MOSCOW, July 31 Scientists have counted 530 sea otters in the area of Urup Island in the Pacific Ocean and have come to the conclusion that it is necessary to protect the habitat of these mammals on the Kuril Islands, the press service of the Nature and People Foundation reported.
The Foundation reported the completion of an expedition in the Kuril Islands, the participants of which studied the habitat of sea otters (sea otters) in the waters of Urup Island. According to the organization, scientists walked 175 kilometers along the island's coastline and recorded more than 530 sea otters.
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"Despite the vagaries of the weather, we were able to estimate the density of the sea otter distribution. And the figures practically coincide with the results of last year — a little more than three individuals per square kilometer. This indicates that the local group here is stable and the animals feel good in this territory. «Thus, we understand that this area needs to be protected and shielded from anthropogenic impact,» the press service quotes Svetlana Artemyeva, a research fellow at the A. N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences, as saying.
According to her, additional measures to protect sea otters in the Urup Island area are extremely necessary, since the number of animals has been falling «catastrophically» in recent years on the Northern Kuril Islands, the coast of Kamchatka and the Commander Islands.