INTERNATIONAL: And… a Four month-old endangered Mediterranean monk seal pup Evi has pulled through months of treatment after being orphaned on a Greek beach, and has been released back into the sea. Evi was released into a marine park on the deserted island of Gyaros, in the northern Cyclades, a NATURA 2000 region, and home to protected species of seals, fish, and birds .
Mediterranean monk seals, of the Monachus Monachus species, number only in the hundreds, with half, about 300 - 400, being in Greece. Entrapment from fishing, pollution, depletion of food resources, and climate change, are some of the factors that threaten the species.
Residents on the island of Evia found Evi alone on a beach in October, 2021 when she was seven days old, and experts have said she was probably thrown on shore due to bad weather and separated from her nursing mother. Heavy storms and winds often wash seal pups on shores, stranding them from their mothers.
"She was really dehydrated in the beginning, which is very common with pups that separate from their mothers at such an early age and the first few weeks were critical for her health because basically there is no way to replace, to replenish the mother's milk," said Dimitris Tsiakalos of the Hellenic Society for the Study and Protection of the Monk Seal , which undertook Evi's care and treatment in their care centre.
During treatment Evi had to be fed through a tube. Her diet progressed from supplements to fish porridge, then fish filet, followed by whole fish placed into the care centre's pool so that Evi could catch fish on her own.
"We are full of anxiety until their release, because something bad could always happen and an animal could be lost," said the organization's project manager Eleni Tounta.
Evi has been fitted with a transmitter to track her movements.
"Now we are hoping that she will connect with the rest of the seals because that is where she belongs. We are really sad to see her go obviously because we have been with her for four months, we fed her during the night, we had to feed her four times a day," said Tsiakalos.
Since 1990, half of some 31 rescued seals in Greece have been successfully released back into the wild, said Aristotle University Professor of Veterinary Medicine in Thessaloniki, Anastasia Komninou, in charge of the seal rehabilitation program at MOm.
"Half of them were males and half of them were females, something which is really important for the population," Professir Komninou has added.
The seals have suffered illnesses such as hypothermia, hyperglycaemia, anaemia, malnutrition, parasitises, and infectious diseases, said Komninou.
Last year the killing of a monk seal named 'Kostis' by a harpoon after it had been rescued and released back into the wild caused an uproar in Greece.
