Text: Pia Ackermann and Katharina Heyer
Photos: firmm

Even though the financial crisis has affected economic activities worldwide, the future looks promising for the firmm team. It even seems that we could be benefiting from the side effects of the recession. The tourism industry anticipates an increased popularity of holiday destinations in Europe. It is expected that the trade and therefore the freight traffic in the Strait of Gibraltar will continue to decrease which will have a positive impact on “our” dolphins and whales. With the larger and stronger boat “firmm Spirit”, more visitors are able to enjoy the animals in their natural environment at the same time. So we are best prepared for season 2009.

On April 1st we re-opened our office in Tarifa. Annual activities like dusting, airing-out and dehumidifying the office as well as preparing all the materials took up most of the time during the first days. On a mild and sunny 3rd of April our boot started out for the first tour of the season. Would we meet “our” friends again?

Yes, here they were: just right on the first trip Curro, the pilot whale who had a deep injury in his back, and Zackzack, showed-up. Curro’s injury seems to have healed well.

Zackzack with Baby

While enjoying the reunion with our good old friends, Lolly, a massive Bottlenose Dolphin, appeared with her baby near the boot. She was full of beans and amused the passengers with a little show. Fortunately the fungus on her dorsal fin did not spread to other parts of her body.

Lolly

And it was getting better and better: On the morning trip on the 8th of April we met a Sperm whale.

On the second trip of the day we sighted two Fin whales which were on their way back to the Atlantic Ocean! We could hardly believe our eyes. Our captain Diego calculated where they were heading. Fin whales are fast swimmers. It is not easy to keep up with them at an adequate distance. But Diego managed to keep up and therefore presented the passengers and crew unforgettable impressions by showing them the massive but also very elegant animals. In addition to this already unbelievable experience, a group of Bottlenose Dolphins put on an amusing show on the way back to the harbour: spy-hopping, splashing, rolling - a complete program. Pure inspiring joy of life. The guests were enthusiastic. This was not only a successful prelude to the Semana Santa, but also to a promising 12th firmm-year.

Text / photos: Yvonne Zollinger, Journalist

Review: A season with difficulties in the beginning

The 11th meeting of firmm took place January 24th in Aarau (Switzerland). The familiar circle of friends around Katharina Heyer and her project has been growing and the annual event therefore developed into a very special occasion. Around 300 visitors filled the house of culture and congress in Aarau. A lot of them were familiar with the foundation firmm for several reasons: Some because they have spent their holidays in Tarifa, others because they have worked there as volunteers or they have worked for firmm in other ways. Every year new people who are interested in the work of our foundation join the group of already familiar faces.

Katharina introduced the evening with a review of the 11th firmm-season, which was one of the most difficult seasons she has experienced in Tarifa. Until August, one problem was followed by the next: Starting with never-ending construction work right in front of the firmm-office during the peak season, followed by absurd regulations concerning the labelling of the new bar at the harbour and at last trouble with the inspection papers of the new boat.

But apart from these problems, there were also a lot of nice experiences during this season. One of these were the visits to the Spanish schools of Bolonia and Tahivilla. Here the marine biologist Jörn gave lectures on the Whales and Dolphins which live in the Straits of Gibraltar. In the previous year a Fin whale had stranded in Bolonia. The students had a lot of questions, and after the lecture they wanted to take a boat trip to visit the sea mammals.
Every week Katharina gave lectures in the Aldiana hotels.
Right before the whale-watching trips presentations for the passengers are held in which information about the foundation, the Straits of Gibraltar, Whales and Dolphins was given. In 2008 about 1500 to 1600 presentations in four different languages were given by the volunteers.

In the 11th firmm season, 580 trips were done. These were about 100 whale-watching trips more than in the year before. Unfortunately, 130 of the 580 trips had to be handed over to competitors because of the late arrival of the new boat.

