MARINE MAMMAL COMMISSION — Annual Report for 1992 
when 9 of its 13 signatory nations ratify or accede to 
its provisions. The United States, one of the signato- 
ry nations, is now in the process of ratifying the 
Protocol. The Protocol calls for cooperation in 
managing and protecting regional wildlife and wildlife 
habitat of particular concern. In anticipation of the 
Protocol’s entry into force, the Regional Coordinating 
Unit of the United Nations Environment Program 
convened a meeting of the Interim Scientific and 
Technical Advisory Committee for the Protocol in 
Kingston, Jamaica, on 4-8 May 1992. 
During the meeting it was noted that the West 
Indian manatee is the most endangered marine mam- 
mal in the region. It was also noted that, pending 
development of national recovery plans, support for 
manatee recovery work, particularly preparing and 
distributing public awareness materials, was a matter 
of great urgency. 
The Parties to the Caribbean Environment Program 
met on 16-18 November 1992 in Kingston, Jamaica, 
to consider work during the 1992-1993 and the 1994- 
1995 planning cycles. No decisions on manatee work 
were reached; however, it is expected that a regional 
manatee workshop will be convened in 1993 or 1994. 
Sea Otter 
(Enhydra lutris) 
The sea otter is the only strictly marine member of 
the Family Mustelidae and the only species in the 
genus Enhydra. With the exception of the South 
American marine otter (Lutra felina), the sea otter is 
the smallest marine mammal in the world. 
Prior to commercial exploitation, sea otters were 
distributed in nearshore waters around the Pacific rim 
from Hokkaido in northernmost Japan through the 
Kuril Islands, Kamchatka Peninsula, the Commander 
Islands, the Aleutians, peninsular and south coastal 
Alaska, and southward down the west coast of North 
America to Baja California. It is estimated that in the 
mid-1700s, prior to the onset of commercial hunting, 
the worldwide population of sea otters was 150,000 to 
300,000. 
Following the discovery of Alaska in 1741, sea 
otters were the target of extensive commercial hunting 
that continued for 150 years. Hunting was unregulat- 
ed and, by the early 1900s, only 13 small and widely 
scattered remnant groups survived. Total abundance 
at that time may have been as few as 1,000 to 2,000 
animals. 
Commercial exploitation ended in 1911 when the 
North Pacific Fur Seal Convention was signed by the 
United States, Russia, Great Britain, and Japan. 
During the next 80 years, sea otters recolonized or 
were reintroduced to a substantial part of their historic 
range in the Soviet Union, the Aleutian Islands, south 
coastal Alaska, and California. 
Efforts undertaken by the Marine Mammal Com- 
mission and others to ensure protection of sea otters 
and their habitat have been discussed in previous 
annual reports. A summary of these actions and a 
discussion of efforts undertaken in 1992 follow. 
The Central California Population 
The remnant sea otter population in California 
occupied only a few miles of nearshore habitat along 
the rocky Point Sur coast and may have numbered 
fewer than 50 animals in 1911 when hunting was 
prohibited by the Fur Seal Convention. Protected by 
the Convention and later by the State of California, 
the population grew slowly until, by the mid-1970s, 
nearly 1,800 animals inhabited nearshore areas along 
approximately 160 miles of the central California 
coast. At that time, the risk of oil spills along the 
central California coast was expected to increase 
largely because of the increased tanker traffic trans- 
porting oil from the Trans-Alaska pipeline, then 
nearing completion. 
Because of its small size, its limited distribution, 
and the increasing risk of oil spills and other cata- 
strophic events, the population was designated as 
threatened under the provisions of the Endangered 
Species Act in January 1977. Recognizing that range 
expansion was the best way to minimize the risk of oil 
spills and that range expansion could impact commer- 
cial and recreational abalone and other shellfish 
fisheries that had developed in the absence of sea 
