In glorious sunshine, the 1st of the IWDG Cape Clear weekend courses produced some really lovely encounters for the 17 participants of harbour porpoises and minke whales.

Member governments must hit fishing vessels that persistently break European Union rules with much higher fines if financial penalties are to be any deterrent, the European Commission said on Friday.

The IWDG have just published a new book entitled “A Guide to the Identification of the Whales and Dolphin of Ireland”. The guide was officially launched by Dr Ciaran O’Keeffe, Director of the National Parks and Wildlife Service.

Illegal fishing has devastated Europe’s stocks of the highly prized bluefin tuna and threatens the species’ survival in the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean, environmental campaign group WWF said on Wednesday.

Europe plans to change tack in the way it tries to curb overfishing and boost numbers of species such as cod, depleted after years of quota-busting by EU fleets, the European Commission said on Wednesday.

Anchovy fishing will be banned in the Bay of Biscay until the end of the year to preserve stocks, the European Commission said on Monday. Planet Ark

The Norwegian and Icelandic prime ministers welcomed on Monday a recommendation by the International Whaling Commission (IWC) to relax a ban on commercial whaling.

The Pentagon on Friday exempted the Navy for six months from a law protecting whales and other marine mammals, a move that may allow planned naval exercises using military sonar to proceed despite a lawsuit.

The IWDG launched their new policy document – addressing commercial fishing – this week at Fish Ireland 2006 in Killybegs, Co Donegal. Commercial fishing is the human activity, which has one of the largest impacts on the marine environment and on those creatures that live therein. The Irish Whale and Dolphin Group (IWDG), with our

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Zoologists have developed a plan to save the Yangtze River dolphin, probably the world’s most endangered mammal, from extinction. BBC