エピソード4：彼らはカワウソのように愛らしい (Episode 4: They Are Otterly Adorable)

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Hey everybody, welcome back to another episode of Life Below the Surface.

ライフ・ビハインド・ザ・サーフェス』へようこそ。
The show where we talk about all things slimy, fuzzy, and all species in between.

ヌルヌルしたもの、モコモコしたもの、そしてその中間に位置するあらゆる種について語る番組。
This is Josh, your host, and today we are joined by Senior Director of Mammals and Birds, Dennis Christen, to talk more about our fuzzy friends, the Southern Sea Otter, and learn more about their unique adventure to come here to Georgia Aquarium.

ホスト役のジョシュです。今日は哺乳類・鳥類担当シニア・ディレクターのデニス・クリステンさんと一緒に、私たちのモコモコした友達、サザナミヤッコについて、そしてここジョージア水族館にやってきた彼らのユニークな冒険について詳しくお話しします。
Welcome to the podcast, Dennis.

ポッドキャストへようこそ、デニス。
Thanks, Josh.

ありがとう、ジョシュ。
Good to see you, buddy.

会えて嬉しいよ、相棒。
So, a lot of you folks out there listening might remember Dennis from our TV series, The Aquarium, where he was featured quite a bit, but Dennis, if you could, for some of the folks that might not have seen that just yet, can you just tell us a little bit about yourself and how you came to be here at Georgia Aquarium?

デニスさん、もしよろしければ、まだご覧になってない方もいらっしゃるかもしれませんが、ご自身のことを少しお聞かせいただけますか、そしてジョージア水族館にいらっしゃることになった経緯を。
Yeah, sure.

ええ、もちろんです。
Well, I am a Senior Director in our Zoological Operations Department, and with a focus on our mammal and bird teams, so I look after a lot of the different animals here that fall under that category, and of course, work with an amazing department, a team of animal care professionals that are specialized with the care of everything from our puffins to our penguins, beluga whales, harbor seals, Asian small-clawed otters, and sea otters.

もちろん、パフィンからペンギン、シロイルカ、ゼニガタアザラシ、アジアコツメカワウソ、ラッコに至るまで、あらゆる動物の世話を専門とする動物ケアの専門家チームである素晴らしい部署と一緒に働いています。
So basically, every single adorable species in the aquarium your department is responsible for.

つまり、基本的には、あなたの部署が担当する水族館にいるすべての愛らしい種が対象となる。
Yeah, we have a good role here, for sure.

ああ、確かにここではいい役割を担っている。
And how I came to the aquarium, I've been here almost 17 years, so I've been here almost since the beginning of Georgia Aquarium, or since the opening of Georgia Aquarium.

ジョージア水族館の開館当初から、あるいは開館以来です。
I was recruited to Georgia Aquarium, I was working at a small marine research education and public aquarium in Alaska, actually, so recruited from Alaska to Georgia, you couldn't almost get further apart in the United States, and made the journey here in 2006, and initially my role was one of the assistant managers in our zoological operations team, and I was responsible for the entire cold water quest gallery, so everything from a spider crab to a California sea lion and a beluga whale, and all species in between.

私はジョージア水族館にスカウトされました。実は、私はアラスカの小さな海洋研究教育水族館で働いていたのですが、アラスカからジョージアにスカウトされたのです。
And that was a very unique role.

それはとてもユニークな役割だった。
At that time, the aquarium animal care group was kind of organized a little bit differently than it is now.

当時、水族館の動物保護グループは、今とは少し違った組織だった。
Right now I'm responsible for mammals and birds, and we have directors that are responsible for fish and inverts, and it's kind of broken up by taxon, it's broken up by animal groups, whereas back then it was broken up by, or divided, organized by gallery.

今、私は哺乳類と鳥類を担当していますが、魚類や無脊椎動物を担当するディレクターもいますし、分類群ごとに分かれています。
So you had specialists that, you know, I had aquarists that reported to me that had a lot of experience with cold water fishes, and then I had specialists that had a lot of penguin experience, blue whale experience, things like that.

つまり、冷水魚の経験が豊富なアクアリストや、ペンギンやシロナガスクジラの経験が豊富なスペシャリストが私のところに報告に来ていたわけだ。
Very cool.

とてもクールだ。
Very cool.

とてもクールだ。
So, you know, kind of during that time, and I honestly, when I visited as a guest, it wasn't until 2010, which is well before I actually started here, have southern sea otters always been a part of our animal population here?

だから、その間に、正直なところ、私がゲストとして訪れたのは2010年で、私がここに来るずっと前だった。
Yes.

そうだ。
Yeah.

そうだね。
Southern sea otters were some of the first mammals that arrived at Georgia Aquarium, and we had our first two animals were very special animals, Oz and Gracie.

