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The entity points out that despite being listed as “Vulnerable to the Mediterranean” in the National Catalogue of Threatened Species, and having a specific action in the LIFE INTEMARES Project, the population data on pilot whales in the Gulf of Vera and the Eastern Alboran Sea have not been updated since at least 2008. the data available for Eastern Alboran being even older. The Association of Naturalists of the Southeast (ANSE) has accumulated data on sightings of this species since 2010, with more than 25,000 photos of dorsal fins that can be used to obtain survival estimates in the Gulf of Vera.

Its analysis, together with the new navigation campaigns proposed, must provide sufficient information on the state of the population considered, in addition to undertaking the specific action on pilot whale foreseen in the LIFE IP INTEMARES Project with the greatest guarantees of success, according to the entity.

The general objective of the project has been to obtain information on the population status of the pilot whale (Globicephala melas) in the Gulf of Vera and the Eastern Alboran Sea.

The specific objectives were as follows:

• To obtain estimates of the population size and other parameters of pilot whales from the Eastern Alboran Sea and the Gulf of Vera.
• To obtain estimates of survival rates for pilot whales in the Gulf of Vera for the period between 2010 and 2021.
• To promote the dissemination of the importance within the Natura 2000 Network of the protected areas and the most unique species of cetaceans, turtles and seabirds in the study area.
• Obtain sufficient information to undertake the following specific action of the LIFE INTEMARES Project with guarantees: study of the spatial-temporal distribution and use of the habitat by means of photoidentification (updating of the catalogues) and satellite tagging and identification of critical areas (feeding, reproduction) of pilot whales.

• Carrying out 4 navigation campaigns to determine the population status of the pilot whale in the Gulf of Vera and the Eastern Alboran Sea, analyzing different population parameters and population density in the study area.
• Update and analysis of the ANSE pilot whale dorsal fin photo identification catalogue for the period between 2010 and 2021, with a view to estimating survival rates for that period in the Gulf of Vera.
• Implementation of an environmental volunteering programme for the implementation of the navigation campaigns, which has had a total of 3 specific courses and 95 people trained in total (64 people in the courses and 31 participants in the navigation campaigns).
• Preparation of proposals for management measures based on the data obtained, with a view to the execution of actions of the LIFE INTEMARES project. These measures have been classified into different types: research actions, management and conservation actions, legislative actions, training, education and awareness-raising actions and monitoring actions.
• Dissemination and communication of the project with the preparation of a website, a final report, publications on social networks, etc.

Using as a starting point the more than 10 years of information and photographs of dorsal fins that ANSE has collected throughout different projects with other target species, four large navigation campaigns for pilot whales, carried out between 2020 and 2022, have been carried out to obtain new data on the current status of the species in the Gulf of Vera and the Eastern Alboran Sea.

Thus, after acting on more than 5,300 km² of surface, through the realization of 3,929 kilometers of linear transects, and after obtaining more than 14,000 new photographs for photo identification and analyzing another 25,000 accumulated, a series of population parameters have been obtained that set off alarms about the conservation status of this species in the study area considered. In this way, the maximum population range does not reach 2,000 specimens, the real number probably being closer to 1,500 specimens. That figure is far from the 2,500 individuals in previous studies. On the other hand, it has been determined that pilot whales in the Gulf of Vera would have an average annual survival rate of 0.932, which is a lower value than what a healthy population would have.

What is worrying, according to ANSE, is that the population parameters are very similar to those obtained for the population of the Strait of Gibraltar, where the species is listed as “Critically Endangered”. The entity warns that, if the trend is not reversed, the pilot whale population in the Gulf of Vera and the Alboran Sea presents a serious risk of extinction in the coming decades.