It’s good news for the smallest and most endangered cetacean of them all, as a recent survey confirmed sightings of between 7 and 10 vaquitas – and the birth of new calves. The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content.

It was only two years ago that the vaquita became the subject of the International Whaling Commission’s first-ever extinction alert , after years of widespread gillnet use and accidental bycatch in the northern region of the Gulf of California in Mexico – where vaquitas live exclusively – led to a decline in the population from 560 in 1997 to just 10 in 2018 .

While efforts such as a ban on the use of gillnets and zero-tolerance areas for illegal fishing have been put into place, conservationists have also been k

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