The Caribbean monk seal, west Indian seal (Monachus tropicalis), or sea wolf, as early explorers referred to it, was a species of seal native to the Caribbean and now believed to be extinct. The Caribbean monk seals' main predators were sharks and humans. Overhunting of the seals for oil, and overfishing of their food sources is the established reason for the seals extinction. The last confirmed sighting of the Caribbean Monk Seal was in 1952 at Serranilla Bank, between Jamaica and Nicaragua. In 2008 the species was officially declared extinct after an exhaustive five-year search for the seals, conducted by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and National Marine Fisheries Service. Caribbean Monk Seals were closely related to the Hawaiian monk seals, (Monachus schauinslandi) which live around the Hawaiian Islands, and are critically endangered, and Mediterranean monk seals, (Monachus monachus) which are also critically endangered, an estimated 600 Mediterranean monk seals, and 1,100 Hawaiian monk seals are alive in the wild.
A collection of Caribbean monk seal bones can be found at the Tropical Crane Point Hammock Museum in Key Vaca.
Read more about Caribbean Monk Seal: Physical Appearance, Behavior and Ecology, Reproduction and Longevity, Habitat, History, Sightings
Famous quotes containing the words caribbean, monk and/or seal:
“It is a curious thing to be a woman in the Caribbean after you have been a woman in these United States.”
—Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)
“A monk ther was, a fair for the maistrie,
An outridere, that lovede venerie,
A manly man, to been an abbot able.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)
“Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thine arm: for love is strong as death; jealousy is cruel as the grave: the coals thereof are coals of fire, which hath a most vehement flame.”
—Bible: Hebrew Song of Solomon 8:6.