サザナミヤッコはジョージア水族館に最初にやってきた哺乳類の一種で、最初の2匹はオズとグレイシーという特別な動物だった。
They're no longer with us, but they lived very, very long lives here at Georgia Aquarium, and they're a very special part of our southern sea otter history.

彼らはもう私たちの手元にはいませんが、ここジョージア水族館ではとてもとても長い生涯を送りました。
Right.

そうだね。
And we'll get into Oz and Gracie in just a little bit, but I think it's, we're kind of at a good point in our discussion too, because I'm very curious.

オズとグレイシーについては、もう少ししたら説明するつもりだが、私たちも今、いい時期に来ていると思う。
There are different types of sea otters, correct?

ラッコにも種類があるんですよね？
Yes.

そうだ。
Yeah.

そうだね。
There are a few different subspecies of sea otters.

ラッコにはいくつかの亜種がある。
The sea otters that we have at Georgia Aquarium are southern sea otters, which inhabit the central coast of California.

ジョージア水族館で飼育しているラッコは、カリフォルニア州中央海岸に生息するミナミラッコである。
It's a very threatened subspecies.

非常に絶滅の危機に瀕している亜種だ。
It's listed on the U.S.

米国に上場している。
Endangered Species Act as threatened.

絶滅危惧種に指定されている。
There's not very many of them, and they're very vulnerable.

彼らの数はそれほど多くないし、とても弱い。
And then there are sea otters that inhabit the waters of Washington State through British Columbia into Alaska.

そしてワシントン州からブリティッシュ・コロンビア州を経てアラスカに至る海域に生息するラッコもいる。
Those are the northern sea otters.

あれは北ラッコだ。
And then there's another subspecies that's kind of more on the, through the Aleutians down into the waters off of Asia.

そしてもう1つの亜種は、アリューシャン列島からアジア沖にかけて生息している。
Understood.

理解している。
You know, it's interesting because in my job here at the Aquarium, one of my, you know, on our interpretive graphics and our educational elements that guests can experience as they walk through the Coldwater Quest Gallery.

水族館での私の仕事のひとつは、コールドウォーター・クエスト・ギャラリーを歩くゲストに体験してもらうための解説グラフィックや教育的な要素なんだ。
And just last year, finishing up a project with the sea otters, what I found very interesting was how difficult it was for, you know, finding stock photos or things like that, like finding wild photos that were labeled properly.

昨年、ラッコのプロジェクトを終えたばかりだが、非常に興味深かったのは、ストックフォトを探すのがいかに難しいか、つまり、適切にラベル付けされた野生の写真を探すのがいかに難しいかということだった。
So if one of our listeners out there is trying to distinguish the difference between them, are there any like, you know, physiological things?

もしリスナーの誰かが両者の違いを見分けようとしているのなら、生理学的なこととかある？
Is there any way when you're looking at a photo, you can be like, that's a southern sea otter, or that's one of the northern ecotypes?

写真を見ていて、これはミナミラッコだ、とか、これは北部の生態型のひとつだ、とかわかるものなのでしょうか？
Is there a way to kind of tell them apart?

見分ける方法はありますか？
Because I had to learn kind of on the fly for last year's Coldwater project.

というのも、昨年のコールドウォーター・プロジェクトでは、その場その場で学ぶ必要があったからだ。
There's a couple of things.

いくつかあるんだ。
It's very difficult just looking at a sea otter, if it's a sea otter just laying on the surface of the water, unless there's some sort of scale.

ラッコが水面に横たわっているだけなら、何らかのスケールがない限り、それを見るだけでも非常に難しい。
Northern sea otters are generally quite a bit larger than southern sea otters.

北ラッコは南ラッコよりかなり大きい。
So if you see an adult, southern sea otters can be substantially smaller than a northern, but also just kind of looking at what the environment is.

だから成獣を見れば、南ラッコは北ラッコよりかなり小さい。
And so if you see a sea otter that's wrapping itself in a certain species of kelp, there's a lot of different types of kelp that would inhabit, or you would find in different parts of their range.

ラッコがある種の昆布に包まれているのを見たとしても、生息している昆布の種類はたくさんあるし、ラッコの生息域のさまざまな場所で見つけることができる。
Gotcha.

やった。
Yeah, so if you're taking a cruise from San Francisco to Alaska, the otters that you see when you leave San Francisco are going to look a little bit different than the ones when you reach Alaska.

サンフランシスコからアラスカまでクルーズをする場合、サンフランシスコを出発するときに見るカワウソと、アラスカに到着したときに見るカワウソは少し違って見えるだろう。
Yeah, if you see an otter in San Francisco, that's going to be pretty awesome. You'll probably see them a little bit further south.

サンフランシスコでカワウソを見かけたら、それはかなりすごいことだよ。もう少し南に行けば見られるだろう。
A little bit further south.

もう少し南だ。
Fair enough.

十分だ。
But ideally, in their original range.