Although it was only possible to go on the whale-watching trips with the small boat, there were enough sightings of animals. In comparison to the previous year the sightings of the pilot whales especially were more frequent. Besides all the disturbing factors, Katharina explained, it seems as if all marine mammals have a good life in the Straits of Gibraltar. Moreover the main reason for the successful sightings is that the foundation has sufficient knowledge about the population dynamics of the mammals. The numbers among the Bottlenose Dolphins has risen as well. However the sightings of the Striped Dolphins and Common Dolphins decreased. This is a critical development because the Common Dolphin is on the list of endangered species and its existence is threatened.

In 2008 the new harbour “Tanger-Med” was built. This harbour is the biggest in Africa. It is Katharina’s fear that the number of animals which will be affected by the increased number of ships and boats will escalate.

Luckily the new boat arrived in Tarifa on the 6th of August. After a few problems which were caused because of missing papers causing a few days delays, the boat was christened “firmm Spirit”. It had to be in the Mol to be ready for the first trip which took place on the 14th of August. From this day on everything was successful and Katharina mentioned in her review that since then the tide has turned. The firmm Spirit has a lot of advantages which are necessary for good whale-watching trips: It has space for 55 passengers, a toilet and it is possible to sit in a dry area. For the crew it is possible now to keep their eyes out for marine mammals above the passengers by standing on a lookout on top of the boat.

In the end of her review Katharina presented the team of the 11th season in Tarifa and expressed her gratitude to all members of her staff.

Presentation

Following Katharina’s presentation the biologist Prof. Patricia Holm of the University of Basel gave an accounting of contributions, which the foundation firmm spends on education. “Only what people know they will be able to love and protect”, and this motto applies to this endeavour. Regarding this aspect, the annual journey of students in Tarifa is arranged. They do not only benefit from the infrastructure, which the foundation with the lecture rooms (auditorium), the boat trips etc. offer, but also by expressing their knowledge and experiences about the marine mammals which the foundation collected during eleven years of work in Tarifa. Together with Prof. David Senn and Prof. Patricia Holm, 30 biology Students came to Tarifa in order to study the marine mammals and their surroundings in the Straits of Gibraltar.

Movie

Daniele Grieco and his film crew stayed in Tarifa for a longer period. The shooting of the documentary film about firmm and the Wales and Dolphins who live in the Strait of Gibraltar is finished. As a point of culmination the visitors of the 11th firmm meeting could see the movie in an exclusive preview. As soon as the movie released in the German cinemas in early summer we will distribute further information about the title, the contents of the film and about the filming.

The Dolphin Resort in Morocco

For a long time Katharina had been eyeing a small bay, including a hotel and a harbour of a one-time smuggler, in Morocco, to build her Dolphin Resort. Since she discovered this site she has had to wait for the contract of lease and for the public authorities. The never-ending waiting has finally come to an end because she found an American group of companies and a Canadian investor, Michael Noble. The hotel with the harbour will be remodelled into a modern Marine Centre, not only granting asylum to elderly Dolphins which lived in aquariums in Europe, but also to marine animals which suffer injuries by ships. There they will get professional medical attendance.

The plans for the Centre have progressed so that it can be expected that the construction work will start next summer. With the help of graphic drawings Katharina showed what this project should look like. This project combines practical needs with economic considerations, the help necessary for the Dolphins with the needs of the tourists. Besides the facilities available to the researchers, veterinarians and the staff of the Marine Centre, big areas for the visitors will be available. The aim is also for the visitors to get the chance to observe the Dolphins without disturbing them.

With the harbour and canal system located in the bay, the Dolphins will have a living area of 5150 square meters.

Among a restaurant, several show rooms and an underwater observatory, there will be a family-friendly holiday resort and a hotel for the tourists.

Two people will be taking care of the Dolphins:

Dr. Christina Schnug, German veterinarian and whale researcher and

Vladas Martirosa , physicist and researcher from Lithuania. Both support the long-term protection of the marine mammals.

