1,000 in the Seattle area alone.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is considering asking the federal government to allow it to kill the bothersome mammals, an idea that has been sharply criticized by environmentalists.

“We’re in a bind,” Fox said. “We have our fish to protect, but we want to protect the animals too.”