しかし、理想は本来の範囲内だ。
And there's a desire to see sea otters again, southern sea otters, in the San Francisco Bay Area.

そして、サンフランシスコ・ベイエリアでラッコ（ミナミラッコ）を再び見たいという願望もある。
So yeah.

そうだね。
Gotcha.

やった。
Hopefully within our careers, we'll see that someday.

私たちのキャリアの中で、いつかそうなることを願っている。
Yeah.

そうだね。
Well, I knew that.

まあ、それは分かっていた。
That was my segue into that.

それが私のきっかけだった。
A little conservation tidbit there.

そこでちょっとした保全の豆知識。
There you go.

そうだ。
No, I'm lying.

いや、嘘だ。
I had no idea.

私は知らなかった。
But that's okay.

でも、それでいいんだ。
So with that being said, with the desire to bring them back, and then we'll kind of lead into kind of our role here at the Aquarium, what role does this species play in their environment?

ということで、この種を復活させたいという思いと、水族館での私たちの役割、この種が彼らの環境で果たす役割とは？
Why are they so important?

なぜ彼らはそれほど重要なのか？
And you had mentioned kelp, which is, I know, a big kind of hot-button conservation topic right now.

コンブの話もされていましたが、コンブは今、自然保護の大きな話題になっていますよね。
Can you just kind of go into a little bit about the role that sea otters play and how this weird plant, you know, that everyone knows kelp, but they don't know what kelp actually does or why otters are so much a part of that, of kelp's story?

ラッコが果たしている役割や、この奇妙な植物、つまり誰もがコンブは知っているけれど、コンブが実際に何をしているのか、なぜラッコがコンブの物語に深く関わっているのかについて、少し話していただけますか？
Yeah.

そうだね。
Well, the sea otters have a very fascinating history.

ラッコにはとても魅力的な歴史がある。
When you go back within the last century, even, these are animals that have experienced quite a bit in terms of hunting pressure over the last couple of centuries.

過去100年以内にさかのぼったとしても、この2、3世紀の間に狩猟圧力の点でかなりの経験をした動物である。
There was a fur trade.

毛皮の取引があった。
They are an animal that has the most dense fur of any mammal.

哺乳類の中で最も密度の高い毛皮を持つ動物だ。
And that luxurious fur came at a cost, and they were hunted throughout their range and in many areas were extirpated, were essentially extinct from that region of the coast.

そしてその贅沢な毛皮は代償となり、生息域全域で狩猟の対象となり、多くの地域で絶滅した。
And once that happened, it was pretty interesting in that it changed the balance of those ecosystems.

そして一旦それが起こると、生態系のバランスが変化するという点で非常に興味深い。
So they inhabit very inshore, rocky coasts along the Pacific, and they are predators of a lot of different invertebrates.

そのため、太平洋沿岸のごく沿岸の岩場に生息し、さまざまな無脊椎動物を捕食する。
They eat a lot of clams, abalone, sea urchins, things that like to graze.

アサリやアワビ、ウニなど、放牧を好むものをたくさん食べる。
And when you take a sea otter out of that environment, you see an abundance of those grazers, and they essentially take out large swaths of what would have normally been a kelp forest.

その環境からラッコを連れ出すと、そのような草食動物が大量に発生し、通常であればケルプの森であったはずの広大な面積を実質的に奪ってしまうのだ。
Kelp forests are fascinating ecosystems.

ケルプの森は魅力的な生態系である。
They're a hotbed of diversity and almost like a little nursery of sorts for different fishes, different fish species.

多様性の温床であり、さまざまな魚、さまざまな魚種のための小さな苗床のようなものだ。
And so when you take sea otters out of that, you see an abundance of mostly sea urchins that kind of overpopulate and they graze out the kelp.

ラッコがいなくなると、ウニが増えすぎて昆布が食べられなくなる。
Another aspect of kelp is it kind of helps with dampening wave action.

ケルプのもう一つの側面は、波の動きを和らげるのに役立つということだ。
And so you see a lot, when you remove the kelp, you see a lot of, you see a strong drop in the diversity of animals that inhabit those areas.

昆布を取り除くと、その地域に生息する動物の多様性が著しく低下する。
And then also a lot more wave action and erosion of coastlines.

さらに、波による海岸線の浸食も進んでいる。
So sea otters are really important to that marine ecosystem, that coastal ecosystem.

ラッコは海洋生態系、沿岸生態系にとって本当に重要な存在なのだ。
And so when sea otters started kind of coming back, knocking back some of those grazer inverts, we saw kind of a return to those more natural kelp forest kind of ecosystems and returns of fish populations and things that were really good for the environment.

ラッコが戻ってきて、無脊椎動物を捕食していた海藻を戻し始めると、より自然なケルプの森のような生態系が復活し、魚の個体数も戻り、環境にとって本当に良いことが起こった。
Sure.

