The vaquita is the rarest marine mammal in the world, with fewer than 10 individuals remaining, representing the ultimate failure of conservation and a welfare crisis for animals caught as bycatch in illegal gillnets.
Vaquita welfare in their final years is characterised by the persistent threat of entanglement and drowning in illegal gillnets. Cetaceans that become entangled experience acute panic, exhaustion, and drowning in a highly distressing manner. The extreme rarity of the species means that every individual animal death is both a conservation catastrophe and a profound individual welfare event. The failed captive breeding attempt, in which animals died from capture stress, illustrated the devastating welfare costs of last-resort interventions for stress-sensitive marine mammals.