Samuel Notz, the youngest member of the firmm foundation council, translated the video message of Vladas Martirosa, who could not be present at the meeting because of a foot injury.

As the evening drew to a close, Katharina expressed her gratitude to all volunteers for their dedicated support of the foundation, making it possible for firmm to accomplish the necessary work. Beginning with thanking all those who were more-or-less in the “back seat” , for example those responsible for the flyers, internet presence, the newsletter or promotion material, then on to various donors and foundation sponsors up to the hardworking helpers at the 11th firmm-meeting.

Text: Katharina Heyer
Photos: firmm

We say goodbye:

to our beloved Pilot whales: Franzfin, Zack-Zack, Puzzle and Curro :

Franzfin

Zackzack

Puzzle

Curro

and to all other Pilot whale families . After 5 months the little ones will be a lot bigger.

We say farewell to the large schools of striped dolphin

and the small groups of common dolphin….

We ask ourselves whether or not the high-spirited bottle-nosed dolphin teenagers will still be as playful? They managed to increase their artful antics this year, and all this in front of our new ” firmm spirit” boat.

Will the three sperm whales which we observed the whole summer still be in the Strait of Gibraltar when we return?

.

We already miss the exciting trips to the Orcas which now and then passed so closely to our boat.

We like to think back on the many finnwhales we were priviledged to observe, the unforgettable images in light and sunshine we were able to capture, causing even our Marineo Diego to get out his camera.

photo: Diego Díaz Piñero

photo: Diego Díaz Piñero

The time has come to bring our boats to safety. They will spend the winter on land in Barbate and go through thorough inspection. The autumn storms have begun and the outings must often be cancelled.

During one recent storm the ferry to Tanger didn´t even set sail! Two small boats sank in Tarifa´s harbor.

and a large tanker capsized near Gibraltar at Punto Europa. Even”firmm spirit” showed damage. The rear anchorage was bent like a straw by the storm, leaving it unusuable.

photo: Diego Díaz Piñero

We´ll miss the breathlessly beautiful sunsets which we experienced during our evening trips.

Miscelleneous items :

A review of the Orcas season by our biologist Jörg Selling you can read in the coming Newsletter 10 which will be sent out in November or will appear in www.firmm.org to download.

We invite everyone to our 11th firmm meeting on the 24th of January 2009 in Aarau/Switzerland. The invitation can be downloaded from our homepage. Homepage herunterladen.

You will find us represented in the following vacation fairs in Switzerland:
Bern : 15.01 - 18.01. 2009
Zürich FESPO: 29.01. - 01.02. 2009
St. Gallen : 06.02. - 08.02. 2009
Basel: 13.02. - 15.02. 2009

We wish you all the best in the New Year and look forward to having many volunteers in 2009!

The firmm ® Team from Tarifa

Text: Sabine Blaser, Evelyne Rufer, Elvira Gómez (Volunteers with firmm)
Fotos: firmm

Nina tells us to hurry up as the office is full of people who cant wait to hear the Charlas to be presented in front of the office. We, Elvira, Sabine and Evelyne quickly grab our folders and carry a few chairs and benches outside. Sabine speaks in English, Evelyne in German and Elvira in Spanish. As soon as the people are separated into groups the introduction in the various languages can begin.

Today Elvira has an especially lively group of many handicapped children from a special school in closeby La Linea.

At the end of the introductions, questions abound from the listeners, but unfortunately there is too little time and the questions must wait until we are underway. We gather all the tourists quickly and together make our way to the boat. We control each passenger’s ticket at boarding

The passengers are greeted joyfully by our Marinero Eduardo who also helps them to climb aboard, and always has a charming smile ready. Evelyne is the guide today and helps to cast off.

