The U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service has proposed to designate the Sakhalin Bay-Nikolaya Bay-Amur River Stock of beluga whales (Delphinapterus leucas) as a depleted stock of marine mammals pursuant to the Marine Mammal Protection Act.
This action is being taken as a result of a status review conducted by NMFS in response to a petition to designate a group of beluga whales in the western Sea of Okhotsk as depleted.
NMFS believes that the biological evidence indicates that the group is a population stock as defined by the MMPA, and that the stock is depleted as defined by the MMPA.
Any comments on this proposed action must be received by June 6, 2016.
Click here to read NMFS’ Federal Register notice of this proposed action.