Famine . . . and Feast : More Sea Lions Are Being Rescued, Nourished by Volunteers in Laguna

Ribs protruding, the dusky brown sea lion sprawled on the steel platform of an offshore oil rig. It barked plaintively but offered no resistance astwo young women from Orange County approached and gently pushed it into a plastic cage.

The volunteers for the Marine Mammal Center in Laguna Beach have been finding an increasing number of starving sea lions and seals along the Southern California shoreline this year, victims of overpopulation and dwindling food supplies.

In Orange County alone, 63 animals have been rescued--double the rate for the first three months of 1992--and brought to the center to be nursed back to health.

“The increase has really surprised us,” said Judi Jones, the center’s operations director. The center has handled nine animals over the past six days, and Jones said the center could break last year’s record of 190 animals.

The problem for California’s sea mammals started early last year, when El Nino weather conditions warmed the ocean and drove away the supply of fish for the sea lions and seals.

Don Zumwalt, the director of the San Pedro-based Marine Mammal Care Center at Fort MacArthur, said his center has taken in 64 animals so far this year. Although that’s 18 fewer than during the first quarter of last year, the number is still higher than it used to be.

“For the past three years, the number of animals we have been seeing has picked up. We hope there won’t be a larger number of animals this year, but we’re prepared for it,” Zumwalt said.

More of the animals are becoming malnourished because their populations are increasing while their food supply has been dwindling, said Dr. Robert DeLong, a scientist with the National Marine Mammal Laboratory in Seattle who has studied seals in the Channel Islands for more than 20 years.

DeLong said El Nino weather conditions last year caused the water off the coast to warm, forcing the temperature-sensitive fish that the mammals eat to flee the area in search of more hospitable conditions.

The shortage of food has meant that many sea lion mothers have been unable to supply this year’s pups with sufficient nutrition. As a result, when the pups are weaned in March and April, they are often not strong enough to fend for themselves and end up coming ashore, DeLong said.

But Jones believes that problems are also indirectly related to human activity.

Sewage leaks and other pollution that spilled into the ocean during recent storms have contaminated the animals’ food supply and made them more susceptible to infection, Jones said.

“Look at all the swimmers who get sick from swimming in polluted water,” Jones said. “Seals are very similar to people, and they get sick as well. The pollution has gotten so bad that they can’t even eat the fish anymore.”

The red and white barn on Laguna Canyon Road that houses the Orange County center is the temporary home for more than 30 sea lions and seals that stay an average of two months before release back into the wild.

Many of the animals, especially the sea lions, have not yet learned to eat solid food when they come ashore, so volunteers often must tube-feed them a milkshake-like combination of vitamins, fish and medicine.

Feeding the animals can be a challenging experience, especially if it’s a 200-pound baby elephant seal.

For “Fred,” a year-old elephant seal brought in last week, five people are needed for feeding: one to restrain the tail, another to hold the animal’s neck, two more to insert a feeding tube and pump the food into Fred’s stomach, and one to prevent other seals from approaching the feeding team.

The animals often require two or three such feedings a day.

Across the compound from Fred’s pen, the young sea lion rescued from the oil rig off Long Beach was quickly adapting to life at the center.

After a quick nose-to-nose meeting with the other sea lions in its pen, the new arrival--named Davey after the oil rig worker who befriended it--had its first meal of a Gatorade-like mix of sugar water, electrolytes and vitamins.

Then, stretching out comfortably on the sun-warmed floor of the pen, Davey fell asleep.

For those interested in a closer look at Davey and the other rescued animals, the center, at 20612 Laguna Canyon Road, is open to the public daily from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is free, but donations are accepted. For more information, call (714) 494-3050.