Baja Conservation Links

There are a lot of people doing great things in Baja California. A couple of groups that could use your support are:

Eco Alianza de Loreto is a recently formed group that I look forward to working with in the future.

Propeninsula is a conservation leader in the region especially with the protection of sea turtles and is a member of the Grupo Tortuguero. Propeninsula hosts the annual sea turtle conference in Loreto. Generally in the last weekend in January, the meeting is always a good time.

Iemanya Oceanica works to protect sharks and rays in the Sea of Cortez. These species are critically important to the ecological health of the sea. Several Sea of Cortez guides who specialize in fly fishing are former commercial shark fishers and the one's that I have spoken with prefer the life of a sport fishing captain to the difficult life of commercial shark fishing. The long lines and gill nets used by shark fishers indiscriminately kill many sport fish and damage the ecosystem than sport fish depend on. Hopefully, low impact fly fishing can provide livelihoods for more of these hard working and knowledgeable tiburoneros. I urge everyone to release sharks and until populations of these long-lived and slow growing species can recover, avoid targeting them at all.

The American Fisheries Society has a Mexican Chapter. I plan on contacting them soon and seeing what I can learn about scientific research on fish populations in the Sea of Cortez.