It doesn´t take long before we spot the first animals. Everywhere “ooooh” and “aaaaah” can be heard. Bottlenose dolphins cavort in the bow´s wave and it doesn´t take long before they begin swimming next to our boat and performing jumps and turns which would make any trained dolphin show envious.
Even spermwhales make their debut. Immediately new questions crop up. “How many whales are there out there? Is that already Morocco? What is that freighter carrying? How fast are we travelling?” With much patience we try to answer what we can, attempting at the same time to care for those who are beginning to feel sick to their stomachs and keeping an eye out for animals.

Two hours later the boat returns and Sabine runs direction dock in order to help with the docking proceedure. She and Eduardo help each passenger as they debark. Some can hardly wait to tell of their experiences while Evelyne and Nina prepare for the wave of enchanted whale watchers. Upon arriving in the office the visitors check out items they can purchase as souvenirs to remind them of the eventful excursion. Many purchase far more than just one item, knowing that each purchase includes a donation for the good of the dolphin.

Text: Elisabeth Kubin, volunteer at firmm

The storm which came over Tarifa in April brought heavy rainfall, making our boat trips impossible and leaving an interesting, and at the same time alarming, “ocean” of animals, plants and other things washed ashore.

Besides two small stranded rays which were already dead, lots of sea cucumbers, sea urchins, starfish, huge seaweed and different kinds of jelly fish, a huge “ocean” of plastics, partly disintegrated into small units, had been washed ashore, mixed with the stranded animals and plants.

It was as if the plastics already belonged to the natural components of the ocean.

Photo: Plastics: This piece of plastic looks remarkably like a marine creature. Photo taken by Manuela and myself.

Plastic is a synthetically or semi-synthetically produced polymer (= chains composed of repeating structural units, so called monomers). We mean with synthesis a process in which more complexly compound materials are created from simple compound materials.
Most plastics are polymers where the carbon is responsible for the binding of the chain.

The polymeric units of plastics are not water soluble and are not able to pass the cell membranes of micro-organisms. That means that there is no interaction with living organisms. Micro-organisms can only process plastics with extra-cellular enzymes which divide the materials into smaller units which can then be absorbed by the cell. However, this process only occurs as surface erosion.
Therefore, the danger for the environment doesn’t come from the polymers themselves because they don’t interact so easily with living cells, but it comes from the additive materials added to the plastics, such as diluting agents, stabilisers, colorants or filler materials. Some of these additives may also diffuse through the package to foods and thus be dangerous for people as well.

New polymers that can be decomposed by microorganisms are called biodegradable plastics or biopolymers.
These bioplastics are decomposed by moisture, warmth and soil organisms. Their disadvantage is that they may also be dissolved by the rain.
Bioplastics are not made from crude oil but from corn, sugar beets, cereals, lactic acid or cellulose (wood), which are renewable resources. However, this is a similarly big problem, because we have to consider the real environmental burden of the packaging from its production to its disposal. In order to get biodegradable plastics, large areas of land would have to be cultivated, and fertilization would pollute water and land. In order to get the large cultivation areas, large areas of forests would have to be destroyed (including many rainforests), which again would contribute to the CO2 problem, and above all, biodiversity would be affected, too. In addition, biodegradable doesn’t mean that it is suitable for compost. Composting businesses refuse bioplastics because they take much longer to decay than materials suitable for the compost. Therefore, bioplastics bring many problems with them, too.

If we consider things more precisely, the main problem is that certain plastic parts are only used once and for a short time.

According to our fast lifestyles, more and more throw-away products are manufactured, which leads to huge litter problems.

In addition, we have to consider that plastics account for 5% of the worldwide crude oil’s needs. They are made from refined crude oils.
Crude oils take millions of years to develop; a plastic bag is often used for only a few minutes, hours or days, and then it takes 1000 years to dissolve again. During all these years, the plastic bag can be very harmful for the environment, and above all for the fauna.
Plastics can also accumulate high concentrations of toxic substances, such as DDT (Dichloro-Diphenyl-Trichloroethane) or PCB (Polychlorinated biphenyl).