もちろんだ。
And this is kind of a, it's funny, this is kind of a shameless plug in a way, but one of my favorite things about the Coldwater Project that I was a part of last year was that we created an interactive, basically.

これはある意味、恥知らずな宣伝なのですが、昨年私が参加したコールドウォーター・プロジェクトで私が気に入ったことのひとつは、基本的にインタラクティブなものを作ったことです。
It's very similar to kind of like Fruit Ninja, something like that, where you get to be the otter and your role is taking out the urchins to save the kelp forest.

カワウソになって、昆布の森を守るためにウニをやっつけるんだ。
It was a really fun thing to be a part of and kind of work on that.

その一端を担うことができて、本当に楽しかった。
So if you guys, I see you out there playing with it every morning, so I know you're very proud of it.

だから、もし君たちが毎朝、外で遊んでいるのを見かけたら、とても誇りに思っていると思うよ。
I do really enjoy that game and I'm pretty sure I have the highest score.

あのゲームは本当に楽しいし、僕が一番高いスコアを持っているのは間違いない。
And whoever does have the highest score, I will come back tomorrow and beat it.

そして、誰が最高得点を出したとしても、私は明日戻ってきて、それを打ち負かすだろう。
Don't worry.

心配しないで。
Yeah.

そうだね。
So yeah, it's a lot of fun.

とても楽しいよ。
So you guys are, if you're walking through, it's right by the, it's right by the sea otter habitat.

ラッコの生息地のすぐそばだ。
You can kind of play with a cool interactive to learn about everything that Dennis just mentioned there.

今デニスが言ったようなことを学ぶために、クールなインタラクティブで遊ぶことができるんだ。
So, all right.

だから、わかったよ。
So you've talked about their role in the ecosystem and how important their conservation is and their return to their natural environment out there and kind of repopulating that Southern sea otter coastline.

生態系におけるラッコの役割や、ラッコの保護がいかに重要であるか、そしてラッコが自然環境に戻り、サザナミヤッコの海岸線に再繁殖することがいかに重要であるかについて、あなたは話してきた。
So what role do our sea otters here at Georgia Aquarium play in that whole conservation story?

では、ここジョージア水族館のラッコは、この保護活動の中でどのような役割を果たしているのだろうか？
Well, a large part of conservation, Josh, is really getting the message out that there is something to be concerned about or to even be worth conserving.

ジョシュ、自然保護の大部分は、何か懸念すべきことがある、あるいは保護する価値があるというメッセージを伝えることなんだ。
Sea otters play a huge role in that and unfortunately or fortunately, depending on how you look at it, they are very charismatic.

ラッコはその中で大きな役割を果たしており、不幸なことに、あるいは幸いなことに、見方によっては非常にカリスマ性がある。
It's hard not to see a sea otter and just want to fall in love.

ラッコを見て恋に落ちないわけがない。
It's one of those exhibits that I have throughout my career found fascinating.

この展示は、私がキャリアを通じて魅力的だと感じてきた展示のひとつだ。
I've worked with sea otters my entire 30, almost 33 years and it's been fascinating to me the entire time that it is the one type of animal that you can see guests walk up to and the animals might not be doing anything but sleeping and guests are just infatuated.

私は30年、いや33年近くずっとラッコと一緒に仕事をしてきたが、ずっと魅力的だったのは、ラッコという動物が、ゲストが歩いてきて、動物が何もしていなくても、ただ寝ているだけなのに、ゲストが夢中になっているのを見ることができることだ。
They'll stay there for 20 minutes sometimes just watching an animal sleep and you don't really see that with too many other animal exhibits and so it's kind of a benefit in a way that you have this animal that is such a key part of the marine ecosystem that has had a very tumultuous history and there are populations that are still very vulnerable.

他の動物の展示ではあまり見られないことだ。海洋生態系の重要な一部であるこの動物が、非常に波乱に満ちた歴史を持ち、今もなお非常に脆弱な個体群を抱えているというのは、ある意味、有益なことなのだ。
And so from a conservation status, the impact that Georgia Aquarium has with the popularity of this as an institution, the mission that we have to better understand and conserve these types of animals is very important and powerful to get the message out that these are animals that yes they're cute, yes they're fascinating but they actually have a very important conservation story to be told and Georgia Aquarium is a very important part of telling that story.

ジョージア水族館は、この種の動物をよりよく理解し、保護することを使命としている。
That's awesome.

すごいね。
So with all that being said and you even said kind of the history of the Southern Sea Otter and things like that, let's take a little trip back in time here.

というわけで、サザナミヤッコの歴史やそのようなことをおっしゃいましたが、ここで少し時間をさかのぼってみましょう。
Let's go back 17 years and can you kind of tell us, you know you had mentioned Oz and Gracie earlier, can you kind of take us through kind of the timeline of Southern Sea Otters here at Georgia Aquarium and you know I'm sure some of our listeners are quite attached to some of them.

