Gulf of California History

Wednesday May 15, 2019 we had a very informative day of lectures. Two from Dr. C, and one from Paloma who coordinates things here at CEDO. Paloma went over a lot of history, and marine life here in Mexico and in the Sea of Cortez. I learned that the Sea of Cortez has multiple names which include; The gulf of California, Vermillion Sea, and the aquarium of the world. She also talked about the differences between the animals and how the teeth were a good way to classify them. We briefly went over the Vaquita which is in the porpoise family. Vaquita in Spanish means “little cow”, and this species in particular is extremely endangered. They originally became endangered from fishermen’s nets, they were trying to get Totoaba fish but caught Vaquita’s. This was not good because the Vaquitas could not escape the net and they would die. With new regulations today fishers are better educated and told where they can and can not fish.