Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava is speaking out after a U.S. Department of Agriculture report said the diets of dolphins at Miami Seaquarium were cut by more than half.
"Like people across our community, I was deeply disturbed by the findings of the recent USDA report regarding marine life at Miami Seaquarium," said Levine Cava on Twitter.
The report revealed that the dolphins at the Miami Seaquarium were not being underfed after 60% of their food rations were cut, resulting in "very thin animals."
Levine Cava says the county has acted swiftly to address the issue, adding that Miami-Dade Parks is issuing The Dolphin Company a formal Notice of Noncompliance for failing to identify and resolve the problem.
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MIAMI SEAQUARIUM
News of the USDA report sparked protests outside the marine attraction Saturday afternoon, where demonstrators from PETA held up signs and chanted "we love dolphins" as people drove by.
"The Miami Seaquarium continues to violate federal law and animals continue to suffer miserably," one protestor said. "Dolphins were starved until their bones were visible. Emaciated animals were forced to perform more frequently and dolphins have been attacking trainers and the public out of the stress of their intense confinement."
According to the report by the USDA, the assistant director of animal training consulted with corporate trainers and the animal care specialists' manager to decrease the diets of nine of the 12 dolphins at Dolphin Harbor.
Levine Cava says the county is now in the process of hiring independent marine mammal veterinarians to perform unannounced inspections, in addition to the USDA inspections.
The effort will ensure compliance with the animal welfare provisions of the lease, which requires The Dolphin Company to comply with federal regulations, including the Marine Mammal Protection Act & Animal Welfare Act, Levine Cava said.
General Manager Patrick Pearson told NBC 6 that the new company that took over operations at the Miami Seaquarium earlier this year noticed some of the dolphins were overweight and that a miscommunication led to the staffers cutting the diet of some of the dolphins without the direct involvement of the veterinarian.
Pearson also said they slowly started feeding the dolphins more food over time and all of the dolphins are now at healthy weights. Pearson added that the Seaquarium has new protocols in place to make sure every diet decision happens on the advice of a vet.
"[The dolphins] are all completely healthy today," Pearson said. "There were some issues with communication, frankly, because we were implementing our procedures and we were still trying to find our way at this property. The veterinarians weren't consulted about those diet changes. We acknowledge that and we have fixed that problem."
According to Pearson, they have also installed new software that tracks the weights of the dolphins and alerts the staff and veterinarian to changes.