先ほどオズとグレイシーの話が出ましたが、ジョージア水族館のサザナミヤッコの年表のようなものを教えてください。
You know some of these Sea Otters actually have their own fan pages and things like that so just kind of tell us about the history of Sea Otters here at Georgia Aquarium and how some of them or all of them got here.

ラッコの中には自分のファンページを持っているものもいますよね。ジョージア水族館のラッコの歴史や、ラッコの一部、あるいは全部がどうやってここに来たのか、教えてください。
Well we have been very fortunate here at Georgia Aquarium and within my department to be able to care for some amazing animals.

ここジョージア水族館や私の部署では、素晴らしい動物たちの世話をすることができて、とても幸運でした。
Obviously we care about these animals as a species and want to conserve them but when we have the opportunity to work with individual animals like these Sea Otters it is a very powerful and impactful role to play and we've been blessed for lack of a better word to have some amazing long-lived Sea Otters within our population here.

ラッコのような個々の動物に携わる機会があれば、それは非常にパワフルでインパクトのある役割を果たすことになる。
In 2005 we brought two Southern Sea Otters from California that were living at another aquarium out west and transported them here to Atlanta and the city fell in love with Oz and Gracie and they lived far beyond their average life expectancy and lived very good lives here and really served as strong ambassadors for opening the eyes of a lot of people, millions and millions of guests that had come through the aquarium during those years.

2005年、私たちは西部の別の水族館で暮らしていた2匹のサザナミヤッコをカリフォルニアから連れてきて、ここアトランタに運びました。そしてアトランタの街はオズとグレイシーに恋をし、彼らは平均寿命をはるかに超えて生き、ここでとても良い生涯を送りました。
In 2010 we were working with our colleagues out at the Monterey Bay Aquarium that has a Sea Otter research and conservation program, a very strong Monterey Bay's program is internationally recognized and they are one of the few facilities at that time the only facility that had what we call a surrogate program.

2010年、私たちはラッコの調査と保護プログラムを実施しているモントレーベイ水族館の仲間たちと協力していました。モントレーベイ水族館のプログラムは非常に強力で、国際的にも認められています。
The journey or the evolution of rescue and rehabilitation of Sea Otters has been quite interesting.

ラッコの救助とリハビリの旅は、非常に興味深いものだった。
These are animals that spend upwards of almost a year with their moms after they're born.

生まれてから1年近くを母親と一緒に過ごす動物だ。
They're very, very dependent and require a lot of coaching, mentoring.

彼らは非常に依存心が強く、多くのコーチングや指導を必要とする。
They learn their foraging skills from their mom and like some other species like a lot of harbor seals or a lot of foasted seals have very brief maternal investment periods where they're with their moms for sometimes only with some species only days if not a week and like for harbor seals that we have here at Georgia Aquarium usually three to four weeks before they're weaned.

アザラシは母親から採餌技術を学び、他の種のように、多くのゼニガタアザラシや多くのアザラシのように、母親と一緒にいる期間は非常に短く、種によっては1週間とは言わないまでも数日しかいないこともある。
They moms kind of wean them they just go off on their own and survive.

お母さんたちは、彼らを離乳させ、自分たちだけで生き延びていくんだ。
Sea Otters don't do that very well and it took a lot of trial and error to kind of figure that out and for the most part if you don't have an ability to really provide that maternal care for the pups that are that are rescued it's very difficult to reintegrate them back successfully into the wild and the Monterey Bay team since the mid 80s has been trying this in various forms and they they've gone you know where they had animal care staff that were you know pretty much just totally invested in trying to do everything possible to play the part of a sea otter mom and and teach these pups everything they would need to know to be able to forage and how to find food and how to break it open and and and they you know tried a number of times to rehabilitate animals like that and release them back into the into the wild and had very little success doing that and so for a long time if there was a stranded sea otter pup it was pretty much deemed non-releasable by the US Fish and Wildlife Service pretty quickly and then if you know and then provided a home was available at a at an accredited institution of an aquarium or zoo that animal would be moved into that that sort of public display type realm but what the folks at Monterey Bay Aquarium started doing was taking some of their older females in their in their exhibit their exhibit population and essentially using them as surrogate moms for these stranded pups where they would provide one of their older females with a with a newly stranded pup to see if the female would take it under her wing for lack of better word and and start raising the pup and that became a very successful program to this day it's very successful and it's starting to branch out into into some other partner facilities that that we hope hopefully we'll be working with in the future on that as well and so but the limiting factor is the number of females that can serve as surrogates because it's a very there's only a handful of them it takes a long time and there have been years where there's more pups stranding or being either abandoned or in the case of some of the animals that we brought here to Georgia Aquarium their mothers were preyed upon by white sharks and and therefore abandoned and so if there's not enough surrogates in the in the program then those animals are deemed non-releasable and an effort is made to try and place them into into aquariums and zoos.

