{"id":27643,"date":"2019-06-05T09:25:10","date_gmt":"2019-06-05T13:25:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/?p=27643"},"modified":"2019-06-05T09:32:00","modified_gmt":"2019-06-05T13:32:00","slug":"marine-wildlife-return-to-marylands-waters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/2019\/06\/05\/marine-wildlife-return-to-marylands-waters\/","title":{"rendered":"Marine Wildlife Return to Maryland\u2019s Waters"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Marine Mammals and Sea Turtles Should be Reported<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"><br \/>\n<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright \" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/8310\/29771981971_5d1e067508.jpg\" alt=\"Photo of whale stranded on beach\" width=\"351\" height=\"234\" \/>Marine wildlife &#8212; dolphins, manatees, sea turtles, whales, and others &#8211;are making their seasonal return to both the Chesapeake Bay and its tidal tributaries, as well as the coastal bays. The<a href=\"http:\/\/dnr.maryland.gov\/Pages\/default.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> Maryland Department of Natural Resources<\/a> reminds anyone who has seen either a marine mammal or sea turtle in Maryland waters to report it to the state <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/dnr.maryland.gov\/fisheries\/Pages\/oxford\/stranding.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Marine Mammal and Sea Turtle Stranding program<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> at 1-800-628-9944.<\/span><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">In addition to calling the hotline, anyone who finds a stranded marine mammal, alive or dead, should follow these steps if possible:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Do not touch the animal.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Record your location using latitude\/longitude, street address, and\/or description with landmarks.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Estimate and record the length, size, color, noticeable body parts, and movements (if alive).<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Take photos of the animal.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Stand by the animal at a safe distance until stranding staff are able to reach you. <\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">While the most common visitors are the bottlenose dolphin and loggerhead sea turtles, more than 25 other marine mammals and four species of sea turtles have been recorded in Maryland waters.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The department\u2019s Marine Mammal and Sea Turtle Stranding program works in conjunction with the National Aquarium in responding to reports of marine animals throughout Maryland\u2019s waters and coastlines.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Marine mammals are specifically protected by federal law, the Marine Mammal Protection Act. In addition, sea turtles and whales are both protected under the 1973 Endangered Species Act. It is illegal to harass, capture, or collect these marine species, alive or dead, including their bones or any body parts. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Marine Mammals and Sea Turtles Should be Reported Marine wildlife &#8212; dolphins, manatees, sea turtles, whales, and others &#8211;are making their seasonal return to both the Chesapeake Bay and its tidal tributaries, as well as the coastal bays. The Maryland Department of Natural Resources reminds anyone who has seen either a marine mammal or sea<a href=\"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/2019\/06\/05\/marine-wildlife-return-to-marylands-waters\/\">&nbsp;&nbsp;Read the Rest&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3171,11,33,13],"tags":[2982,3703,3344,3335,3345,3337,4980],"class_list":["post-27643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-boating","category-fisheries","category-the-bay","category-wildlife","tag-chesapeake-bay","tag-dolphin","tag-endangered-species-act","tag-marine-mammal-and-sea-turtle-stranding-program","tag-marine-mammal-protection-act","tag-national-aquarium","tag-sea-turtle"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27643"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27674,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27643\/revisions\/27674"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}