Every year about one million seabirds and 100000 marine mammals die from floating plastic waste. 80% of the plastics which drift in the ocean have been thrown away on shore or blown over.
Plastics don’t only release additives which are sometimes toxic but they also get into the food chain of the animals, because the plastics are often confused with food by the animals . The following photograph shows the stomach content of a minke whale found dead near England.

Photo: Stomach content of a dead minke whale that couldn’t eat anymore because its stomach was filled with indigestible plastics.
[Source: http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2008/02_04/006plasticbagDM_468×287.jpg ]

Seabirds often confuse floating plastics with fish or squid. A Dutch study realized between 2002 and 2004 examining 819 fulmars showed that 93% of the birds had plastics in their stomachs.

Turtles suffer very much from the plastics, too; they cannot distinguish between floating plastic bags and jellyfish. Here in the Strait of Gibraltar I have myself seen a turtle (Caretta Caretta) that couldn’t dive down anymore because it had swallowed a plastic bag which might have contained an air bubble.

Even the large baleen whales, such as blue and fin whales, filtering their food through baleen, also filter many little plastic parts because in the sunlight, such little plastic pieces don’t look very different from zooplankton, like fish larvae for example.

And little plastic pieces are even filtered from the water by zooplankton, such as little crabs.

Photo: Krill filtering Diatoms. Unfortunately, it isn’t always only Diatoms that are filtered but also little plastic pieces, which can accumulate toxic substances like DDT or PBC.
[Source: http://www.saturdaze.net/prv/img/krillfilter01.jpg ]

Not only plastics floating at the surface of the oceans are causing problems but also, and above all, plastics which drop and cover the floors of the deep seas, as well as lakes and rivers. About 70 % of the plastics drop to the floors of the oceans, where they cover and suffocate marine life completely. Dutch scientists have found 600000 tons of plastics at the bottom of the North Sea.

In the North Pacific there is already a giant “carpet” of floating plastics and litter (2 times the size of Texas). It is kept at the same place because of the predominant currents and winds, increasing in size and accumulating more and more litter. This indigestible swirl is fatal for life in the ocean and for the birds.

Photo: North Pacific swirl, where all the floating (plastic) litter accumulates.
[Source: http://pruned.blogspot.com/2007/10/vortex-of-80000-nikes.html]

In many countries there are already efforts to dam up the plastic flood. Since 2002, when plastic bags were charged in Ireland, consumption has dropped from 238 plastic bags per person and year to 21 bags per person and year. Also in most of the Central European and Northern European countries, no plastic bags are given out for free in the shops anymore, and shopping bags or cardboard boxes available at the exit of shops are used instead.
In China, it will be forbidden to give out plastic bags for free as from the first of June, and in South Africa, people violating these new “plastic laws” will even be fined or jailed.
France is planning to remove any plastic bags from the shopping centers by 2010.

Unfortunately, there is a very high consumption of plastics in Spain: 238 plastic bags are consumed per person every year, and 1 trillion plastic bags is produced in Spain every year. In the shopping centers, they are wastefully offered and given out in huge amounts, just to be blown into the ocean by the wind on the following day. The above mentioned numbers could be considerably diminished by implementing a 30-cent charge per plastic bag.

There are still many things to be done but every person can contribute to an improvement by taking home his or her own litter and disposing of it properly, and maybe also by picking up a plastic bag found in the middle of untouched nature and by using a reusable (cloth) bag for shopping.
To reuse things is more important than to waste lots of energy to produce non-returnable products, even if they are biodegradable.

During my grandmother’s time, linen bags were used for everything; large amounts of groceries, such as flour and potatoes, were offered on the markets and people took the amounts they needed into their linen bags, which were then weighed and paid…

We praise ourselves for new, complicated and large achievements but it seems that the simple things don’t work anymore…

Why…?

Perhaps the answer to this question is simply to be happy with fewer things.

If you want to be happy, travel with little baggage. This refers also to the journey of your life.

[Antoine de Saint-Exupéry]