ラッコはそれが苦手で、それを解明するためには多くの試行錯誤が必要だった。そしてほとんどの場合、保護されたラッコの仔に母性的なケアを提供する能力がなければ、野生にうまく復帰させるのは非常に難しい。ラッコの母親になりきって、この仔ラッコに採餌の仕方、餌の見つけ方、餌の割り方など、必要なことをすべて教え込むことに全力を注いできた。そして、このような動物をリハビリして野生に戻すことを何度も試みたが、ほとんど成功しなかった。その後、水族館や動物園などの認定施設に里親が見つかれば、そのラッコは公共の展示場に移される。
So you mentioned that about them being orphaned and and things like that are the the sea otters that guests can come see now are there any interesting kind of rescue stories from from our current population?

ラッコが孤児になったというお話がありましたが、今、お客さまが見ることができるラッコは、現在の個体群から救出された興味深いエピソードがあるのでしょうか？
Yeah I think they all sort of have interesting rescue stories you know we have currently at the aquarium we have five sea otters southern sea otters three of them were brought here in 2010 so they're 12 years old and we have a pair of three-year-olds that if you did watch the our series the aquarium you saw the the backstory of Gibson and Mara and their their journey to Georgia Aquarium.

現在、水族館には5頭のラッコがいるんだけど、そのうちの3頭は2010年にここに連れてこられたから12歳で、3歳のペアもいるんだ。水族館のシリーズを見た人は、ギブソンとマーラのバックストーリーと、ジョージア水族館までの道のりを見ただろうね。
When we go back to our 12 year olds we have Cruz who was a it was just just a couple of weeks old actually actually I'll back up if I could if you go back to our 12 year olds we have Brighton we have Bixby and we have Cruz.

12歳児に話を戻すと、ちょうど生後2週間だったクルーズがいる。
Brighton was a young female that looked like she was prematurely weaned for some reason or another she was a no she was several months old when she when she stranded and she was very sick with a with essentially inflammation of her digestive tract based on the fact that she was dealing with a very significant parasite load.

ブライトンは、何らかの理由で離乳が早まったような若いメスで、生後数カ月で座礁し、かなりの寄生虫を抱え、消化管に炎症を起こしていた。
The treatment for that and given her age and the fact that to clear her of those parasites was going to take almost upwards of a year of treatment she was deemed non-releasable at that point and so she's an animal that we we we put our hands up we were at that point interested in adding more sea otters to our population here in Atlanta and and she was made available to us by the by the agency that that oversees the sea otter regulations and so she's an animal that we that was able to bring here with the help of the folks at Monterey and some friends that we had at at the University of California in Santa Cruz and we moved her here on a cargo flight and it was a neat experience.

寄生虫の駆除には1年以上の治療が必要で、その時点でラッコはリリース不可能と判断された。そこで私たちは、ここアトランタにラッコを増やすことに興味を持ち、ラッコの規制を監督する機関から手を挙げてもらい、モントレーの人々やサンタクルーズのカリフォルニア大学の友人たちの協力を得て、貨物便でここに移動させることができた。
Also that same year there was a young female that was about four weeks old or so when she she was abandoned she was found pretty much by kayakers on the water you know they're sea otter pups when they're when they're very young have a very unique vocalization they they scream it's a it's a it's hard to miss makes your ears bleed sometimes just kidding but it's a and so she was found next to a remains of her mom that would have been preyed upon by a white shark and so she was brought to the Monterey Bay Aquarium there was not a surrogate available but the Monterey folks knew that we had space here at Georgia Aquarium to to welcome not only Brighton but a but another female as well.

また同じ年、生後4週間ほどの若いメスラッコが捨てられ、水上でカヤッカーに発見された。ブライトンだけでなく、もう一頭のメスもジョージア水族館に迎えるスペースがあることを、モントレー水族館は知っていた。
While we part of that arrangement with Monterey was once we knew they had a pup we we would deploy or send staff out to to be of assistance to that team to make sure that you know the the the burden or the workload of taking care of a sea otter is very significant and and to to to kind of lay that on to that that stranding team there we wouldn't want that effort to kind of detract from the care of the animals that they also have and so we sent a number of staff out there to help with that process.

モントレーとの取り決めの一環として、ラッコの保護にかかる負担や仕事量は非常に大きく、その負担を座礁したチームに負わせることで、彼らが保護する動物のケアに支障をきたすようなことがあってはならない。
So staff from obviously so staff that live here in Atlanta that worked at the aquarium were able to actually go out into the field basically and with Monterey Bay Aquarium's assistance of course they were able to actually help care for these animals so in Atlanta based organization we were able to send people to the coast of California to help with these guys.

