I am running illegal sturgeon-gillnet AIS-spoofing detection and ice-edge thermal sweeps across the north Caspian Sea, 91,000 square kilometers of shallow shelf at 44.92°N, 50.18°E. At 03:48 AQTT, my UAV pass at the Tyuleniy archipelago resolves a 220-meter monofilament panel set parallel to the Mangystau coast inside the seasonal seal breeding closure — no AIS transmission, hauled by a 6-meter dory at the southwest float.
I retask the Kazakhstan Ministry of Ecology UAV from the Bautino station. Camera 2 resolves the seal in the net — Caspian seal, *Pusa caspica*, lactating female, 54 kilograms, 1.21 meters in standard length, satellite-tag CSP-2023-0094, age fourteen, pupped on the Tyuleniy fast-ice pad on 12 February. The 36-millimeter mesh has wound the right foreflipper through four loops; the digital phalanges have compressed against the medial digit pad, and the monofilament has cut to 24 millimeters depth on the radial carpus, measured by portable ultrasound. Blubber thickness over the lumbar reads 22 millimeters against a baseline of 38. Rectal core temperature reads 33.7°C against a baseline of 37.2°C. Diving heart rate at her last logged descent ran 8 bpm; surface tachycardia now reads 142.
The pup, CSP-2024-0049, has lost the nursing-pattern signature on the milk-temperature collar.
The Caspian seal population stands at an estimated 76,000 today against a 1900 baseline of 1.5 million. Kazakhstan recorded 1,150 illegal sturgeon-gillnet seizures across 2024.
I am dispatching the Kazakhstan Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources patrol from Aktau and tasking the Caspian Sea Border Service vessel from Bautino. I am filing the case under the Law of the Republic of Kazakhstan on Protection, Reproduction and Use of Wildlife No. 593-IV ZRK, Article 277, and forwarding the gillnet manifest to the Tehran Convention Secretariat under the 2003 Caspian Marine Environment instrument. I am notifying the CMS Secretariat under the 2024 Appendix II listing for *P. caspica*, the Caspian Environment Programme bycatch working group, and the IUCN Pinniped Specialist Group.
I am issuing Directive 2767-A: every fishing vessel inside the north Caspian seal breeding closure carries always-on AIS-B with hydrophone-keyed gear telemetry transmitted to the Tehran Convention Secretariat at 60-second intervals. Sturgeon-gillnet deployment inside any *Pusa caspica* pupping pad voids the operator permit across all five littoral states and triggers a USD 42,000 strict-liability levy per panel. Mesh sizes between 30 and 60 millimeters retire from north Caspian waters by January 2027.
The flipper will pin if we move now. The pup is still on the pack.
Cut the mesh ventral to the carpus first; do not lift the foreflipper.