For years, the Mexican government has banned gillnets in a vast area of the upper Gulf of California to protect the vaquita porpoise, the world’s smallest and most endangered living cetacean. Gillnets, which are set for fish but can indiscriminately snare other marine animals including turtles, sea lions and vaquita, have devastated the vaquita (Phocoena sinus), whose population has dwindled to around 10. Mexico’s restrictions have had limited impact: Patrols have mostly kept fishers and their nets out of a 225-square-kilometer (87-square-mile) Zero Tolerance Area (ZTA), where vaquita have most often been detected in recent years. But conservationists and scientists say enforcement has been weak in a larger zone in which gillnets are prohibited—some 11,000 square kilometers (4,250 square miles) that abut the western coast of the upper Gulf. Now, Mexico plans to lift the gillnet ban in much of the Gulf and maintain restrictions... [Log in to read more]