水族館で働いていたアトランタ在住のスタッフが、モントレーベイ水族館の協力を得て、実際に動物たちの世話をすることができた。
Yes yeah it's really cool for several weeks and while we had staff out there there was another it's a very similar case another white shark preyed upon female that was was taken out and essentially abandoned a very young less than it was about two weeks old and that was Cruz.

そうそう、数週間は本当にすごかった。私たちがそこにスタッフを派遣している間に、もうひとつ似たようなケースがあった。メスを捕食したホホジロザメが連れ出され、生後2週間にも満たない幼いメスを捨てたのだ。
The issue that we had at that time was there was not really any more room at the inn for for a lack of a better way of expressing that the Monterey folks work with the the Association of Zoos and Aquariums they have a group that specializes on kind of knowing everything there is to know about sea otters and and which facilities might have space to accept not only space but also expertise to accept very young sea otter pups and when Cruz abandoned was and when Cruz was was recovered there were really no more opportunities to place and so he was when the when the stranding folks get to that situation their their only choice at that point is humane euthanasia if there's not a space in the surrogacy program there's not a space at an accredited facility then the most humane thing to do at that point is to is to put that that pup down unfortunately which makes you know it's it's hard to wrap your mind around that this is a threatened species why could you do that but it's it's it is the most responsible thing to do we had staff out there caring for Bixby at the time and I got a phone call late it's like they just came up there's another young pup it's a male male sea otters are a little bit more they take a little bit more ingenuity I guess and and they're a bit more of a challenge to manage sometimes and so there we have to be careful with the the dynamic that we have in terms of the number of males and females that we would manage here with our with our exhibit but we made the choice at that time that you know this animal was was destined to be put down to be euthanized and you know we had our hands full with with two sea otters that we had that we were taking on already but we made the choice to to extend and do we do we did there and and and save that little sea otter and brought him back with Bixby on a private plane and and it never looked back he's he's an amazing amazing animal that we've learned a lot from well Dennis I'm not gonna lie you know through throughout that story you just told I'm kind of hearing some some Sarah McLaughlin in the background this kind of has that is there that SPCA kind of commercial vibe to it I mean when you think about these animals there they are undeniably probably one of the most adorable species not just here at the aquarium but but on the planet but when you hear about how much that they're going through you know hear about habitat loss when you hear about that how difficult the you know rehab and rehabilitation you know process is for them it's a lot different than like a California sea lion that can go out into a group and basically learn from the group so it seems like these animals have a lot kind of going against them yes but it's really cool to know that there's actually a whole bunch of people ourselves included that care very much about these critters and especially in that story just there when when the alternative was you know the animal not being here anymore that the decision was made to to prolong that animals life and now he's you know a private plane to Atlanta and now live in the suite life here in the cold water quest gallery I mean that's that's very much a positive so so what can our listeners with all of that being said what is one positive impact that our our listeners and our visitors can can have on southern sea otters well what is a you know one or a couple things that can you know kind of help this species out that any any person can can do yeah that's a great question Josh and that's something that's really a powerful message for us when we have these sea otters here in Atlanta they they're viewable visible to millions of guests every year and there are they are as I've said a very powerful conservation kind of case and the message is very simple and it's something that you hear a lot you know everybody has a role to play our goal here is is to inspire people to care about these animals we obviously care about them we want to do everything possible to make sure that these are animals that that that live for generations you know with without impact based on our activities but the honest truth is our activities have an impact on these animals and with the case of the southern sea otter there's a there's a number of things unfortunately these are animals that are succumbing or being exposed more and more to runoff related to agricultural runoff but also curiously they're very susceptible to a parasite called toxoplasmosis if you you might know of it through it's it's one of the reasons that if you're an expect it's one of the reasons that if you're an expectant mother you're not supposed to change or tend to your cat's litter box it's a it's a parasite that is is transmissible through cat feces and so what we're seeing is sea otters are coming up with this toxoplasmosis they're exposed to this toxoplasma and that's that's having an issue on that creates a lot of neurological issues for them they just they're not equipped to handle it and so we're seeing issues with people poorly or improperly disposing of their their pet waste essentially it's creating an issue for them probably related somewhat to just the population of that exists along that same coastline the number of cats number of pets feral or otherwise and and so that's an issue but also marine debris these are animals that are very curious and they they're they're actually one of the few species actually that use tools to to to help their efforts in getting into the hard-shelled invertebrates that they eat they'll go down and bring up a clam but also bring up a rock and smash the clam against the rock but they use other things and they're very curious in their environment and so when they're people are using a lot of single-use plastic bags those tend to unfortunately end up in the ocean and these are animals that there's there's animals that are you know photographed with bags on their head you know essentially not surviving that sort of interaction with with marine debris and so just being careful of what we're utilizing in our day-to-day lives trying to take every effort