participated. Among other things, participants reviewed matters 

 concerning: program funding; the Kure Atoll Head Start Project 

 to help rebuild the atoll's seal population; the designation of 

 critical habitat for monk seals; consultation with the Coast 

 Guard on ways to reduce disturbance of seals on Kure Atoll; 

 ongoing and planned research; maintenance of the Fish and 

 Wildlife Service's field station on Tern Island at French Frigate 

 Shoals; and the removal and rehabilitation of emaciated pups from 

 French Frigate Shoals to enhance their survival. 



During the meeting, the Commission again raised the need for 

 improving program oversight and direction by convening the 

 Recovery Team to update the Recovery Plan. In 1988, however, the 

 Service again provided no funds for meetings of the Recovery Team 

 and there was no progress on updating the Recovery Plan. A 

 discussion of developments and Commission activities in 1989 

 follows. 



Kure Atoll Head Start Project 



Kure Atoll, 1,150 miles northwest of Honolulu, is the 

 westernmost island in the Hawaiian Islands chain. The number of 

 seals at this atoll has decreased steadily since the 1960s 

 apparently due to human disturbance and low survival rates of 

 pups during the first year of life. High pup mortality was 

 believed to have been caused by shark predation and attacks by 

 adult male seals. As recruitment of young animals into the Kure 

 Atoll population declined, the number of breeding females and the 

 number of young seals gradually decreased. 



To address the problem, the Service initiated a pup capture 

 and release program known as the Head Start Project at Kure Atoll 

 in 1981. The program has been one of the most successful 

 elements of the monk seal recovery program. It involves removing 

 newly weaned pups from the beaches of Kure, placing them in an 

 enclosed pen on the atoll's shoreline for protection, raising 

 them through their first summer of life in the protective 

 enclosure, and then releasing them back into the wild at Kure. 



From 1981 to 1988, 40 seals were "headstarted, " and 85 

 percent of the pups survived through the first year. Nine seals 

 were taken under the Project in 1989. To further supplement the 

 female component of the seal population at Kure, emaciated and 

 prematurely weaned pups also were taken from French Frigate 

 Shoals. These pups, which were unlikely to survive on their own 

 in the wild, were rehabilitated at facilities in Honolulu and 

 then released at Kure. 



The number of pups born on Kure Atoll reached an all-time 

 low of one pup in 1986. Since then, pup production has begun to 

 increase as females released through the Head Start Project have 

 begun to give birth. The first such births began in 1987. As of 



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