to use things that are more and are less likely to end up in the ocean and end up being an issue for these animals and the other animals that live in the marine environment so basically if you live in California or are visiting the coast of California just pick up after yourself and pick up after your pet and that can actually make a world of difference to these animals to these animals but but also again everybody has a role to play you know every every stream leads to the ocean and so even though we're hundreds of miles away from the ocean guests or residents of Atlanta have have a role to play too because it's not just a sea otter it's a sea turtle it's it's you know whales that are that are washing up with stomachs full of plus of single-use plastics sea otters or sorry sea turtles that are watching up with straws up there up their nose and things like that so lots of lots of decisions that people have to make in their day-to-day lives but understanding that you know just cutting back helps it makes a big difference right all good very very very good points there so Dennis thank you very much I've learned a way more about these animals than I worked here for almost seven years now and I learned a lot today about these incredible critters so before you go you do as we mentioned in the very beginning you do care for all of the adorable critters here at the aquarium out of all of them all those species and it honestly it might be the sea otter but what is your what's your favorite put me on the spot what is your favorite it's like you don't have a favorite child you know you can't answer yeah but you kind of do you got to do the honest answer is it probably depends on the day I find I just like a child just like a child it depends on what's what's going on you know right right now to be honest with you as a sitting here we have five little pufflings that have been hatched over the last last couple weeks and I'd say I'm kind of infatuated with watching my phone or little nest cams watching these little puffballs grow so quickly so I'm definitely into that sea otters are always a favorite anybody that maybe watched this watch the show or knows me knows that I'm a fan of our harbor seals and Rose our little female specifically is one that always gets me I spend time every day saying hi to her for sure she is adorable she's adorable yeah so didn't really answer your question it's okay nobody really has because everyone everyone's trying to yeah we have a lot of incredible animals here it's really it's really hard to favorite animals I've ever worked with is helping the OV team with with the manta rays behind us here just I mean they're all they're all very very they get to me yeah I mean this is a you know it's this is a very special place and obviously over 17 years you've been a huge part of this aquariums history and you've you know dedicated your life in the past 17 years of your life to to these to these incredible animals while you know having a family of you have your own kids and things like that that you're caring for so you're taking care of actually I just learned that puffling is a word unless you made that up nope that is the actual scientific term baby puff baby puffin a puffin chick is a puffling that's the cutest thing on the planet pretty sure you got that from Harry Potter but that's fine nope so with all of that with 17 years of history at this facility I'm gonna put you on the spot again what's your favorite memory of this place my favorite memory yeah favorite experience favorites just what flooding yeah there was a flood no no just the memories are oh okay good I was gonna say well that would be memorable honestly actually you know some of these transports you know being able to to go out in the field and be able to you know work with these animals and bring them back here and the the planning and all the expertise and just you know just takes a lot to pull that off and being in the role that I am or that that's my responsibility it's it's to see that kind of happen and the animals come here and they make it into the into the into the habitats and seeing them you know thrive is all the memories kind of flood back to those moments so with respect to you know maybe the last sea otter transport was probably one of them and it was you know nice you know to get sea otters to Atlanta from California you have to you know there's a lot that goes into moving them they have to stay cold we've learned that the best way is just to charter a private plane so it's a sounds a little bougie I guess but it is for their own best interest we can get get a sea otter pup here in a couple of hours from the coast of California which is which is what what they need and so the last time when we were moving Gibson and Mara it was a beautiful plane I was I felt kind of bad because we were like moving all these like wet things and chests of ice on this plane that I once we were in the air I learned the charter before us I don't know if I'm allowed to say this or not but it was Bruno Mars was taken to to Hawaii in that same plane so just a little bit uh so it was it was Bruno Mars's plane and it wasn't it wasn't Taylor Swift's no nice because in a previous episode we talked to Andy from the the sea lion team but I remember from all the old footage you were a part of yeah those those guys coming here so as the listeners know I started my career at Georgia Aquarium here in Atlanta with our sea lion team so all the little guys that I cared for when I first started back in 2016 here were all animals that literally you had just brought from California months before yeah yeah we could sit here for a couple hours just talking about animal transports and things like that yeah for sure but yeah Neptune and Jupiter were animals that I brought back I remember seeing Andy at the facility where those animals were being housed at the time he was here so he's in the same footage in a different role but yeah very cool well I mean I think now I think we have a reason for you to come back I think that we could have a part two to talk all about good transports you've done great today so Dennis thank you so much for joining us today and yeah thank you all for listening in we'll see you next time

そのとき私たちが抱えていた問題は、これ以上部屋がないということだった。うまく表現できないが、モントレーの人々は動物園水族館協会（Association of Zoos and Aquariums）と協力し、ラッコについて何でも知っていて、どの施設に受け入れるスペースがあるかだけでなく、幼いラッコの仔を受け入れる専門知識があるかについても専門的に研究しているグループがある。クルーズが遺棄されたとき、そしてクルーズが保護されたとき、ラッコの幼い仔を受け入れるスペースがあるだけでなく、専門的な知識も必要だった。